By WILLIAM KATES
Associated Press

VERONA (AP) - The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling Tuesday that a Rhode Island tribe isn't eligible for trust land could doom the Oneida Indian Nation's pending trust request, said a lawyer for two upstate New York counties fighting the application.

The Supreme Court decision hinged on whether trust land was available to a tribe that was not formally recognized by the United States in 1934, when the trust law was enacted. The court ruled that a tribe not recognized in June 1934 was not eligible, and the Narragansett tribe was not recognized until after that date.

The Oneidas have asked the federal government to place 17,000 acres of upstate New York into federal trust, where it would be exempt from state and local laws and taxes. The Department of Interior has recommended putting about 13,000 acres into trust, a decision that is being challenged in several lawsuits in federal court.

One of those lawsuits, filed by the state of New York and by Madison and Oneida counties, argues that the Oneidas were not eligible for trust land for precisely the same reason as the Narragansetts, said attorney David Schraver, who represents Madison and Oneida counties.

"We think the decision is relevant to our lawsuit," Schraver said. "We do not believe the Oneidas were a federally recognized tribe when the IRA was enacted in 1934."

The Oneidas specifically rejected the Indian Reorganization Act in 1934, which means it would never apply to them, the lawsuit claimed.

The Oneidas, however, said their case is different from the Narragansett tribe and the Supreme Court decision has no bearing on them.

"This decision turns on whether a tribe was recognized by the United States in 1934 and, therefore, has no applicability here," said Peter Carmen, the tribe's chief legal counsel.

In a statement, the tribe said the United States' annual delivery of treaty cloth to the Oneida Nation for more than 200 years was evidence of its recognition of the Oneidas under the 1794 Treaty of Canandaigua. The Oneidas rejected any claim that the United States did not recognize the Oneida Nation in 1934.

Additionally, the Supreme Court was "very clear in the Sherrill decision that trust land is available and appropriate for the Oneida Nation, and this decision obviously does not change the Supreme Court's direction," the statement said, referring to an earlier ruling by the nation's top court in favor of the tribe.