Production Tax Credit

Michigan Debate Institute
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Alderete.Randall.Blank.Farra
PTC Affirmative
NATIVES PTC AFFIRMATIVE 1.0
NATIVES
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383838 PTC AFFIRMATIVE 1.0...................................................................................................................................1
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PTC→ ECONOMIC GROWTH..................................................................................................................................13
PTC→ RENEWABLES................................................................................................................................................14
RENEWABLES→ECONOMIC GROWTH................................................................................................................15
PTC→ WIND................................................................................................................................................................16
PTC→ WIND................................................................................................................................................................17
PTC→ WIND................................................................................................................................................................19
TRIBAL WIND SOLVES ENERGY............................................................................................................................20
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES SECESSION.................................................................................21
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION ≠ SECESSION.............................................................................................24
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION ≠ SECESSION.............................................................................................25
SECESSION≠ DESTROY DEMOCRACY.................................................................................................................26
SELF DETERMINATION K/T US HUMAN RIGHTS LEADERSHIP.....................................................................27
SELF DETERMINATION K/T HUMAN RIGHTS.....................................................................................................28
SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES CONFLICT.......................................................................................................29
US MODELED.............................................................................................................................................................30
US K/T KASHMIR.......................................................................................................................................................31
PAKISTAN K/T SOLVE TERRORISM.......................................................................................................................32
NO IMPACT TO SECESSION.....................................................................................................................................33
PLAN POPULAR.........................................................................................................................................................34
PLAN POPULAR.........................................................................................................................................................35
PLAN UNPOPULAR...................................................................................................................................................36
A2 SPENDING.............................................................................................................................................................37
A2 SPENDING.............................................................................................................................................................38
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Observation One: Inherency
Current U.S. tax policy denies Native Americans access to tax credits for renewable energy
American Indian Law Review 2008 [Mark Shahinian, third-year law student at the University of
Michigan] SPECIAL FEATURE: THE TAX MAN COMETH NOT: HOW THE NON-TRANSFERABILITY OF
TAX CREDITS HARMS INDIAN TRIBES American Indian Law Review 2007 / 200832 Am. Indian L. Rev. 267.
"The power to tax involves the power to destroy," has become a shibboleth of any economic reading of U.S.
constitutional law. 1 Yet behind Justice Marshall's oft-repeated words lies an important insight into the
balance of power between sovereign entities. That insight is essentially this: the ability of an entity to
maintain its sovereignty depends on economic power, and that economic power can be taken away by
taxation. With the power to tax also comes the power to push, to encourage, to foster and to favor. If taxation
can sap economic power, tax policy can also confer vast economic rents on certain favored groups. However,
America's Indian tribes are a group not favored by federal tax policy. 2 This paper is concerned with elements
of U.S. tax policy that do [*269] unrecognized harm to Indian tribes. In the standard analysis, Indian tribes
benefit from tax-free status - it is a bright line rule of U.S. tax policy that tribes and their subsidiary
corporations do not pay federal income taxes. However, the guarantee of tax-free status for Indian tribes also
guarantees the tribes cannot use tax credits granted by the federal government.
Plan: The United States federal government should authorize American Indian Tribal
eligibility for a permanent Production Tax Credit as identified in Internal Revenue Code
45.
or
Plan: The United States federal government should authorize American Indian Tribal
eligibility for a permanent Production Tax Credit.
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Advantage: Self Determination
Current federal tax code creates an unequal economic playing field for American Indians
Tex Hall, President of the National Congress of American Indians, 3-1-2004,
http://www.eere.energy.gov/windandhydro/windpoweringamerica/filter_detail.asp?itemid=678&print
Second, Congress must authorize the Tribal eligibility for the Production Tax Credit (PTC) that drives all
wind projects in this country. Tribes are now penalized in that they cannot attract the private investor to
develop partnerships for projects on Tribal lands. Indians are the only people with a "trust relationship" with
the federal government. Our treaties require the federal government to assist us in developing our reservation
economies. But all renewable energy incentives go to tax-paying developers via the PTC or to states or
subdivisions of state through the Renewable Energy Production Incentive (REPI). Indians are the only group
excluded from any of the federal renewable energy incentives, yet we are the only ones with a legal
obligation — our treaties — for federal assistance! Currently, because Tribes are not taxed entities (a status
we secured from the United States in return for our giving them most of this continent), any developer that
teams up with a Tribe in a joint venture for wind development is penalized by only being able to use a portion
of the available PTCs, which are apportioned under federal law by the percentage of ownership in the
production facility. So if a tribe has any ownership in a project on Tribal lands, our partner must forego any
incentives represented by our ownership. The PTC is the main driver for wind development in this country,
but this federal incentive policy steers investment capital away from Indian lands. Intertribal COUP once
proposed a Tribal energy production incentive to correct this federal oversight. Wryly called a "TEPI", it
gently reminded Congress that it had an obligation to provide an equal playing field for Indian energy
development. The Senate version of the federal energy bill contains language to allow Tribes and other non-
taxed entities (such as municipal utilities and rural cooperatives) to sell, assign, or trade any tax credits that
might become available to them, but those provisions were removed by the House in the conference
committee. A current COUP proposal is a little more restrictive in scope, allowing joint ventures between
Tribes and non-Indian developers to allocate the Tribe's share of the credits to their tax-paying partners. This
proposal would be tax neutral, but it removes the penalty for investment in Indian Country through Tribal
joint ventures. Tribes could still be principal owners of the project, but our partners would not be financially
penalized.
Tradable tax credits will reduce tribal dependency and increase tribal sovereignty
The argument for a tradable tax credit is, at root, an argument for equity. Legal scholarship has a history of
arguments for a federal tax treatment of tribes that allows tribal economies to develop. 23 The moral basis of
arguments for an equitable - even favorable - tax treatment of tribes tends to rest on the federal trust
responsibility toward tribes established early in U.S. history and articulated by Chief Justice Marshall in
Cherokee Nation v. Georgia. 24 Writing of the Tribal Tax Status Act of 1982, legal scholar Robert Williams
said "To satisfy the 'moral obligations of the highest responsibility and trust' incumbent upon the United
States in its dealings with Indian nations, federal Indian Country development policy must address itself to
the structural barriers currently preventing tribal economic and social self-sufficiency." 25 Lack of tribal
access to tax credits is one of today's structural barriers. Addressing those barriers will help alleviate the
federal concern for tribal economic development expressed by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
"On Pine Ridge, Lower Brule and Rosebud reservations," a bank publication found, "roughly half of Indian
families are poor." 26 By aligning the tax incentives tribal businesses face with those faced by the rest of the
business community, the federal government will meet its goals of energy development, reduced tribal
dependency and increased tribal sovereignty. That alignment of incentives can be made a reality by making
wind energy tax credits tradable. More broadly, allowing tribes to utilize all tax credits now available only to
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tax-paying entities will better align the interests of tribal business and U.S. policy, and also will better
provide for tribal economic development.
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Tribal sovereignty is undermined by current federal jurisprudence. A nation-building

approach like that offered by the plan will increase economic self-determination and tribal
sovereignty.
Tribal sovereignty may be the number one concern of tribes. Indeed, one prominent legal scholar identifies
the right of self-government as the tribes' most valuable reserved right. 90 Historically, tribes have had good
reason to fear a loss of sovereignty, 91 and modern jurisprudence has done little to assure them of their long-
term status. 92In narrow terms, allowing tribes to develop and own their own wind generation will give them
more control over their resources, thus increasing tribal sovereignty. In broader terms, increased economic
self-determination - and specifically the ability of a local population to use and manage resources - is at the
heart of many of the concerns about sovereignty around the world, from the debate over free trade 93 to the
rapidly developing jurisprudence concerning the efforts of California and northeastern states to impose
restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions. 94 Policymakers have thrown strong weight behind the idea that
increased development of tribal energy and natural resources leads to increased tribal sovereignty. The
Reagan Administration, for example, believed that strengthening tribal governments could be accomplished
by resource development. The 1983 policy statement quoted above noted, "[t]his [*289] Administration
pledges to assist tribes in strengthening their governments by removing the federal impediments to tribal self-
government and tribal resource development." The Reagan administration's philosophy was still prominent
in 2005, when Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Section 503(a)(1) of the 2005 Act reads, "To
assist Indian tribes in the development of energy resources and further the goal of Indian self-determination,
the Secretary shall establish and implement an Indian energy resource development program" 95In the Senate
Report on the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the Energy and Natural Resources committee wrote:The
Committee believes that the provisions contained in this legislation, especially when combined with the tax
provisions to be offered from the Finance Committee, are the genesis for improving the national security of
this Nation, enhancing the environment, strengthening self-government for Native American communities,
decreasing dependence on foreign sources of energy, aiding the economy, and diversifying the energy base of
the country. 96Note that the Senate Report specifically mentioned the tax provisions to be offered from the
Finance Committee. In fact, language in the Act itself indicates that Congress may have wanted to address
tribal tax issues at a later date. Section 503 further provides the "Secretary of Energy shall submit to congress
a report on the financing requirements of Indian tribes for energy development on Indian land." 97 Making the
PTC tradable for tribes, as part of a program to make all tax credits tradable for tribes, would have a positive
economic impact on tribes. But to fulfill its potential, a tradable tax credit must be enacted as part of broader
legislation to bolster tribal economic development. Or, as one scholar put it, "A federal Indian policy that
focuses on the exploitation of tribal natural resources, and not on the development of tribal economies, is
doomed to resistance and failure." 98 Much research has been done over the past decade on the factors that
make tribal economies prosper, notably by Stephen Cornell, Joseph Kalt, Jonathan [*290] Taylor and their
colleagues at the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development. 99 The main points of the
research stress tribal governance, the importance of tribal sovereignty, tribal corporate governance and the
need to think broadly about economic development in order for tribal enterprises to succeed.Cornell and Kalt,
in particular, stress a nation-building approach:A nation-building approach to development doesn't say, "let's
start a business." Instead, it says, "let's build an environment that encourages investors to invest, that helps
businesses last, and that allows investments to flourish and pay off." A nation-building approach requires new
ways of thinking about and pursuing economic development. Telling the planning office to go get some
businesses going doesn't begin to crack the problem. The solutions lie elsewhere: in the design and
construction of nations that work. 100New ideas in tax credits and other tax incentives for tribes can be a part
of this nation-building approach, by laying the fiscal framework for tribal business to prosper.
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Indigenous Indian development creates a solvent global model
Miriam Jorgensen, Research Associate for the Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development and
consultant to the Standing Rock Sioux and White Mountain Apache Tribes, 1997, American Indian Studies, p. 137
In particular, the challenge for American Indian economic development is for it to be indigenously defined
and institutionally based. As such, development will be a process which takes account of Native assets and
goals and incorporates them into specific plans for the future. It will be capable of addressing welfare issues
generally, and not income issues alone. Because it concentrates on institutional development, it will not put
limited projects ahead of broader policy-making. It will create a political-economic environment which is
conducive to investment by tribal members and non- members alike. Furthermore, its political and social
institutions will together promote the continued success of these designated welfare- improving investments.
Clearly, development that succeeds at combating poverty and its concomitant ills is not narrowly "economic."
Finally, if Native nations achieve this kind of development, their success will be a beacon not only to other
indigenous peoples whose colonizers allow a measure of political independence, but to all nations which are
restructuring their development outlook. American Indian nations have the potential to show other countries
—from Eastern Europe to Asia and beyond -how development can be done "right."
Suppression of self determination triggers war

Glenn Morris, Professor of the Fourth World Center for the Study of Indigenous Law and Policy at the University
of Colorado, 1999, Native American Sovereignty, p. 324-325
More important, the purpose here is to indicate that through the application of contemporary principles of
international law, particularly in the area of decolonization and self-determination, indigenous peoples must
ultimately be entitled to decide for themselves the dimensions of their political, economic, cultural, and
social conditions. It must be emphasized that the construction of this position is not based in the supposition
that because indigenous peoples constitute ethnic or cultural minorities in larger societies they must be
protected due to that status. Rather, the position is that since Europeans first wandered into the Western
hemisphere they have acknowledged the unique status of indigenous peoples qua indigenous peoples. That
status is only now being reacknowledged through the application of evolving principles of positive and
customary international law. While such assertions may seem novel and untenable at present, it should be
recalled that just forty years ago, tens of millions of people languished under the rule of colonial domination;
today, they are politically independent. Central to their independence was the development and acceptance of
the right to self-determination under international law. Despite such developments, many colonized peoples
were forced by desperate conditions to engage in armed struggle to advance their legitimate aspirations.
Similarly, for many indigenous peoples few viable options remain in their quest for control of their destinies.
Consequently, a majority of the current armed conflicts in the world are not between established states, but
between indigenous peoples and states that seek their subordination. Armed struggle for most indigenous
peoples represents a desperate and untenable strategy for their survival. Nonetheless, it may remain an
unavoidable option for many of them, because if their petitions seeking recognition of their rights in
international forums are ignored, many indigenous peoples, quite literally, face extermination.
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Scenario One: Biodiversity
A right to Self Determination will maintain indigenous peoples’ connection to the land and
their cultural identity
Quane 2005 [Helen, Lecturer in Law, University of Wales, Swansea, United Kingdom]“The Rights of Indigenous
Peoples and the Development Process” The Johns Hopkins University Press Human Rights Quarterly 27.2 (2005)
652-682.
The article begins with a brief examination of the definition of an "indigenous people." It then examines the
scope of several rights claimed by indigenous peoples. The emphasis is on rights of particular significance to
indigenous peoples in a development context, namely, the right to self-determination, the right to participate
in public affairs, and the right to enjoy one's culture. As previously noted, the right to self-determination
underpins all other claims advanced by indigenous peoples. If they are successful in claiming this right, it
could be used to exert greater control over development projects on ancestral lands such as the construction
of dams, the extraction of mineral resources, and the use of traditional plants and indigenous knowledge for
pharmaceutical products. In the present context, [End Page 656] the right to participate in public affairs could
be significant in enabling indigenous peoples to participate effectively in the formulation of development
projects that affect them. Finally, the right to enjoy one's own culture could have important implications in a
development context given the close connection between lands traditionally owned or occupied by
indigenous peoples and the preservation of their cultural identity. For this reason, the right to enjoy one's
culture could have an impact on development projects affecting indigenous land and resources.
Indigenous self determination is key to biodiversity

Dean B. Suagee, Director, First Nations Environmental Law Program, Summer, 1999, Arizona State Law Journal,
31 Ariz. St. L.J. 483
In tribal cultures, places that are regarded as sacred tend to be located in places where the web of life has not
yet been disrupted by human activity. The web of life in such places may reflect hundreds or thousands of
years of the presence of human cultures, but the web has not been ripped apart by the kinds of activities that
industrialized cultures allow to take place under the banner of "development." Many of the non-human kinds
of living things that make up the web of life in such places- what human policy-makers now call "biological
diversity" or "biodiversity"-hold significance in tribal [*488] religions and cultures: eagles, wolves, salmon,
ravens, coyotes, buffalo, cedar, sage, sweetgrass, to mention just a few. Because tribal cultures are rooted in
the natural world, protecting the land and its biological communities tends to be a prerequisite for cultural
survival. Much has been written about whether or not tribal cultures embody values that can be described as
environmental ethics, or, to frame the inquiry in the past tense, whether or not the cultural values and
practices of tribal peoples enabled them to provide for human needs and wants without causing irreparable
damage to their environments. Professor Rebecca Tsosie recently reviewed a substantial amount of the
literature on this topic and concluded, after raising the usual cautions about generalizations, that, for most
indigenous cultures of North America, traditional Indian world views can be described as having several
common aspects: a perception of the earth as an animate being; a belief that humans are in a kinship system
with other living things; a perception of the land as essential to the identity of the people; a concept of
reciprocity and balance that extends to relationships among humans, including future generations, and
between humans and the natural world. A basic premise of this article is that the objectives of the movement
to preserve biodiversity will be served by recognizing the human rights of indigenous peoples. The most
effective way to make use of their traditional ecological knowledge is to recognize the rights of indigenous
peoples to govern their own territories. The national and sub-national governments of the world should
support these rights by showing the same kind of respect toward indigenous peoples that they show in their
interactions with other governmental entities. This premise is based, in part, on the historical experience in
the United States, which has shown that tribal self-government is a prerequisite for cultural survival.
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Scenario Two: Pakistan
Pakistan wants Kashmiri self determination

The Bulletin's Frontrunner, 1/7/2002
The Washington Post (1/7, A14, Cody) observes, "Beneath the public relations coup, tucked discreetly into
his summit declarations, were repeated warnings from Musharraf that terrorism launched from Afghanistan is
one thing, rebellion in Kashmir another. Pakistan's overriding national cause -- self-determination for fellow
Muslims in Kashmir -- must not be blurred into the struggle to extinguish terrorism that has become
paramount for the United States since Sept. 11, he said." Continues the Post, "'We cannot address only the
symptoms and leave the malaise aside,' he declared. 'It is equally important that a distinction be maintained
between acts of legitimate resistance and freedom struggles on the one hand and acts of terrorism on the
other.'" Adds the Post, "Musharraf, a tolerant Muslim, had ordered his security services to smother anti-
American demonstrations during the early days of the U.S. bombing campaign in Afghanistan in October.
The protests were encouraged by Pakistan's radical Islamic groups, whose leaders supported the Taliban and
its uncompromising version of Islam. They were the same kind of groups -- in some cases the same groups --
that have been leading the charge in Kashmir with Islamabad's encouragement for the last decade."
U.S. pressure for internal self determination is key to prevent India-Pakistan nuclear
conflict
Michael Kelly, Director of Legal Research, Writing & Advocacy at Michigan State University's Detroit College of
Law, 1999, Drake Law Review
Kashmir is now occupied by three sovereign nation-states: India, which controls the lion's share; Pakistan,
which occupies a small western portion; and China, which controls Ladakh. Various mediations of the
situation have been attempted (the United Nations from 1948-58, the U.S.S.R. from 1965-66, and the United
States in 1990), but to no avail. Predictably, the situation in Kashmir has degenerated. There are both
secessionist groups and unionist groups taking militant action against each other and the Indian army that has
occupied the state to enforce military rule for most of the 1990s. Violence has become the daily norm for this
region. In 1990 alone, there were 3000 deaths related to the unrest in Kashmir. Complicating matters, and of
concern to the world community and the United Nations, is the recent development of nuclear capabilities on
the part of both India and Pakistan. Indeed, as the realistic and potential flashpoint amongst the three
occupying nuclear powers, Kashmir has been referred to as a "nuclear tinderbox" waiting to be ignited. One
formula recently put forward, and significantly based on principles of self- determination, calls for the
creation of a "Kashmiri Autonomous Region" under nominal Indian control that would exist until a
referendum can be held, at which point the various parts of Kashmir can freely choose with which sovereign
they wish to associate without the entire region going as a single entity. This appears to be a rational
suggestion. But until the United States can weigh in to pressure the concerned parties into a joint settlement,
it is likely to go unrealized. Thus, self-deterministic issues continue to fester and foment further violence
while simultaneously offering an elusive solution to the problem.
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The multilateral coalition is key to solve terrorism and maintain U.S. leadership
Newsweek, 10/15/2001
We can define a strategy for the post-cold-war era that addresses America's principal national-security need
and yet is sustained by a broad international consensus. To do this we will have to give up some cold-war
reflexes, such as an allergy to multilateralism, and stop insisting that China is about to rival us militarily or
that Russia is likely to re-emerge as a new military threat. (For 10 years now, our defense forces have been
aligned for everything but the real danger we face. This will inevitably change.) The purpose of an
international coalition is practical and strategic. Given the nature of this war, we will need the constant
cooperation of other governments--to make arrests, shut down safe houses, close bank accounts and share
intelligence. Alliance politics has become a matter of high national security. But there is a broader
imperative. The United States dominates the world in a way that inevitably arouses envy or anger or
opposition. That comes with the power, but we still need to get things done. If we can mask our power in--
sorry, work with--institutions like the United Nations Security Council, U.S. might will be easier for much of
the world to bear. Bush's father understood this, which is why he ensured that the United Nations sanctioned
the gulf war. The point here is to succeed, and international legitimacy can help us do that.
US leadership is essential to prevent global nuclear exchange.

Zalmay Khalilzad, RAND, The Washington Quarterly, Spring 1995
Under the third option, the United States would seek to retain global leadership and to preclude the rise of a
global rival or a return to multipolarity for the indefinite future. On balance, this is the best long-term guiding
principle and vision. Such a vision is desirable not as an end in itself, but because a world in which the
United States exercises leadership would have tremendous advantages. First, the global environment would
be more open and more receptive to American values -- democracy, free markets, and the rule of law. Second,
such a world would have a better chance of dealing cooperatively with the world's major problems, such as
nuclear proliferation, threats of regional hegemony by renegade states, and low-level conflicts. Finally, U.S.
leadership would help preclude the rise of another hostile global rival, enabling the United States and the
world to avoid another global cold or hot war and all the attendant dangers, including a global nuclear
exchange. U.S. leadership would therefore be more conducive to global stability than a bipolar or a
multipolar balance of power system.
Another attack could kill millions

The Washington Times, October 16, 1998, Pg. A21
But that's the way it goes. A historical event surrounded by great theatrical effects makes a really big
impression. But what if the next weapon of mass destruction is silent, gives no warning, is not preceded by a
pyrotechnic blast, but takes effect more slowly, leaving hospitals swamped, and millions in great American
cities with hideously blistered faces dying in the streets? The doctors sent to succor them also die the same
painful and unsightly deaths. For biological weapons now have the potential to wipe out cities, states and
even entire national populations if positioned in the air, water supply or food supply. The food supply would
progressively be shipped to various parts of the country, ultimately killing millions of people. And all, except
for the groans of the dying, could be done in relative silence, with only the piles of dead in the streets to bear
witness as in the Plague Years of the Middle Ages.
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Scenario Three: Democratization
International support for internal self determination is key to democratization

Eric Kolodner, currently completing a joint degree at New York University School of Law and Princeton
University's Woodrow Wilson School, Fall 1994, Connecticut Journal of International Law, 10 Conn. J. Int'l L. 153
The international community, therefore, should attempt to resolve conflicts under principles of internal self-
determination before supporting a people's right to external self-determination with its potentially disruptive
consequences. Although this strategy has not been explicitly enunciated in the international arena, it is
derived from principles found within the Declaration on Friendly Relations. This document implies that a
people's claim to external self-determination is less legitimate when it is living under a system of democratic
governance, i.e., when it can effectively exercise its right to internal self-determination. Movements for
internal self-determination are, in fact, coterminous with movements for increased democracy, which have
recently swept the globe from the former Soviet Union to Guatemala. Some observers have even begun to
advance the idea that there exists an emerging right to democratic governance which may create an obligation
for the international community to promote and protect democracy. The international community must direct
its efforts towards defining the parameters of this emerging right to democratic governance and thereby
delineate the boundaries of the right to internal self-determination.
Global democratic consolidation is essential to prevent many scenarios for war and
extinction.
Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, October 1995, “Promoting Democracy in
the 1990’s,” http://www.carnegie.org//sub/pubs/deadly/dia95_01.html, accessed on 12/11/99
OTHER THREATS This hardly exhausts the lists of threats to our security and well-being in the coming
years and decades. In the former Yugoslavia nationalist aggression tears at the stability of Europe and could
easily spread. The flow of illegal drugs intensifies through increasingly powerful international crime
syndicates that have made common cause with authoritarian regimes and have utterly corrupted the
institutions of tenuous, democratic ones. Nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons continue to proliferate.
The very source of life on Earth, the global ecosystem, appears increasingly endangered. Most of these new
and unconventional threats to security are associated with or aggravated by the weakness or absence of
democracy, with its provisions for legality, accountability, popular sovereignty, and openness. LESSONS OF
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY The experience of this century offers important lessons. Countries that
govern themselves in a truly democratic fashion do not go to war with one another. They do not aggress
against their neighbors to aggrandize themselves or glorify their leaders. Democratic governments do not
ethnically "cleanse" their own populations, and they are much less likely to face ethnic insurgency.
Democracies do not sponsor terrorism against one another. They do not build weapons of mass destruction to
use on or to threaten one another. Democratic countries form more reliable, open, and enduring trading
partnerships. In the long run they offer better and more stable climates for investment. They are more
environmentally responsible because they must answer to their own citizens, who organize to protest the
destruction of their environments. They are better bets to honor international treaties since they value legal
obligations and because their openness makes it much more difficult to breach agreements in secret. Precisely
because, within their own borders, they respect competition, civil liberties, property rights, and the rule of
law, democracies are the only reliable foundation on which a new world order of international security and
prosperity can be built.
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Observation Two: Solvency
PTC for Tribes is a narrow targeted fix to a problem enhancing sovereignty and solving
energy resource shortfalls
To help resolve the problems outlined above, Congress should institute tax- credit tradability for tribes,
including a tradable PTC. Congress should change the current non-assignable status of tax credits and allow
tribes to trade their tax credits to business partners with tax liabilities in return for cash, equity or other
consideration equal to the value of the credits minus any (presumably minor) transaction costs. This is a
narrow, targeted fix to a problem, which does not require large-scale revisions of the tax code or of the
federal-tribal [*283] relationship. With this sort of provision in place, tribes could become involved in
businesses that make heavy use of tax credits.A. Tradable PTC is Win-Win Tradable tax credits would be an
ideal solution for all parties - tribes, government and private business. Tribes would gain economic
development opportunities; government would be able to further promote the business ventures it is trying to
encourage through the tax code and would reduce tribal dependency on federal dollars; private business
would be able to partner (and profit) with tribes in developing an important natural resource. Each party
would bring something to the table. The tribes would contribute the resources - land, wind and labor. The
outside investor would contribute the capital. The federal government would contribute the tax credits. The
tribes and the outside investor would be partners, both sharing in the venture's profits. The tribe would take
much of the cash flow, while the outside equity investor would take all of the tax credits and, depending on
the arrangement, some of the cash flow from the project.
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PTC→ ECONOMIC GROWTH

Native’s tax status prevents their partial rights to project cash flow
Production Tax Credits can be shared between multiple owners of a single wind farm, but according to IRS
rules, credits can be shared only in proportion to the cash flow the respective owners receive from the wind
farm. 38 This non- severability of tax credits from cash flow means that tribes cannot own partial rights to
project cash flow, because that would mean the tribes also own the rights to the tax credits - tax credits which
the tribes cannot use and so would not contribute to a project's bottom line. For example, in a project with
two tax-liable owners, BigBank with a 40% share of cash flow and Developer [*277] with a 60% share,
40% of the tax credits must flow to BigBank and 60% must flow to Developer, and neither partner can assign
their tax credits to each other or to a third party. So, if BigBank partners with GreatTribe (with a forty-sixty
share, respectively), 60% of the PTC will go to GreatTribe. GreatTribe cannot use the tax credit and cannot
assign it, and the partnership will suffer financially.
Tax credits solve the lack of capital investment in Indian Country

Tradable tax credits are a targeted, practical policy instrument. They have been used by the states, they are
revenue neutral, and they enjoy broad political support from politicians, policymakers, and tribal groups.
Tradable tax credits carry out the clearly articulated congressional goals of providing incentives to certain
economic activities, reducing tribal dependency through resource development, and increasing tribal
sovereignty. Indian Country suffers from a $ 50 billion shortfall in capital investment. 101 The federal
government has a number of tools at its disposal which it can use to address the problem - a tradable tax
credit is lying at the top of the toolbox and should be made a permanent fixture of U.S. energy and Indian
law.
Changing the tax code will simultaneously achieve goals of tribal and renewable energy
development
There are three clear rationales for this change in the tax code. First, the change will give tribes the same
incentives as the rest of the business community as tribal economies develop. Second, the change will reduce
tribal dependence on federal grants, as larger pools of investment capital become available to tribes. Third,
the change will increase tribal sovereignty, as dependence is reduced.
1. Aligning IncentivesMaking tax credits tradable by tribes - and thereby aligning the financial incentives of
tribes with the rest of the U.S. business community - promotes the federal goal of guiding economic activity,
whether in the wind power industry or in other industries with substantial tax credits.
Congress is bent on fostering renewable energy production in the United States. Congress is also bent on
fostering tribal energy development. If Congress made the PTC tradable, tribes would face the same tax
incentives as the rest of the business community, renewable energy development on tribal lands would
increase, and Congress would take a step forward in achieving its goals of tribal and renewable energy
development. Tax credits are economic incentives the government provides to promote certain activities. 76
With these incentives, the government is trying to encourage economic activity (such as charitable giving or
pollution-free energy production) that the government considers socially beneficial. 77 The government has an
interest in promoting those activities targeted for promotion to the fullest extent possible, including in Indian
Country.
14
PTC Affirmative
PTC→ RENEWABLES
Changing the tax code will simultaneously achieve goals of tribal and renewable energy
development
There are three clear rationales for this change in the tax code. First, the change will give tribes the same
incentives as the rest of the business community as tribal economies develop. Second, the change will reduce
tribal dependence on federal grants, as larger pools of investment capital become available to tribes. Third,
the change will increase tribal sovereignty, as dependence is reduced.
1. Aligning IncentivesMaking tax credits tradable by tribes - and thereby aligning the financial incentives of
tribes with the rest of the U.S. business community - promotes the federal goal of guiding economic activity,
whether in the wind power industry or in other industries with substantial tax credits.
Congress is bent on fostering renewable energy production in the United States. Congress is also bent on
fostering tribal energy development. If Congress made the PTC tradable, tribes would face the same tax
incentives as the rest of the business community, renewable energy development on tribal lands would
increase, and Congress would take a step forward in achieving its goals of tribal and renewable energy
development. Tax credits are economic incentives the government provides to promote certain activities. 76
With these incentives, the government is trying to encourage economic activity (such as charitable giving or
pollution-free energy production) that the government considers socially beneficial. 77 The government has an
interest in promoting those activities targeted for promotion to the fullest extent possible, including in Indian
Country.
15
PTC Affirmative
RENEWABLES→ECONOMIC GROWTH
Renewable energy development serves as a model for self-development
Bismark Tribune, August 19, 2001
The Blackfeet, whose reservation borders Glacier National Park and the Canadian province of Alberta, also
have timber and water resources that could play a role in a long-range economic plan, Parsons said. In
North Dakota, the Three Affiliated Tribes also are looking at wind generation as a source of electricity for
reservation businesses and residents, Chairman Tex Hall said. The Three Affiliated Tribes also see wind
energy as a possible job creator. 'Wind energy can help reduce (electricity) costs of each household but
still provide a profit for economic development to generate new jobs,' Hall said. Successful projects
between Indians and outside partners could serve as a model for other tribes, and allow for an exchange of
ideas among cultures, said Larry Flowers, with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Prospects for
wind energy development have some residents on the Blackfeet reservation excited. 'It would provide
jobs, you could train people. I don't see any bad in it,' Yvonne Night Gun said. 'It's a natural resource that
should be tapped into,' William Wade Running Crane said. 'The wind keeps on coming.'
Renewable energy boosts the entire economy of the reservation

The wind can howl for days without taking a breath, blowing with a force known to tip over railroad cars.
Leaders of the Blackfeet Indian reservation, where unemployment hovers near 70 percent, hope the wind has
enough strength to carry off some of the poverty, too. The Blackfeet, who live in the shadows of the
Rocky Mountains in northwest Montana, are developing what is being called the first commercial wind farm
on an American Indian reservation. Indian leaders hope to harness what often has been seen as little more
than a nuisance and turn it into a moneymaker for their communities. The wind farm, scheduled for
construction near the eastern boundary of Glacier National Park as early as next year, could produce enough
electricity to power 20,000 homes. Besides money and jobs -- including an estimated 30 construction jobs
and up to six permanent positions -- Indian leaders see a field of dozens of tall wind turbines as a possible
tourist draw that could help other sectors of the local economy. 'It's one avenue by which we can reach our
economic independence,' said Marilyn Parsons, the tribe's planning director.
16
PTC Affirmative
PTC→ WIND
Federal tax credits are necessary for American Indian Tribes to develop wind power
industries
In certain industries, federal tax credits play such an important financial role that entities unable to use those
tax credits are at a significant financial disadvantage to entities able to utilize the tax credits. Federal tax
credits play a key role in the coal bed methane extraction industry, 3 the low-income housing development
industry 4 , and the wind power industry, 5 among others. In some of these fields, tribes cannot make use of
the tax credits, and so face a severe financial handicap as compared to entities that can utilize the tax credits.
Perversely, this handicap is present in precisely the industries the federal government has decided to nurture
and encourage - for instance, the wind energy industry.To bring focus to the discussion of tax credits and
tribes, this article examines how the inability of tribes to access federal tax credits handicaps tribes' ability to
own and develop wind farms. Indian tribes could be a major force in the growing U.S. wind industry. Wind
power from tribal lands could provide 22% of installed U.S. electric power generation capacity. 6 Renewable
energy development is an issue with broad support in the United States and has the potential to bring
significant economic benefits to the tribes.
Credits are a prerequisite to wind industry development

In order to successfully develop a wind farm, a wind project's owners must have access to federal tax credits.
Tax credits for wind production are so valuable that wind farm owners who cannot make use of the tax
credits are at a severe financial disadvantage as compared to those who can take advantage of tax credits.
A. Federal Tax Credits for Wind Power Two programs are the primary drivers of wind development in the
U.S. today: (1) State Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) and; (2) Federal tax credits, especially the
Production Tax Credit. Two types of federal tax credits come into play: the Production Tax Credit (PTC) and
MACRS. 27 These tax credits, especially the PTC, make or break a wind project. The PTC gives owners of
wind farms a 1.9 tax credit for each kilowatt-hour (kWh) the wind farm generates. 28 The current building
boom in wind generation is evidence of the PTC's importance - the boom exists now precisely because the
current authorization of the PTC expires on Dec. 31, 2008, and developers are racing to get projects in the
ground before that deadline. 29 The PTC is more valuable than the 1.9 /kWh figure would indicate because it
effectively supplements earnings after taxes. To make up 1.9 after taxes, the project owner would have to
earn about 2.6 before taxes, making the PTC worth 2.6 in additional earnings. Note that this is 2.6 in
earnings, not revenue, and a corporation with 20% profit margins would have to take in 13 in revenues to
earn this amount. 30 Companies invest in projects only if they expect a return at least equal to the next best
alternative, and the PTC has made wind energy an extremely attractive investment.
17
PTC Affirmative
PTC→ WIND
Lack of credits puts Natives at a competitive disadvantage
Wind projects are extremely capital-intensive but have low overhead once up and running. 31 As
investments, they are conceptually similar to long-term bonds - low risk, fixed-income investments. Like any
capital project, three parties have a role in building a wind farm: (1) the customer, (2) the financier, and (3)
the project owners. The customer: In a wind project, the customer, once identified and locked into a long-
term contract, is a relatively silent element. The customer is the buyer of the electricity the project produces,
and is usually a utility or power marketer. 32 The customer's main role is to provide the project with a Power
Purchase Agreement (PPA). The PPA is usually in the form of a ten- to fifteen- year year output contract for a
set price per kWh generated, with built-in escalators. The financier: The developer uses that PPA as the
finance-able asset, and with that PPA in hand, finds money to build the project. Financiers of wind projects,
for reasons discussed below, are typically large investors with a significant tax liability. The project owners:
Project ownership is the key to the issues discussed in this paper. Only certain owners will find profit in wind
farms. These owners must, for financial reasons, meet two criteria. First, they must have easy access to the
capital markets. Wind farms are extremely capital intensive. A 30MW 33 wind farm (enough to power, on
average, 12,000 homes) such as one proposed for the Rosebud Reservation can cost $ 48 million to build. 34
Modern wind farms are generally in the 100-200MW range, and can represent capital investments of half a
billion dollars. 35 Second, the owner must have a large, steady tax liability from non-wind operations that they
can offset with the PTC credits. A 30MW wind farm throws off more than $ 1.6 million per year in tax credits
for the first ten years of its operation. 36The two requirements above - access to capital markets and large tax
liability - mean wind farm owners tend to be some of the largest corporations in the world, and that the
owners and financiers of projects tend to be one in the same. American investment bank Goldman Sachs,
financial giant General Electric and Australian investment bank Babcock & Brown all own or have owned
significant wind properties. 37III. Tax Credits and Tribes However, the two requirements - access to capital
markets and large tax liability - also work to wreck the hopes for tribal ownership of wind projects. Tribes, as
discussed infra, are non-taxable entities. As such, they cannot use tax credits, and are at a competitive
disadvantage compared to taxable owners of wind projects.
Credits are necessary to offset tax liabilities in wind production

It is not obvious why a non-taxable entity such as a tribe that does not pay a good chunk of its income in
taxes to the federal government should be at a competitive disadvantage to an entity that does pay taxes - the
phenomenon requires some explanation. In select industries, the tax credits available are greater than the
taxes that would be paid on the earnings from any one project. Taxable entities simply take the tax credits
they earn in these select industries, apply those credits to their overall operations, and, in total, pay less in
taxes than if they had not invested in the tax-credit generating industry. However, entities like tribes with no
tax burden cannot use this strategy. For example, taxable BigBank invests in WindFarm Alpha, which
generates $ 400,000 in earnings, on which BigBank would normally pay $ 140,000 in taxes. However, WindFarm Alpha
generates $ 190,000 in tax credits. WindFarm Alpha's tax credits wipe out any tax liability BigBank has from WindFarm Alpha; in
addition, BigBank can use the tax credits from WindFarm Alpha to wipe out $ 50,000 in additional tax liability from BigBank's other
operations. On the other hand, if GreatTribe also invests in a wind farm called WindFarm Beta, the situation is different. WindFarm Beta
[*276] is identical to WindFarm Alpha, and also produces $ 400,000 in earnings and $ 190,000 in tax credits. GreatTribe pays no taxes
on the earnings. However, GreatTribe cannot use any of the tax credits, and so the project's return is $ 50,000 less to GreatTribe than
WindFarm Alpha is to BigBank. To summarize, the tax credits, which are added to revenues after taxes are taken out, are sufficiently
large in this example to give the taxable entity (e.g., a corporation) a financial advantage over the non-taxable entity (e.g., a tribe). The
taxable entity can take those tax credits and apply them to offset tax liabilities in other parts of its operations,
18
PTC Affirmative
thus making a diversified taxable entity better off than a diversified non-taxable entity if both invest in this
project.
19
PTC Affirmative
PTC→ WIND
Tax-free status dooms native efforts at renewable energy
The origins of the tribal tax credit issues lie buried deep in the origin of the federal-tribal relationship. The
tax status of tribes is most closely analogized to that of the states, and is rooted, like state sovereignty, in the
idea of tribal sovereignty. 43 "Indians not taxed," of course, is written into the constitution. 44 In context, the
phrase "Indians not taxed" is not a guarantee of tax-free status, but part of the framers' articulation of the
apportionment of voting power among the states. 45 Nevertheless, the phrase is illustrative of the pre-twentieth
century view that tribes and Indians were excluded from the constituent body - what the solicitor general of
the Interior called the "non-application of all laws of general application to the Indians." 46 As this "non-
application" doctrine has faded with changing congressional and judicial attitudes, so has the non-taxable
status of Indians. 47 In 1935, the Supreme Court ruled the federal government is permitted to tax the income
of individual Indians. 48 Nevertheless, Indian tribes, as opposed to individual Indians, remain tax-free
entities. This non-taxability is one of the few bright-line rules in Indian law. "Income tax statutes do not tax
Indian tribes. The tribe is not a taxable entity," as the IRS has simply put it. 49 Some corporate forms, if owned
by tribes, are also not taxable. 50 This tax-free status has been a boon to some tribes and their subsidiary
corporations, allowing them to develop industries free from the burden of [*279] paying out 35% of their
income to the government. The Southern Ute Tribe has leveraged natural gas reserves on its land to amass a
business empire that holds $ 1.45 billion in assets. 51 Other tribes, such as the Mississippi Choctaw, have done
equally well. 52 Unfortunately, in some industries, such as wind power, this tax-free status has proven an
insurmountable handicap for tribes.
Lack of tax credits makes renewable energy unfeasible

And tribes are seemingly at a disadvantage when it comes to securing some incentives to develop wind
energy. Since they don't pay most federal taxes, tribes cannot get a production tax credit that makes wind
more competitive with other power, Gough said. The Blackfeet are working with developer SeaWest
WindPower Inc. to develop the wind farm. The Bonneville Power Administration, which acquires and
distributes power to utilities in the Northwest, also is involved and considering purchasing power from the
project. Separately, the tribe offered Anschutz Exploration Corp., which wanted to drill an exploratory oil
well at a site off the reservation considered sacred by several tribes, the chance to drill on reservation land
instead.
20
PTC Affirmative
TRIBAL WIND SOLVES ENERGY

Tribally produced wind power will solve energy shortfalls
Tribes do not have experience with operating wind farms as businesses, but tribes do have long experience in
more traditional forms of energy development. The tribes of the Southwest, especially the Navajo and
Southern Utes, have long-developed their coal and oil and gas resources. The Utes have become quite
wealthy off revenues from energy development. 19 The U.S., especially the Western U.S., needs this tribally
produced power. The Western Governors' Association has convened an energy task force to address Western
states' concerns about shortfalls in energy production. The Governors' Association has called for 30,000MW
of clean power (including wind) development by 2015, 20 and has pointed out the need for federal, state, local
and tribal authorities to coordinate in siting wind projects. 21Yet tribes cannot fully participate in the
renewable energy industry because of their tax status and their lack of ability to use the tax credits the federal
government allocates to renewable energy companies. Despite the current wind boom, reservations have not
become wind development sites. In fact, [*272] only one major wind development exists on an Indian
reservation in the U.S. - a 50MW project on the land of the Campo Band of Kumeyaay Indians near San
Diego, Calif. 22To address the handicap tribes face with regards to the impossibility of utilizing tax credits,
this paper proposes making federal tax credits tradable - tribes could trade the tax credits they would receive
as part of their investment in projects to business partners with tax liability in return for cash or other
consideration.
21
PTC Affirmative
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES SECESSION

Internal self determination is the best way to prevent secession and secure world peace
Recently, however, some commentators have suggested that the international community should begin to
resist movements for self-determination. This perspective derives from a misguided conception of self-
determination and a short-sighted view on geo-political realities. Contrary to the assumption of these
observers, self-determination is not coterminous with secession, and therefore, self-determination movements
do not inherently produce international instability. In fact, since efforts to limit the self-determination
movements of today often foment the conflict of tomorrow, recognizing legitimate claims for self-
determination might ensure world stability. Rather than abandoning this important right, the international
community must readjust its conception of self-determination to address the changing needs of the post-Cold
War world. It should emphasize the internal aspects of this right, which in many respects comport with
principles of democratic governance that have recently assumed a primacy throughout the world.
Additionally, by the international community supporting movements for internal self-determination, it can
potentially avoid the disruption that often accompanies movements for external self-determination. Because
some peoples still suffer under neo-colonial oppression, however, the international community should not
categorically reject movements for external self-determination. Only when principles of internal self-
determination cannot satisfy the legitimate needs of an aggrieved people, should the international community
support this people's right to external self-determination. It should attach stringent conditions upon the
legitimate exercise of this right, however. Only by limiting movements for external self-determination and
recognizing legitimate movements for internal self-determination, can the international community
simultaneously foster human rights, support democracy, and maintain world peace and stability.
Internal self determination stops secession movements

Michael Kelly, Director of Legal Research, Writing & Advocacy at Michigan State University's Detroit College of
Law, 1999, Drake Law Review
Ironically, devolution, and other internal self-deterministic moves like increased federalism, could be the
salvation of the nation-state. Acquiescing to internal self-determination provides the recognition, sovereignty,
and identity that homogenous groups crave without breaking apart the country so those groups can achieve
independence in what might prove to be unviable nation-states of their own. "All over the developed world,
devolution is a fact of life. In the dictum of Daniel Bell, an American sociologist, 'the nation-state has now
become too small for the big problems of life and too big for the small problems.'" So, utilizing internal self-
determination to avoid external self-determination is a path to continued viability for the multi-ethnic nation-
state today.
Refusal to grant autonomy is the cause of secession

Oloka-Onyango, Associate Professor and Dean of Law, Makerere University, 1999, American University
International Law Review
The foregoing viewpoint assumes that secessionists are born and not made. Rasheed asserts that the urge for
autonomy is often fostered by deliberate marginalization, such that "demands by ethnic groups for power-
sharing, political freedom, greater political autonomy, and the right to self-determination have on occasion
led to large-scale reprisals and atrocities against these groups and have often driven them to insurrection."
Rather than reaffirming the notion of statehood, which has produced these various problems, we should
consider how to make the State more flexible, as the first stage to "statelessness."
22
PTC Affirmative
Internal self determination prevents anarchy and international resistance.

Michael J. Kelly, B.A., J.D., Indiana University; LL.M.- International & Comparative Law, Georgetown
University. Mr. Kelly currently serves as Director of Legal Research, Writing & Advocacy at Michigan State
University's Detroit College of Law. Drake Law Review 1999
So, the re-emergence of the principle of self-determination has manifested itself in such a manner as to have
three situational meanings based upon the context in which it arises. When a nation-state breaks apart,
peacefully or violently, self- determination can mean independence for a previously oppressed people. This is
sometimes referred to as "external self-determination," and encompasses the first two examples. However,
when a homogenous group within a [*222] democratic nation-state rankles for self-determination, the
international preference is for more autonomy through devolution of power within the existing nation-state
instead of full independence. This is sometimes referred to as "internal self-determination" and encompasses
the last example. Why the bifurcation in the application of this principle? Simply put, the international legal
system is based on nation-states' relations with each other-it is the state, as a cohesive entity, that has standing
in the international community. Sub-states or minority groups within nation-states have no standing in
international law and, therefore, no forum in which their voices may be heard. Beyond the decolonization
context, the International Court of Justice has refused to recognize a "sub-state" claim for external self-
determination. The practical basis of "internal self-determination" is an extension of the maxim: self-interest
is the prime motivator. The United Nations and other international governmental organizations, generally do
not support secession by minority identity groups from a state because to do so would be to invite "'attacks
on the unity and integrity of their own member states.'" Consequently, the threat of secession cannot be
tolerated. If it were, then the sovereignty of the nation-state as a viable political unit would be constantly
under threat by its smaller constituent units. As the League of Nations Commission of Rapporteurs stated in
the 1921 Aaland Islands case: [*223] To concede to minorities . . . the right of withdrawing from the
community to which they belong, because it is their wish . . . would be to destroy order and stability within
States and to inaugurate anarchy in international life; it would be to uphold a theory incompatible with the
very idea of the State as a territorial and political unity. So, there is logically more support among nation-
states for the internal, devolutionary aspect of this principle. By granting a degree of autonomy to a sub-state
or minority group within a nation-state, a central government may be acting in furtherance of its own
continued self-preservation. But, care must be taken to ensure individual minority rights to avert the risk of
devolving repression along with power from central to regional elites, thus leaving minorities no better off
than they were before.
23
PTC Affirmative

A model of internal self determination is necessary to prevent further conflict.
Michael J. Kelly, B.A., J.D., Indiana University; LL.M.- International & Comparative Law, Georgetown
University. Mr. Kelly currently serves as Director of Legal Research, Writing & Advocacy at Michigan State
University's Detroit College of Law. Drake Law Review 1999
Some overly-eloquent political commentators, such as William Safire, have even endorsed the evolution of a
new form of self-determination for ethnically repressed peoples: After World War I, . . . Wilson had an
idealistic notion called "the self- determination of nations": national boundaries should be drawn around
peoples who have a common language and cultural heritage. A generation later, . . . Churchill and Roosevelt
made "self-determination" a part of the Atlantic Charter. Sounds great, but it runs counter to every nation's
natural impulse to hold itself together. . . . Serbia today wants to hold on to a historic part of its territory
called Kosovo. . . . [The Kosovars] want to break away from Serbia's oppressive rule . . . . Not surprisingly,
Serbia says no. . . . . . . . Here is where the age-old power of a nation to put down a rebellion comes up
against this generation's power of unacceptable suffering. The Clinton Administration, facing the prospect of
television coverage of tens of thousands of freezing [Kosovar] refugees, will ultimately [act militarily]. . . .
That's what happened after our "victory" over Saddam Hussein. Only when we saw the televised human
tragedy of the Kurdish people, . . . did we create a sanctuary for them in northern Iraq . . ., limiting Iraq's
sovereignty in that "no-flight zone." Thus, . . . a new policy is being backed into by the Western world: if
enough civilian lives are in danger of starvation or massacre, and if intervention by airpower can make a
difference and if the U.S. takes the lead then an alliance of nations will reluctantly act to impose a temporary,
de facto self-determination. . . . . Needed now is a new policy of evolutionary self-determination that time
can advance or modify. Some leader must formulate and sell a new form of shared sovereignty, a tertium
quid to accommodate insurgencies and defuse ethnic conflict not just in Kosovo, but in other lands where
there can be no clear winner from Iraq to East Timor and the West Bank. History awaits that newly practical
and more sophisticated Wilson . . . Nonetheless, self-determination, whatever its form, continues to threaten
nation-state sovereignty, though perhaps not to the extent that the nation-state will cease to exist on the
international stage as the primary mover and shaker. There is too much self-interest yet for that to occur; and
like all things when their survival is threatened, the nation-state will react to insure its continued relevance.
By not denying the right to self-determination, but instead emphasizing internal self-determination, through
aspects of federalism and devolution, over external secessionist self-determination, nation-states would be
wise to take such action.
24
PTC Affirmative
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION ≠ SECESSION

Their authors oversimplify: internal self determination doesn’t send a model for secession
Sandor Ballogh, retired profess of politics, 1999, Autonomy and the New World Order, p. 86
There would be less of a problem with definitions if instead of the minority group the individual would be
considered the depository of the right. But this would be impractical in the political community, since
individual self-determination could lead to anarchy. Even groups having the right to self-determination seems
to scare many of our statesmen: according to Reuters News Service: “The big powers fear granting Kosovo
independence would set off a disastrous chain reaction of demands for the same prize from disgruntled
nunonties nearby in the Balkans, especially Albanians in Macedonia.” But is this fear justified? Ved P. Nanda
mentions that there are some observers who seem to “fear that secessionist claims by various ethnic-
nationalist groups will acerbate the existing fragile international order [and} call for placing severe limits on
the scope of self-determination so as to regulate, control, and minimize its evil consequences,” and names
Etzioni as one such writer. But instead of debating Etzioni, Nanda evades the answer dismissing Etzioni’s
ideas that “it may be argued that this hypothesis remains untested and lacks validity.” So he changes the
focus of the paper to “study the mechanism under which all these claims can be peacefully pursued and
resolved.” Eric Kolodner takes a more effective approach: he argues that Etzion,’s argument takes a very
limited view of the concept of self-determination.’ Kolodner distinguishes between internal and external self-
determination, arguing that Etzioni’s fear might apply to certain cases of external self-determination, but not
to internal self-determination. External self-determination means complete independence, while internal self-
determination means various forms and degrees of autonomy. Unfortunately, some authors who oppose self-
determination, equate self-determination with secession, i.e. external self-determination, Kolodner’s
distinction notwithstanding. Disregarding autonomy as a form of (internal) self-determination creates
problems, because external self-determination is much more difficult to achieve both administratively and
politically. This allows many politicians to pay lip service to human rights and self-determination without
effectively pursuing it, using yet another argument: they defend the sanctity of frontiers under the guise of
defending peace and stability.
International institutions can safeguard a distinction between self determination and

unchecked secession
Daniel Philpott, assistant professor of Political Science at UC-Santa Barbara, 1998, National Self-Determination
and Secession, p. 88
These ancient political drives raise our general question about incorporating self-determination into
international law, whether through the World Court, the Security Council, or state recognition policies. If we
legalize claims to self-determination along with the qualifications and the last resort criterion, buttressing all
these values with the enforcement capacities of institutions plus whatever legitimacy legalization may confer,
might it happen that the claims would gain rampant recognition while the restraints would he ignored? The
danger is real, but also, I think, avoidable. Legalization alone would not seem to result in a bias for enforcing
separatism over the restrictions. Human rights, including minority rights, and democracy are currently far
more entrenched in international law and state foreign policies than is self-determination, and there is no
reason to think that international bodies would abjure their enforcement, sacrificing them to an absolute value
of self-determination.’6 What arouses more worry is the role of states in judging and enforcing international
law. The Security Council, the most probable enforcer of law, is made up of states; recognition is granted by
states; and states pursue primarily their traditional desiderata of security, position, and wealth, not legal
rectitude. Here again, though, it is not clear that a general secessionist bias will result. Germany and Croatia
was a single case; one can easily imagine other cases where great powers find it in their interests to oppose
the breakup of a state. But if states’ tendencies do not slant one way or the other in the aggregate, this hardly
assures us that states will make the just decision in the single case of a Bosnia, a Quebec, or a Kashmir. Our
hopes for impartial judgement and enforcement, in the end, depend on our confidence in the judgement of
states, or of states acting in the Security Council, or, most speculatively, of states acting on behalf of an
international judiciary body. Of these forums, we may have the most confidence in states as they act through
the Security Council. Again, post-Cold War interventions sanctioned by the Security Council give us some
25
PTC Affirmative
reason to believe that the Council can act where justice demands it: imperfectly and selectively, to be sure,
but also with some prospect for success.
INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION ≠ SECESSION
Recognition of an indigenous right to self determination creates a good, anti-secession
international norm
Patrick Thornberry, Professor of International Law, Keele University, 2000, Operationalizing the Right of
Indigenous People to Self Determination, p. 64
Secession is not an issue for most groups, though it is still embedded in the standard imagery of self-
determination. There is opportunity as well as difficulty for the further development of international law. If
we are witnessing the emergence of a specific form of self-determination, its legal recognition as a benign,
protective and balanced mode of self -determination, would be a considerable prize for international law and
a possible model of good practice for application in related contexts. There are features in indigenous
descriptions which are capable of moving self-determination away from a fascination with secession towards
broader notions of human dignity and solidarity.
26
PTC Affirmative
SECESSION≠ DESTROY DEMOCRACY

A right to secede doesn’t destroy democracy
and Secession, p. 95-96
A right to secede would not necessarily undermine democracy, either. Indeed, one could imagine it helping a
federal state to form, inducing a wary group to join in the first place. If some or all of a region’s inhabitants
did develop a desire to secede over time, a constitutionally prescribed procedure might help to avoid
bloodshed, or even to diffuse radicalism, perhaps even helping to dissipate popular support for secession.
Consider the cases of Quebec and Slovakia, the first a region whose inhabitants narrowly voted down seces-
sion, the second a region which did secede, and both cases in which little blood was shed over the question.
Although in neither case did a constitutional right to secede guide the way, in both cases the larger state’s
government and the separatist region’s inhabitants were willing to abide by agreed-upon procedures. We may
take these regions, then, as experimental proxies for constitutional secession. Now, there are admittedly
grounds in both cases for scepticism. The procedures were messy and contested, the referenda presented the
question of independence ambiguously to the voters, safeguards for minority rights were questionable, and
depending on whom one asks, other flaws existed as well. But the crucial question to ask is: What if there
had been no (approximation of a) right to secede at all? What if the Czechs and the Canadians had failed to
brook even the possibility of secession in the first place?
27
PTC Affirmative
SELF DETERMINATION K/T US HUMAN RIGHTS LEADERSHIP
An increased prioritization of self determination is key to U.S. human rights leadership
Christopher Wall, LL.M., 1998, University of Durham (England); J.D., 1997, Brigham Young University,
December 1998, Fordham International Law Journal
The right to self-determination, however, is an important fundamental right to be considered in and of itself,
even though the right to self-determination is not necessarily a human right recognized with any regularity by
the West. In fact, for some Third World countries, the right to self-determination involves a right to rise from
poverty and third-rate status to which they see themselves consigned by wealthy imperialists. In a very real
sense, the right to self-determination is in itself a human right, and in many of those states that recognize it as
such, the quest to improve their global status becomes an overriding goal that may temporarily subsume other
rights. Other states see the imposition of unilateral economic sanctions as an attempt by the United States to
impose its will upon them in violation of their human right to self-determination. They argue that to
concentrate too much upon civil liberties is to ignore rights of national sovereignty and self-determination.
One commentator has noted that "the international community constantly frustrates the creative management
of self-determination through its unwillingness or inability effectively to sanction states that manifestly
violate the right." Thus, while the United States has become a most vocal advocate of human rights in the
realm of civil liberties around the globe, it has also become an example of human rights violations in the
realm of self-determination simply because self-determination falls below other human rights in the United
States' hierarchy of human rights enforcement.
28
PTC Affirmative
SELF DETERMINATION K/T HUMAN RIGHTS

Self determination is a prerequisite to other human rights and freedoms
While the era of decolonization might have formally ended, many peoples still suffer under neo-colonial
oppression. Only if the international community supports movements for self-determination can it guarantee
the protection of the rights of peoples throughout the world. As Hector Gros Espiell, a U.N. Special
Rapporteur on the right to self-determination, concluded: The effective exercise of a people's right to self-
determination is an essential condition or prerequisite . . . for the genuine existence of the other human rights
and freedoms. Only when self-determination has been achieved can a people take the measures necessary to
ensure human dignity, the full enjoyment of all rights and the political, economic, social and cultural progress
of all human beings. . . .
29
PTC Affirmative
SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES CONFLICT

Denying self determination is responsible for the majority of global wars
Fourth World Center for the Study of Indigenous Law and Politics (Marc Sills and Glenn Morris)
July 1993, Fourth World Bulletin, http://carbon.cudenver.edu/public/fwc/Issue5/commentary-2.html
The spread of representative democracy can be considered a noble goal, in contrast to systems that might be
characterized as autocratic or totalitarian dictatorships, but narrowing the definition of the right to self-
determination, prior to its realization by hundreds of presently non-state indigenous nations, is not likely to
produce the global peace and stability so cherished by Etzioni and company. Instead, it is likely to produce
more acrimony and animosity, in reaction to the perception that prior application of the right has produced an
exclusive club that is now closing its doors, based on arbitrary and suspect criteria. To believe that those who
are now to be excluded will simply accept their fate and meekly participate in processes in which they are
continually relegated to disaffected electoral and social minority status is unrealistic. The evidence for this
last assertion is multifold. We are presently living in the context of a "new world order" in which almost all
of the current warfare (in at least 40 examples) is accounted for as conflict between states and non-state
nations. Almost all of the non-state nations now at war with states are indigenous to the territories for which
they fight. Presuming that those conflicts will all culminate in the eradication of the indigenous nations by
the states whose rule they contest seems premature, at the least.
30
PTC Affirmative
US MODELED
U.S. Indian policy is modeled
Fourth World Center for the Study of Indigenous Law and Politics (Marc Sills and Glenn Morris),
Spring/Summer 1996, Fourth World Bulletin, http://carbon.cudenver.edu/public/fwc/Issue10/fwbtoc.html
In the summer of 1994, following the conclusion of the 12th session of the UN Working Group on
Indigenous Peoples, the Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and the Protection of
Minorities sent the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to the UN Commission on Human
Rights. This was a necessary step for the Draft in route to the ultimate approval by the UN General Assembly
that its proponents hope to achieve. But in February 1995, the Draft Declaration was put in jeopardy of de-
railment when the Human Rights Commission ordered the Draft reviewed by a new working group. That
group, named the "Open-ended Inter-sessional Working Group" (referred to herein as the "Inter-sessional"),
held its first meeting from 20 November to 1 December 1995. The proceedings from the meeting
demonstrate an attempt by a coterie of states, led by the United States, to commandeer the debate on
indigenous rights, as they try to maintain their control of international law and the United Nations' role in
enforcing the principles found in the Draft Declaration. Because of its role as the one surviving super-power
at the end of the Cold War, with the financial leverage to determine the future of the United Nations, the US
has inordinate control over the way the Draft Declaration is being worded and what exactly the document
will imply as policy. The United States intends that its own model for treatment of indigenous peoples should
be emulated by other states, and therefore that the Draft Declaration should reflect the order of US Indian
Law. The agenda is not merely to define a simple moral order; more important, the US is attempting to create
a broader, more encompassing hegemony that minimizes the possibility that indigenous peoples might
actually be protagonists of their own destinies.
A state’s practice to recognize the right to internal self-determination is the only means by
which international law can be created
Quane 2005 [Helen, Lecturer in Law, University of Wales, Swansea, United Kingdom]“The Rights of Indigenous
Peoples and the Development Process” The Johns Hopkins University Press Human Rights Quarterly 27.2 (2005)
652-682.
Under current international instruments, distinct ethnic, linguistic, or religious groups within states do not
appear to have a legal right to external or internal self-determination. An examination of the wording,
context, drafting history, and subsequent practice of the relevant provisions of the UN Charter, the ICCPR,
the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), and General Assembly
Resolution 2625 (XXV) tends to support this view.37 This view might seem over cautious, especially when
one considers recent events in Central and Eastern Europe. It is also at [End Page 660] odds with a growing
body of opinion in the academic literature that suggests that groups within states have a right to internal, and
possibly external, self-determination. Arguably, this cautious approach can be defended, especially if one
examines the literature in light of the relevant state practice. The importance of state practice cannot be
underestimated, even in this age of globalization, because it remains the only means by which new rules of
customary international law can be created.
31
PTC Affirmative
US K/T KASHMIR
U.S. pressure is key to solve Kashmir
Business Recorder, 1/18/2002
America is the only country, which can help resolve Kashmir dispute that remains the main cause of tension
between India and Pakistan, said Roger Godsif, Chairman Parliamentary Kashmir Group in House of
Commons on Thursday. "No other country in the world has got the power to compel or force them for the
resolution of Kashmir dispute," he told APP in an interview while commenting on President General Pervez
Musharraf's address to the nation on Saturday to curb terrorism and extremism. Godsif said, "I applaud any
step taken by General Musharraf to eliminate indiscriminate terrorism. I hope it will contribute towards
reduction of tension between India and Pakistan. Pakistan has made repeated offers to India for a
"meaningful" and "purposeful" dialogue for finding a peaceful settlement of the issue but New Delhi has so
far not responded positively. - The main cause of tension between two countries is the Kashmir dispute, said
the British parliamentarian. Godsif said, he did not believe bilateral talks "will bring about resolution of the
dispute," threatening peace and stability in a nuclearised South Asia. "America has both the financial ability
and the ability to put pressure both upon India and Pakistan in order to move towards resolution- of the
dispute. No other country has the capacity to do it," said Roger Godsif.
32
PTC Affirmative
PAKISTAN K/T SOLVE TERRORISM

Pakistan is the keystone of the anti-terrorism coalition
Anatol Lieven, Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, January/February 2002,
Foreign Affairs
THE SURVIVAL of Pakistan in its existing form is a vital U.S. security interest, one that trumps all other
American interests in the country. A collapse of Pakistan -- into internal anarchy or an Islamist revolution --
would cripple the global campaign against Islamist terrorism. Strengthening the Pakistani state and
cementing its cooperation with the West have thus become immensely important to Washington.
Pakistani cooperation is key to the coalition

The Independent (London), 9-20, 2001
The most immediate priority for American diplomacy remains the need to tie Pakistan fast into the alliance
and to support the initiatives the Pakistani government has been taking with the Taliban. The tension lies in
the need to provide proof to both the Taliban regime and the Pakistani people that Osama bin Laden is indeed
the prime suspect. Of course "proof" is notoriously difficult to provide where terrorism is concerned, and bin
Laden's "organisation" is diffuse. And what may serve as proof to the satisfaction of Western authorities and
public opinion may be insufficient for the Taliban, even assuming that they were prepared to look at the
evidence objectively. The temptation will then be for America to lose patience and press ahead with action,
regardless of the opinions of its principal ally in the region, Pakistan. That, however, would be an extremely
dangerous move. More than one former Soviet colonel has talked about the difficulty of fighting a
conventional military or "special forces" campaign in this inhospitable region, which is still heavily mined
from the time of the Russian occupation. To attempt to do so without the (relative) safety of bases in Pakistan
is almost inconceivable. Whether President Bush likes it or not, the government and, indirectly, the people, of
Pakistan have an effective veto over the deployment of American forces in the area. So far, as his TV address
yesterday showed, President Musharraf has been as supportive as he can be, given the fractures within his
own country. But Pakistan may yet prove to be both the most important and yet the weakest link in the grand
coalition against terrorism.
33
PTC Affirmative
NO IMPACT TO SECESSION
There is no impact to secession
and Secession, p. 91
Even if secessions did proliferate, though, which I do not advocate, we should be clear why it would be a
problem. It is not necessarily a problem, for instance, for there to be small states. As I claimed in my original
argument, there is no reason why even a city or tiny region cannot be self-determining. Andorra, Monaco,
Liechtenstein, Singapore, and (up until this year) Hong Kong have all fared perfectly well as tiny
sovereignties. There are some limits to how small a sovereign entity can be, but these arise from the necessity
of providing certain public functions: maintaining roads and utilities, educating children, preserving minimal
order, and providing basic public goods.2” It is not necessarily a problem, either, for there to be a large
number of states. International stability and peace has endured among the many and collapsed among the
few. Compare Europe’s fate with one Germany in the first half of the twentieth century with Europe’s fate
with 300 German states during the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.2’
No impact to secession
Kai Nielsen, Professor Emeritus, Department of Philosophy, the University of Calgary, 1998, National Self-
Determination and Secession, p. 114
Of course, the existing states in the UN and in the international law establishment will stick together to seek
to sustain the idea of the territorial integrity of states, i.e. of the existing states. They are pretty much, in this
respect, like an old boys club. And, of course, we do not want a circus of anarchy, but, as a matter of
historical fact, states come and go and it is not such a terrible thing if changes occur, particularly if the
societies in question are liberal democratic ones with very distinct nations hamessed together rather
artificially, and where the flourishing of these nations, or at least the smaller nations, within the umbrella
state, could be enhanced by separation and no great harm would accrue to the remainder state by separation.
A state should not, and indeed in most instances will not, break up without good reason. And when it does
break up there will always be some dislocation and not all the after effects will be good. But some of them
will be very good indeed. A nation or a people—which before had been treated as a national minority or
worse still like an ethnic group—can now be in control of its own destiny as much (and as little) as any
nation-state can be in the modem world.23 States do come and go, and sometimes they break up, perhaps
without the conditions that Remedial Right Only Theories could sanction obtaining, with no great harm
resulting, and arguably sometimes with considerable gain, e.g. Iceland from Denmark and Norway from
Sweden. If Quebec should secede from Canada, Scotland from Britain, and Wales from Britain, their
thoroughly liberal democratic environments staying intact, it is anything but evident that that would not give
more people more control over their lives and a fuller self-realization than the continuing of the status quo.
Moreover, this could obtain without harming others in the remainder state. Quite possibly more good would
obtain all around. At the very minimum, this idea should not be rejected out of hand. Perhaps in some of
these cases—the case of Wales, for example—it would not be practically feasible. Here we should go case by
case. But there are no good grounds for the rejection of the putative right to secession on high moral or legal
principle. And, at the very least, none of the dire results that Buchanan believes must just go with secession
seem at all to be in the cards in such cases. It looks at least like it is better to go in the more permissive
direction of what Buchanan calls Primary Right Theories than in the direction of Remedial Right Only
Theories.
34
PTC Affirmative
PLAN POPULAR
This congress recently renewed the PTC for a decade and enacted portions of the Energy
Policy Act of 2005 both are consistent with the mandates of the plan.
The PTC is a tax credit Congress created to foster the production of renewable energy. The PTC is a broad
incentive - it has aided renewable energy developments from California to Maine. An examination of the
record of congressional debates surrounding the renewal of the PTC in 2005 makes clear Congress was
interested in both reducing dependence on foreign fossil [*286] fuels 78 and stimulating the growth of
domestic renewable energy businesses. 79 To this end, Congress decided to enact a tax incentive (the PTC)
that will cost taxpayers over $ 300 million a year over the next decade. 80 Congress has acted on its goals of
increasing renewable energy production by enacting the PTC - Congress has also acted on its goals of
increasing tribal energy resource production by enacting parts of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. Congress
would like tribal corporations to work toward resource development in the same manner as non-reservation
businesses. The 2005 Energy Policy Act articulates Congress' intent to foster energy development on tribal
lands. 81 The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, in its report on the bill, wrote "There are
abundant energy resources available for production on Indian lands. Development of those resources must be
encouraged." 82 Making the PTC tradable would merge those two goals. Congress should - and, the record
indicates, does - want Indian tribes to face the same set of incentives as non-Indian business entities. Both
logic and congressional action indicate that the government would want all economic activity within the
boundaries of the United States to face the same incentive system, in order to broadly encourage the activities
targeted by tax credits. Congress has articulated its goals of energy security and clean energy production.
Tribes, given the proper incentives, and a tradable PTC, can help the U.S. meet those goals.
Wind is politically popular and cost effective boosting domestic manufacturing industries
Traditional methods of electricity generation are faced with increasing difficulties: coal-fired generation is a
liability in the age of global warming; 7 natural gas prices are high and unpredictable; 8 nuclear power still
poses [*270] storage problems; 9 and there are few rivers in the U.S. left undammed for hydroelectricity. 10
These problems have opened up a market opportunity for wind-generated electricity. Wind power has stepped
in to fill the gap left by traditional power sources and provides new generation capacity. 11 Builders of wind
farms will add about 2750 megawatts (MW) of generating capacity in 2006, which will produce about as
much electricity as is used by the entire state of Rhode Island. 12 Wind enjoys three main advantages: price,
environmental benefits and economic benefits. When coupled with federal tax credits, new wind turbine
designs are now cost-competitive with new coal plants and natural gas generation. 13 With concerns of global
warming rising, wind is an energy source that results in few greenhouse gasses. Wind power also enjoys
political support for the positive impact it can have on domestic manufacturing industries. 14 Renewable
energy development brings high levels of economic benefits to the local community, when compared to
fossil-powered electricity. 15 Renewable energy is particularly popular in rural areas with few [*271] other
economic prospects. In 2006, a successful challenger for a U.S. Senate seat in Montana made wind power a
prominent part of his campaign. 16There is potential for tribes to play a major role in the U.S. wind industry.
As noted above, wind power on tribal lands could provide a substantial portion of U.S. electricity needs. 17
The Great Plains have wind in abundance, and many tribal reservations are located in the Great Plains. Wind
developers are interested in working with tribes because tribes are single landowners over vast, windy tracts
of land - the area within the Rosebud Reservation boundaries alone is larger than the land area of the entire
state of Rhode Island. Additionally, some power purchasers, realizing the economic plight of the reservations,
are willing to give the tribes better-than-market prices for tribally generated electricity. 18
35
PTC Affirmative
PLAN POPULAR
There has been bipartisan support for over a century to lessen tribal dependence on the
federal government--energy development policies like the plan are empirically popular.
Increasing tribal revenues from wind energy production - or any other economic activity that prospers off-
reservation in a tax-credit environment and could benefit tribes if tax credits are made tradable - is a good
way to meet federal goals of reducing tribal dependence. The reduction of tribal dependence has been a
congressional goal since the nineteenth century. Even during the passage of the Allotment Acts in the late
nineteenth century, the twisted logic of the time said that forcing tribal members into farming would push the
Indians toward "real and permanent progress." 83 This goal of reduced tribal dependence was first codified in
the economic development context nearly 100 years ago - in the Buy Indian Act of 1908. 84 The Act directs
the Department of Interior to give preference to Indians as far as is practicable in hiring and procurement. 85
The Buy Indian Act has been expanded over the years. In 1974, it was made to apply to all federal contracts.
86
Congress has been willing to extend the same type of support evinced by the Buy Indian Act to tribal
energy programs. For example, in 2001, the full House of Representatives passed the Hayworth amendment
to the proposed energy bill adding "energy products and energy by-products" to the categories of materials
covered under the Buy Indian Act. 87 That bill, House Bill 4, died in conference committee in 2002. However,
the ideas from the Hayworth amendment are incorporated into the Energy Policy Act of 2005 - the Act
provides for federal purchases of power generated by Indian tribes. 88 Even outside the energy development
or economic development contexts, the Federal Government has made clear through the years that it would
like to see the tribes less dependent on direct grants of federal dollars. The Reagan administration advocated
reduced tribal dependence in an important policy statement issued in 1983. "It is important to the concept of
self-government that tribes reduce their dependence on federal funds by providing a greater percentage of the
cost of their self-government," the administration wrote. 89 Any measures that give the tribes a leg up in the
economic development game reduce their economic dependency on the federal government. Wind power
development could play a role in this economic development, but only if tribes have access to the PTC. Wind
power development would provide the "greater percentage of the cost of [tribal] self government" that the
Reagan administration sought and it would push the tribes toward "real and permanent progress".
36
PTC Affirmative
PLAN UNPOPULAR
Non-Indian land owners will be angered by the loss of projects to natives

Under the proposal, the tribes can partner with an outside investor, and no matter what the respective
ownership percentages, the outside investor could still get the PTC's full value (and the tribe would be paid
consideration in fair exchange for this value). Ideally, the tribe would want to leverage the deal as much as it
could - borrowing its share of the project and bringing in an outside investor who could take the tax credits,
bring in cash and/or a good credit rating to satisfy the lender as to the project's viability, and drop out after
ten years. Importantly, the proposed change is revenue neutral. Very few wind farms of any size are built
without access to the PTC. So, whether a wind farm is built under partial tribal ownership or without tribal
ownership, the tax credits the wind farm generates - and, therefore, the cost to the U.S. government - would
be the same. A tradable PTC may meet some opposition from non-Indian landowners who are afraid of wind
projects moving to reservations instead of their land. However, wind sites are chosen for a multitude of
factors, including wind speeds and access to transmission - the tribes will be competing with others based on
these many factors, and the most economically feasible projects will [*285] go forward. Clearly, the
Western Governors' Association did not feel it much of a concern - they have backed the idea of a tradable
PTC. 75
37
PTC Affirmative
A2 SPENDING
PTC will lessen tribal dependence of federal grants

It is commonly thought that Indian tribes enjoy a significant business advantage because they are tax-free
entities. This is often true - an entity that does not pay 35% of its earnings to the government is generally
better off than one that does. However, in certain industries, the tax credits available are so great that not
paying taxes hurts the tribes in a side-by-side business comparison to taxable entities, such as corporations.
This paper will argue that tribes should be given the opportunity to transfer to tax-paying partners the tax
credits they would have earned from certain projects but for their tax-free status. Making tax credits tradable
for tribes will accomplish three important goals: (1) The federal government will be able to better promote
targeted economic activities by giving tribes the same financial incentives as the rest of the business
community; (2) Tribal dependence on federal grants will be reduced, as larger pools of investment capital
become available to tribes and tribal wealth increases; (3) As dependence is reduced, tribal sovereignty will
increase. This paper will examine the issue of tax credit tradability through the lens of wind energy projects,
which normally receive large tax credits, but which are structurally very difficult for tribes - as non-tax-
paying entities - to develop.
Wind brings high levels of economic benefits to local communities

Traditional methods of electricity generation are faced with increasing difficulties: coal-fired generation is a
liability in the age of global warming; 7 natural gas prices are high and unpredictable; 8 nuclear power still
poses [*270] storage problems; 9 and there are few rivers in the U.S. left undammed for hydroelectricity. 10
These problems have opened up a market opportunity for wind-generated electricity. Wind power has stepped
in to fill the gap left by traditional power sources and provides new generation capacity. 11 Builders of wind
farms will add about 2750 megawatts (MW) of generating capacity in 2006, which will produce about as
much electricity as is used by the entire state of Rhode Island. 12 Wind enjoys three main advantages: price,
environmental benefits and economic benefits. When coupled with federal tax credits, new wind turbine
designs are now cost-competitive with new coal plants and natural gas generation. 13 With concerns of global
warming rising, wind is an energy source that results in few greenhouse gasses. Wind power also enjoys
political support for the positive impact it can have on domestic manufacturing industries. 14 Renewable
energy development brings high levels of economic benefits to the local community, when compared to
fossil-powered electricity. 15 Renewable energy is particularly popular in rural areas with few [*271] other
economic prospects. In 2006, a successful challenger for a U.S. Senate seat in Montana made wind power a
prominent part of his campaign. 16There is potential for tribes to play a major role in the U.S. wind industry.
As noted above, wind power on tribal lands could provide a substantial portion of U.S. electricity needs. 17
The Great Plains have wind in abundance, and many tribal reservations are located in the Great Plains. Wind
developers are interested in working with tribes because tribes are single landowners over vast, windy tracts
of land - the area within the Rosebud Reservation boundaries alone is larger than the land area of the entire
state of Rhode Island. Additionally, some power purchasers, realizing the economic plight of the reservations,
are willing to give the tribes better-than-market prices for tribally generated electricity. 18
38
PTC Affirmative
A2 SPENDING
The federal government has already authorized the PTC for wind farms the plan makes
tax code revenue neutral allowing natives to compete for investors
Under the proposal, the tribes can partner with an outside investor, and no matter what the respective
ownership percentages, the outside investor could still get the PTC's full value (and the tribe would be paid
consideration in fair exchange for this value). Ideally, the tribe would want to leverage the deal as much as it
could - borrowing its share of the project and bringing in an outside investor who could take the tax credits,
bring in cash and/or a good credit rating to satisfy the lender as to the project's viability, and drop out after
ten years. Importantly, the proposed change is revenue neutral. Very few wind farms of any size are built
without access to the PTC. So, whether a wind farm is built under partial tribal ownership or without tribal
ownership, the tax credits the wind farm generates - and, therefore, the cost to the U.S. government - would
be the same. A tradable PTC may meet some opposition from non-Indian landowners who are afraid of wind
projects moving to reservations instead of their land. However, wind sites are chosen for a multitude of
factors, including wind speeds and access to transmission - the tribes will be competing with others based on
these many factors, and the most economically feasible projects will [*285] go forward. Clearly, the
Western Governors' Association did not feel it much of a concern - they have backed the idea of a tradable
PTC. 75

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Michigan Debate Institute

Observation One: Inherency

Tribal sovereignty is undermined by current federal jurisprudence. A nation-building

Suppression of self determination triggers war

Indigenous self determination is key to biodiversity

Pakistan wants Kashmiri self determination

US leadership is essential to prevent global nuclear exchange.

Another attack could kill millions

International support for internal self determination is key to democratization

Observation Two: Solvency

PTC→ ECONOMIC GROWTH

Tax credits solve the lack of capital investment in Indian Country

Renewable energy boosts the entire economy of the reservation

Credits are a prerequisite to wind industry development

Credits are necessary to offset tax liabilities in wind production

Lack of tax credits makes renewable energy unfeasible

TRIBAL WIND SOLVES ENERGY

INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES SECESSION

Internal self determination stops secession movements

Refusal to grant autonomy is the cause of secession

INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES SECESSION

Internal self determination prevents anarchy and international resistance.

INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES SECESSION

INTERNAL SELF DETERMINATION ≠ SECESSION

International institutions can safeguard a distinction between self determination and

SECESSION≠ DESTROY DEMOCRACY

SELF DETERMINATION K/T HUMAN RIGHTS

SELF DETERMINATION SOLVES CONFLICT

PAKISTAN K/T SOLVE TERRORISM

Pakistani cooperation is key to the coalition

Non-Indian land owners will be angered by the loss of projects to natives

PTC will lessen tribal dependence of federal grants

Wind brings high levels of economic benefits to local communities

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