A settlement has finally been reached in the thirteen-year old suit over mishandled Indian trust funds:

Tribal members have long contended that they are owed billions of dollars in unpaid dues for farming, grazing, timber-cutting and other government leases on their land dating back to the 1887 federal act that broke up reservations and gave Indians individual parcels.

Records about who owns — and are owed — are scattered across the country in remote locations and dusty files, or simply don’t exist.

And many tribal elders waiting for their rightful recompense have been dying in poverty.

That, perhaps more than anything, says Indian activist Elouise Cobell, is what persuaded her to agree this week to settle her 13-year legal fight to force the government to account for what’s due to a half-million Indian landowners, and to pay up.

She joined administration officials Tuesday in announcing an agreement under which the government would spend about $3.4 billion to pay out a fraction of the unpaid royalties claimed in the lawsuit, and to help tribes acquire small, Indian-owned parcels to establish larger, more usable tracts.

“Too many individual beneficiaries are dying every day without their money,” said Cobell, a banker and member of Montana’s Blackfeet Tribe.

The suit arose as a result of the failure of the U.S. government to manage and account for various lands held in trust by Native Americans, a mismanagement that dates back to policies by the Federal government that encouraged the unlimited fractionalization of tribal lands held by individual owners such that proper accounting for the lands and any profits from them became practically impossible. Though the plaintiffs have suggested that the Federal government is liable for up to $176 billion in mismanaged trust funds, as the article states accounting for lost funds with complete accuracy (in whatever amount) would be extraordinarily difficult. But that’s not the only reason that the plaintiffs in the case were willing to settle for a relatively low figure:

The cost to the government to defend Cobell’s class-action suit, coupled with the major issues it was set to resolve, had essentially brought to a halt government action on a host of other urgent issues in tribal communities — from law enforcement and water rights to health care and education.

Many tribal leaders and their legal representatives, stymied for years in their efforts to move other issues forward, had agitated for a settlement much earlier.

“The lawsuit created paralysis within the federal government’s relationship with tribes in many areas,” says Henry M. Buffalo Jr., a St. Paul lawyer representing Indian interests and member of the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians.

“For many years, tribal leaders have been saying to the Cobell plaintiffs, ‘You’ve got to get this settled,’ ” Buffalo says. “The [royalty] amounts are important, but from an operational standpoint, we needed to get it behind us.”

In other words, the plaintiffs felt pressure to settle because other Natives were suffering from the lack of attention the Dept. of the Interior could afford to devote to other issues. Native Americans suffered from thoughtless Federal policies, and from the effort to right those policies, proving once again that in fact there is no justice in the world. However, some credit must be given to the Obama administration for their willingness to settle the case, a willingness that did not exist during the Clinton and Bush administrations (though it probably also helps that the government suffered a defeat in a Federal court of appeals earlier this year.)

The terms of the settlement will provide for a token payment to beneficiaries of the trusts, but it also hopes to undo the severe fractionalization that is the result of a century of land being automatically divvied up:

The proposed settlement, which has to be approved by Congress and the court, would send an initial $1,000 payment to all beneficiaries. A distribution model would be developed to award the remaining $1.4 billion royalty award, Cobell says.

In addition, another $2 billion would be used by the government to buy, in trust for the tribes, parcels of what are called “fractionalized” land interests — parcels that have been divided and redivided among tribal heirs over the past century or so. The voluntary buy-back program, says lawyer Harper, would allow tribes to piece together larger parcels that could be used more productively — and under tribal control.

The administration has also proposed a new commission to oversee the management of the Indian trust in the future. Indian leaders and their legal representatives say the board should be comprised of Indians to encourage a rebuilding of trust.

The deal must still be approved by Congress, where it already has the support of Sens. John McCain and Byron Dorgan.