"Indians to Lose Land to Power Authority"

WASHINGTON (AP) - The New York state Power Authority has been given the power to take 1,383 embattled acres of Tuscarora Indian land in western New York state for the gigantic Niagara River power project.

The United States Supreme Court ruled Monday that the Indians must give up the land they have occupied for 150 years. This apparently marks the end of a long legal fight.

The high court's 6-to-3 decision overtuned an earlier U.S. Court of Appeals decision that the lands were inviolate.

Ironically, Robert Moses, chairman of the Power Authority, said shortly after the decision was announced that the authority has revised its plans and now needs only 550 acres of the Tuscarora land.

The court ruling, Moses said, will make it possible to finish the huge power project on schedule. First power is due in February 1961.

Elton Greene, head chief of the Tuscarora Council, said at his home on the reservation near Niagara Falls, N.Y., that until now the courts always had considered the Indian lands treaty-fixed and inviolate except by direct act of Congress.

However, Justice Charles E. Whittaker, who gave the majority opinion, said the lands do not constitute a federal reservation within the meaning of the Federal Power Act because the Tuscarora Indian nation owns them outright.

Thus, he said, the lands are subject to condemnation upon payment of just compensation, just as any individual's land would be.

The dissenting opinion was by Justice Hugo Black, who was joined by Chief Justice Earl Warren and Justice William O. Douglas. It said the condemnation of the land would violate long established Indian policy and violate valid treaties.