In the United States v. Carver et al., 1928, the Supreme Court ruled on a case involving federal jurisdiction over crimes committed on Native American reservations. The defendants, non-Native Americans who were charged with introducing alcohol onto an Indian reservation in violation of federal law, argued that they could not be prosecuted because the land had been allotted to individual tribal members and was no longer considered "Indian country." However, the court disagreed and upheld their convictions. It held that even though lands within reservations may have been allotted to individuals under various Congressional acts aimed at assimilating Native Americans into mainstream society by encouraging private property ownership among them, such allotments did not remove these lands from being classified as "Indian country" for purposes of enforcing federal criminal laws prohibiting introduction of liquor into such areas.

In the dissenting opinion for United States v. Carver et al., Justice Holmes argued that the majority's decision was based on an overly broad interpretation of federal law and a disregard for state rights. He contended that Congress did not intend to regulate every aspect of interstate commerce, but only those aspects which directly affected it. In this case, he believed that the defendants' actions were too remote from interstate commerce to fall under federal jurisdiction. Furthermore, he asserted that by extending federal authority into areas traditionally governed by states, such as local crime control, the Court was undermining principles of federalism and infringing upon state sovereignty. Thus, in his view, the convictions should have been overturned because they were based on an unconstitutional application of federal law.