WATT, SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR, ET AL. v. ALASKA
No. 79-1890
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Argued January 13, 1981—Decided April 21, 1981
451 U.S. 259
*Together with No. 79-1904, Kenai Peninsula Borough v. Alaska et al., also on certiorari to the same court.
Deputy Solicitor General Claiborne argued the cause for petitioners in No. 79-1890. With him on the briefs were Solicitor General McCree, Assistant Attorney General Moorman, and Dirk D. Snel. Charles K. Cranston argued the cause and filed briefs for petitioner in No. 79-1904.
G. Thomas Koester, Assistant Attorney General of Alaska, argued the cause for respondents in both cases. With him on the brief was Wilson L. Condon, Attorney General.
JUSTICE POWELL delivered the opinion of the Court.
The narrow issue presented by these cases is which of two federal statutes provides the formula for distribution of revenues received from oil and gas leases on national wildlife refuges reserved from public lands.
I
The Kenai National Moose Range was created in 1941 by the withdrawal of nearly two million acres from public lands on the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska. See Exec. Order No. 8979, 3 CFR 1043 (1938-1943 Comp.). See also Public Land Order No. 3400, 29 Fed. Reg. 7094-7095 (1964) (adjusting the boundaries). The Kenai Moose Range, as its name suggests, provides a refuge and breeding ground for moose. The Fish and Wildlife Service in the Department of the Interior administers it as part of the national wildlife refuge system.
The Kenai Peninsula Borough then brought suit against the Secretary of the Interior in the United States District Court for the District of Alaska, seeking a declaration that the amended § 401 (a) of the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act governed the distribution of oil and gas revenues from the Kenai Moose Range. Kenai Borough is the “county” within which the Moose Range lies. If § 401 (a) governs, it will receive 25% of the revenues and the State none. The State of Alaska then filed suit in the same court against the Secretary and various federal officials, seeking a declaration that § 35 of the Mineral Leasing Act still governed distribution of these same oil and gas revenues. If that provision applies, the State will continue to receive 90% of the funds and, so far as federal law is concerned, Kenai Borough none. The District Court consolidated the lawsuits.6
The District Court granted summary judgment for the State of Alaska. 436 F. Supp. 288 (1977). Upon exami-
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed. 612 F. 2d 1210 (1980). That court found the legislative history largely ambiguous. Id., at 1213. It refused to find that the addition of the word “minerals” to the amended Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act had repealed by implication the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 without a clear showing that this was the intent of Congress. See Morton v. Mancari, 417 U. S. 535, 549-551 (1974). The court further approved the District Court‘s holding because it gave effect to each statute. 612 F. 2d, at 1214-1215.
We granted certiorari. Sub nom. Andrus v. Alaska, 449 U. S. 818 (1980).8 We now affirm.
The Secretary and the Kenai Borough rely primarily on the “plain language” of § 401 (a) of the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act. They contend that it provides without ambiguity that mineral resources from all national wildlife refuges be distributed according to the formula described in § 401 (a) of the Act. As currently phrased, § 401 (a) provides:
“[A]ll revenues received by the Secretary of the Interior from the sale or other disposition of animals, salmonoid carcassas [sic], timber, hay, grass, or other products of the soil, minerals, shells, sand, or gravel, [or] from other privileges . . . shall be . . . reserved in a separate fund for disposition as hereafter prescribed.”
16 U. S. C. § 715s (a) (1976 ed., Supp. III).
The provision defines the wildlife refuge system to include lands “acquired or reserved” for conservation and protection of certain fish and wildlife. No restriction is placed upon the common meaning of “minerals.” Given this clarity, it is argued, resort to the legislative history is unnecessary or improper.
We agree with the Secretary that “[t]he starting point in every case involving construction of a statute is the language itself.” Blue Chip Stamps v. Manor Drug Stores, 421 U. S. 723, 756 (1975) (POWELL, J., concurring).
Sole reliance on the “plain language” of § 401 (a) would assume the answer to the question at issue. These cases involve two statutes, each of which by its literal terms applies to the facts before us. Restatement of the terms of § 401 (a) cannot answer which statute Congress intended to control. Recognizing this, the Secretary invokes the maxim of construction that the more recent of two irreconcilably conflicting statutes governs. 2A C. Sands, Sutherland on Statutes and Statutory Construction § 51.02 (4th ed. 1973). Without depreciating this general rule, we decline to read the statutes as being in irreconcilable conflict without seeking to ascertain the actual intent of Congress. Our examination of the
III
Congress gave extensive consideration to the purpose and probable effect of the 1964 amendments to the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act. Pub. L. 88-523, 78 Stat. 701. Nonetheless, and we think it significant, there is no explanation in the legislative history for the addition of the single word “minerals” to the list of refuge resources subject to the Act. See H. R. Rep. No. 1753, 88th Cong., 2d Sess. (1964) (hereinafter 1964 H. R. Rep.); S. Rep. No. 1096, 88th Cong., 2d Sess. (1964) (hereinafter 1964 S. Rep.); 110 Cong. Rec. 19882-19883 (1964) (remarks of Rep. Ostertag). Our study of the few legislative materials pertinent to the insertion of “minerals” persuades us that Congress intended to work no change in the pre-existing formula for distribution of mineral revenues from federal wildlife refuges.
A
Prior to 1964, § 35 of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 governed distribution of revenues from mineral leases on wildlife refuges withdrawn from public lands. This conclusion cannot be seriously questioned. First, from the time the first mineral revenues were generated on such lands until well after 1964, the Secretary invariably distributed the revenues as provided in the Mineral Leasing Act. Second, the Comptroller General long ago ruled that the only other arguably
Third, our opinion in Udall v. Tallman, 380 U. S. 1 (1965), strongly suggests that the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 governed the distribution of revenues from reserved refuge lands prior to 1964. That case involved the authority of the Secretary to issue oil leases on the Kenai Moose Range after the lands had been withdrawn from the public domain by
Neither the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 nor the 1935 Refuge Act authorized the Secretary to issue leases for mineral extraction from refuges created from acquired lands. 40 Op. Atty. Gen. 9 (1941) (Attorney General Jackson); 21 Comp. Gen. 873 (1942). Congress responded by passing the Mineral Leasing Act for Acquired Lands, Act of Aug. 7, 1947, ch. 513, 61 Stat. 913,
B
The question presented by these cases is whether Congress intended to alter this program of revenue distribution when it amended the 1935 Refuge Act in 1964. The impetus for proposals leading to the passage of the amendments was the difficulty the Department had experienced in acquiring new refuge lands. See 1964 S. Rep. 5; 1964 H. R. Rep. 2. Localities resisted having land removed from local tax roles. The purpose of the amendments was to “provide a more equitable formula for payments to counties as compensation for loss of taxable properties that have been acquired by the Federal wildlife refuge system.” 1964 S. Rep. 2. See 1964 H. R. Rep. 2-3. Public Law 88-523 met this problem by changing the formula for distribution of revenues from refuges consisting of acquired lands. § 401 (c) (1), 78 Stat. 701. The new formula provided that counties within which acquired refuge lands lay could receive, at their option, a payment based on the adjusted cost of the lands rather than on revenues produced.12 Congress intended the Department to pay more to counties under the new law than it had under the old.
There is no explanation in the legislative history of Pub. L. 88-523 for the insertion of “minerals” in the list of resources
During deliberations on the amendments, the Fish and Wildlife Service presented to Senate and House Committees tables showing present payments to counties containing refuges, and payments estimated under the proposed amendments. 1964 S. Rep. 13; 1964 H. R. Rep. 3. The relevant table shows no change in the expected payments to the Borough of Kenai Peninsula. This table assumed that oil and gas revenues were governed by the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 both before and after the amendments.15
The insertion of “minerals” in § 401 (a) could both leave the mineral revenues from reserved lands subject to the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920 and “perfect” § 401 (a) by incorporating prior changes. The 1947 Mineral Leasing Act for Acquired Lands subjected mineral revenues from lands acquired for wildlife refuges to the distribution formula in the 1935 Refuge Act. We hold that Congress inserted “minerals” in the amended § 401 (a) to recognize the effect of the 1947 Act and to make clear that the amended distribution formula applied to mineral revenues from acquired lands. This conclusion draws support from the evident fact that Congress was concerned almost exclusively with problems related to acquired refuge lands in adopting the 1964 amendments.
Finally, the Department of the Interior interpreted the amendments when passed, and for 10 years thereafter, as not altering the distribution formula. The Department‘s con-
IV
In summary, we hold that revenues generated by oil and gas leases on federal wildlife refuges consisting of reserved public lands must be distributed according to the formula provided in § 35 of the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920. Finding no “clearly expressed congressional intention” to repeal this provision by implication, Morton v. Mancari, 417 U. S., at 551, we conclude that the term “minerals” in § 401 (a) of the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act applies only to minerals on acquired refuge lands. Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE STEVENS, concurring.
My colleagues periodically criticize the way the Court manages its docket. Most frequently, such criticism takes the form of a dissent from the denial of certiorari. See, e. g., Brown Transport Corp. v. Atcon, Inc., 439 U. S. 1014 (WHITE, J., dissenting). Although I consider the practice of dissenting from denials of certiorari counterproductive, see Singleton v. Commissioner, 439 U. S. 940, 942-946 (opinion of STEVENS, J.), in the context of the present cases it may be appropriate to suggest that the Court may misuse its scarce resources not only by occasionally denying certiorari in cases deserving plenary consideration, but also by granting certio-
In these cases, the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit should have been permitted to provide the final answer to the unique question of statutory construction presented by the petitions for certiorari. The decision of the Court of Appeals did not conflict with any other judicial decision, and there is no reason to anticipate that a comparable issue will arise in another Circuit in the foreseeable future.2 I fully agree with the majority‘s explanation of why the Court of Appeals correctly read these ambiguous statutes, but even if I were persuaded that JUSTICE STEWART had the better of the argument, I still would feel that the public interest would have been better served by allowing this litigation to terminate in the Court of Appeals.
The question of how to divide the revenues from oil and gas leases on public lands in the Kenai Peninsula is clearly a matter for Congress to decide. If Congress is displeased with the decisions of this Court and the Court of Appeals, it may promptly reverse them by revising the relevant statutes. If that is its view, it no doubt would have acted more promptly if we had simply denied certiorari.3 On the other
The federal judicial system is undergoing profound changes. Among the most significant is the increase in the importance of our courts of appeals. Today they are in truth the courts of last resort for almost all federal litigation. Like other courts of last resort—including this one—they occasionally render decisions that will not withstand the test of time. No judicial system is perfect and no appellate structure can entirely eliminate judicial error. Most certainly, this Court does not sit primarily to correct what we perceive to be mistakes committed by other tribunals. Although our work is often accorded special respect because of its finality,4 we possess no judicial monopoly on either finality or respect. The quality of the work done by the courts of appeals merits the esteem of the entire Nation, but, unfortunately, is not nearly as well or as widely recognized as it should be. Indeed, I believe that if we accorded those dedicated appellate judges the deference that their work merits, we would be better able to resist the temptation to grant certiorari for no reason other than a tentative prediction that our review of a case may produce an answer different from theirs. In my opinion, that is not a sufficient reason for granting certiorari.5
My disagreement in these cases with the Court‘s management of its docket does not, of course, prevent me from joining JUSTICE POWELL‘S opinion for the Court on the merits.
JUSTICE STEWART, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and JUSTICE MARSHALL join, dissenting.
Today the Court strains to conclude that Congress did not mean what it said, and judicially repeals a reasonable1
A
The Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act, as amended in 1964, expressly provides that “all revenues received by the Secretary of the Interior from the sale or other disposition of . . . minerals . . .” within federal wildlife refuges administered by the Fish and Wildlife Service shall be “reserved in a separate fund for disposition as hereafter prescribed.”
The Court argues that the addition of the word “minerals” to the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act must be read to apply only to acquired refuge lands and not to reserved refuge lands. But there is no support, in law or legislative history, for exempting mineral revenues from refuges consisting of reserved public lands from the distribution formula of the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act. The District Court concluded that “there is nothing in
The addition of the word “minerals” to the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act in 1964 would be meaningless if it reached only leases of acquired lands. And, “[i]n construing a statute we are obliged to give effect, if possible, to every word Congress used.” Reiter v. Sonotone Corp., 442 U. S. 330, 339 (1979). Section 6 of the Mineral Leasing Act for Acquired Lands,
B
The Court concludes that the statute does not mean what it says because the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act of 1964 is in conflict with the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920,3
The maxim that “repeals by implication are disfavored” has force when the argument is made that a general statute, wholly occupying a field, eviscerates an earlier and more specific enactment of limited coverage but without an indication of congressional intent to do so. In such a case, it may be reasonable to presume that Congress had not antici-
Thus, in Morton v. Mancari, 417 U. S. 535, the Court refused to find a repeal where the words of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act of 1972, if taken literally, would have worked a repeal of an Indian preference policy consistently recognized by Congress for almost 40 years. The Court‘s description of Mancari as “a prototypical case where an adjudication of repeal by implication is not appropriate,” id., at 550, is instructive: “The preference is a longstanding, important component of the Government‘s Indian program. The anti-discrimination provision, aimed at alleviating minority discrimination in employment, obviously is designed to deal with an entirely different and, indeed, opposite problem.” Ibid.; see also Fussell v. Gregg, 113 U. S. 550. The contrast with these cases is obvious. The provision in the more recent enactment deals specifically with the same subject—distribution of revenue from leases on federal lands—that had been the object of an earlier, and more general,4 statute. In any case, there is more than enough evidence
The legislative history of the 1964 amendments to
It is therefore very difficult to conclude that the addition was inadvertent or unnoticed.7 But, in any case, nothing in the legislative history demonstrates congressional intent different from that reflected in the words of the statute. “The most that can be said for the legislative history is that it is on the whole inconclusive. Certainly, it contains nothing that requires the court to reject the construction which the statu-
The Court today is bothered because the literal meaning of a statute altered prevailing law.8 But usually the very point of new legislation is to alter prevailing law. “Every act is made, either for the purpose of making a change in the law, or for the purpose of better declaring the law; and its operation is not to be impeded by the mere fact that it is inconsistent with some previous enactment.” T. Sedgwick, The Interpretation and Construction of Statutory and Constitutional Law 104 (2d ed. 1874). Congress does not have the affirmative obligation to explain to this Court why it deems a particular enactment wise or necessary, or to demonstrate that it is aware of the consequences of its action.9 See Harrison v. PPG Industries, Inc., 446 U. S. 578, 592. And “[i]t
Rather than join the Court in its speculative efforts to deal with the doctrine of implied repeal, I would rest decision of these cases upon an established rule of statutory construction: leges posteriores, priores contrarias abrogant. Sedgwick describes this rule with approval as follows: “‘If two inconsistent acts be passed at different times, the last,’ said the Master of the Rolls, ‘is to be obeyed; and if obedience cannot be observed without derogating from the first, it is the first which must give way.‘” Sedgwick, supra, at 104. See District of Columbia v. Hutton, 143 U. S. 18, 26-27; Henderson‘s Tobacco, 11 Wall. 652, 657; United States v. Tynen, 11 Wall. 88, 92. Observance of this rule also allows the Court to respect the most basic of all canons of statutory construction: that statutes mean what they plainly say.10 As Chief Justice Marshall said more than a century and a half ago: “[T]he intention of the legislature is to be collected from the words they employ. Where there is no ambiguity in the words there is no room for construction. The case must
I respectfully dissent.
Notes
“All money received from sales, bonuses, royalties, and rentals of the public lands under the provisions of this chapter . . . shall be paid into the Treasury of the United States; . . . of those from Alaska . . . 90 per centum thereof shall be paid to the State of Alaska for disposition by the legislature . . . .”
States other than Alaska receive only 50% of public land mineral revenues under the Act. Ibid.
By its terms, the Mineral Leasing Act applies to specified minerals, including oil and gas, on all lands owned by the United States, except those lands excluded by the Act.
Section 401 of the 1935 Act established a distribution scheme for refuge revenues “from the sale or other disposition” of natural resources and receipts “from other privileges.” Although oil and gas leases are not mentioned, the provision was intended to give the administering agency broad authority to make “disposition of surplus . . . products on these reservations or refuges upon such terms and conditions as [it] shall determine to be for the best interests of the Government.” H. R. Rep. No. 886, 74th Cong., 1st Sess., 3 (1934). In 1946, the Interior Department ruled that oil and gas leases could be granted on wildlife refuge lands under the 1935 Act. Op. Solic. Interior Dept. M. 34516 (Aug. 5, 1946). Under the 1964 amendments to the Wildlife Refuge Revenue Sharing Act, 25% of oil and gas lease revenues are apportioned to the affected counties embracing reserved refuge lands. Accordingly, Congress may have intended that the addition of the word “minerals” in
Indeed, Interior Department spokesmen in the 1962, 1963, and 1964 congressional hearings described the existing law for receipts collected from both reserved public lands and acquired lands as generally subject to § 401 of the 1935 Act. See S. Rep. No. 1919, supra, at 2, 13; H. R. Rep. No. 2499, supra, at 4; H. R. Rep. No. 1753, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 14 (1964); S. Rep. No. 1096, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 25 (1964). The Secretary of the Interior stated that “[u]nder existing law, enacted in 1935, the counties in which our refuges are located receive 25 percent of the net revenue from operations on national wildlife refuges, such as oil production, grazing, timber harvest, and the like.” More Equitable Payments To Counties Having Wildlife Refuges: Hearings on S. 179, S. 1363, S. 1720, and S. 2498 before the Senate Committee on Commerce, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 19 (1964) (emphasis added); Participation By Counties In Refuge Receipts: Hearings on H. R. 1127, H. R. 2393, H. R. 5596, H. R. 9030 and H. R. 11008 before the Subcommittee on Fisheries and Wildlife Conservation of the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, 88th Cong., 2d Sess., 34 (1964) (emphasis added).
But it is not important to decide today what the true rule for apportionment of mineral resources from refuge lands was before 1964. And, contrary to the Court‘s assertion, I do not do so here, and “explai[n] that Congress added ‘minerals’ . . . to reaffirm” that the 1935 Act already controlled the disposition of oil revenues from reserved refuge lands. Ante, at 268, n. 10. In 1964, Congress did not have to resolve the question of what the law had been before; its concern was properly with the future. Ideally, it could have prefaced § 715s with the language “notwithstanding any other provision of law.” But it did not. Instead, it introduced an entirely unambiguous prospective rule with the phrase: “Beginning with the next full fiscal year and for each fiscal year thereafter . . . .” At least for me, it needed to do no more.
“(1) The Secretary shall pay out the fund, for each fiscal year . . . , to each county in which is situated any fee area whichever of the following amounts is greater:
“(A) An amount equal to the product of 75 cents multiplied by the total acreage of that portion of the fee area which is located within such county.
“(B) An amount equal to three-fourths of 1 per centum of the fair market value, as determined by the Secretary, of that portion of the fee area which is located within such county.
“(C) An amount equal to 25 per centum of the net receipts collected by the Secretary in connection with operation of and management of such fee area during the fiscal year . . . .
“(2) At the end of each fiscal year the Secretary shall pay out of the fund for such fiscal year to each county in which any reserve area is situated, an amount equal to 25 per centum of the net receipts collected by the Secretary in connection with operation and management of such area during such fiscal year . . . .”
Section 401 (b) allows the Secretary to pay any expenses related to revenue production or distribution from this fund. Section 401 (e) provides that funds remaining after expenses and the States are paid are transferred to the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund, established for the laudable purpose of purchasing migratory bird refuges. The possibility that a lower court may have incorrectly decided a federal question is, of course, a relevant factor when this Court decides whether to exercise its discretionary certiorari jurisdiction. However, as Rule 17.1 of the Rules of this Court makes plain, our certiorari jurisdiction is designed to serve purposes broader than the correction of error in particular cases:
“A review on writ of certiorari is not a matter of right, but of judicial discretion, and will be granted only when there are special and important reasons therefor. The following, while neither controlling nor fully measuring the Court‘s discretion, indicate the character of reasons that will be considered.
“(a) When a federal court of appeals has rendered a decision in conflict with the decision of another federal court of appeals on the same matter; or has decided a federal question in a way in conflict with a state court of last resort; or has so far departed from the accepted and usual course of judicial proceedings, or has so far sanctioned such a departure by a lower court, as to call for an exercise of this Court‘s power of supervision.
“(b) When a state court of last resort has decided a federal question in a way in conflict with the decision of another state court of last resort or of a federal court of appeals.
“(c) When a state court or a federal court of appeals has decided an important question of federal law which has not been, but should be, settled by this Court, or has decided a federal question in a way in conflict with applicable decisions of this Court.”
By its own terms, Rule 17.1 “neither control[s] nor fully measur[es]” the extent of our discretion to grant or to deny certiorari. Nonetheless, it is surely significant that none of the factors identified in the Rule can fairly be said to be present in these cases. These cases do not involve an apparent limitation on an important and pervasive statute, such as the Sherman Act. See, e. g., United States v. Borden Co., 308 U. S. 188. In such a case, as in Mancari, implied repeals are not found because it would be unreasonable to assume Congress would alter fundamental policy without an unambiguous expression of its intent to do so. But it is equally unreasonable to expect Congress to specify, or indeed even to consider, the effect of a new statutory provision on all earlier provisions affecting the same subject that may be swept away by the enactment, particularly if the old provisions are unclear. See n. 3, supra.
The sole issue that has been before the courts during this five years of litigation is the intent of Congress in adding the single term “minerals” to the statute in 1964. Congress declined to clarify its intent in 1978. Accordingly, we are left to resolve by judicial construction what should be addressed as a question of legislative policy judgment: the appropriate distribution among federal, state, and local governments of natural resource revenues. This is not a case where the plain meaning of statutory language would lead to an absurd or futile result, see, e. g., Armstrong Paint & Varnish Works v. Nu-Enamel Corp., 305 U. S. 315, or to an unreasonable result at variance with the policy of the legislation as a whole. See, e. g., United States v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 310 U. S. 534. See also Shapiro v. United States, 335 U. S. 1, 31.
As noted, the Comptroller General rejected this contention in 1942 and 1951. For the reasons elaborated in the text, we believe that it was understood by Congress that the 1935 Refuge Act did not govern the leasing of minerals. Indeed, even the 1946 opinion of the Solicitor of the Department of the Interior that the provision authorized oil leases on acquired refuge lands, App. 68, is contradicted by Congress’ passage of the Mineral Leasing Act for Acquired Lands, Act of Aug. 7, 1947, ch. 513, 61 Stat. 913,
The dissent also speculates inconsistently, we think, that Congress embraced this often discredited interpretation of the 1935 Refuge Act, post, at 279-280, n. 3. The dissent criticizes the Court for concluding that Congress’ insertion of “minerals” in § 401 (a) did not change pre-existing law. Post, at 278-279. The dissent then explains that Congress added “minerals” in 1964 not to change the law, but to reaffirm that the 1935 Refuge Act already governed disposition of oil revenues from reserved refuge lands. Post, at 279-280, n. 3. In other words, the dissent contradicts itself and joins us in positing that the addition of “minerals” was never intended to work a substantive change, but disagrees merely about what the law provided prior to the 1964 amendments. Of course, if I am wrong, and Congress did not intend that oil revenues from reserved refuge lands be distributed according to the scheme of the 1964 Act, Congress is always free to revise the statute. It would be far more appropriate, given the constitutional allocation of lawmaking power to Congress and not to the courts, if this Court were to respect the plain meaning of the statute, and leave it to Congress to make any changes it thinks necessary. The Court‘s readiness to rewrite legislation contributes, I am afraid, to undue congressional willingness to leave it to the courts to do its redrafting. Indeed, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, when confronted with the dispute involved in these cases chose to “tak[e] no position as to whether disposition of mineral revenues should be made pursuant to the Mineral Leasing Act or the Refuge Revenue Sharing Act.” S. Rep. No. 95-1174, pp. 4, 8 (1978). See also ante, at 264-265, n. 8.