1、CRS Legal Sidebar Prepared for Members and Committees of Congress Legal SidebarLegal Sidebari i Is the Indian Child Welfare Act Constitutional? Updated August 12, 2019 Update: After this Sidebar was originally published, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (Fifth C
2、ircuit) reviewed a district court decision that held the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) unconstitutional. On August 9, 2019, the Fifth Circuit agreed that the plaintiffs in this case had standing to challenge ICWA, but reversed the district courts grant of summary judgment to those plaintiffs, ruli
3、ng that ICWA is instead constitutional with respect to all of the plaintiffs challenges. Specifically, the appeals court concluded that: ICWA and the Final Rule are constitutional because they are based on a political classification that is rationally related to the fulfillment of Congresss unique o
4、bligation toward Indians; ICWA preempts conflicting state laws and does not violate the Tenth Amendment anticommandeering doctrine; and ICWA and the Final Rule do not violate the nondelegation doctrine. We also conclude that the Final Rule implementing the ICWA is valid because the ICWA is constitut