By Crispin T. South.
Under McClanahan v. Arizona State Tax Commission, States are categorically preempted from taxing the income of an Indian who lives within his own Tribe’s reservation and gains his income from reservation sources. Later cases have distinguished McClanahan, holding that the income of Indians who live and work within a different Tribe’s reservation is generally taxable by the State. State income taxation of these non-member resident Indians poses a number of problems for individuals, Tribal governments, and tribal sovereignty as a whole. This Comment argues that to push back against these problems, Tribes ought to enter into membership reciprocity agreements that allow non-member resident Indians to become Tribal members, thus exempting them from state income taxes under McClanahan’s categorical rule.