In Alaska, Tradition is a Powerful Legal Concept, Appearing in a Wide Variety of Legal Contexts GMAT Reading Comprehension

Reading Passage Question

In Alaska, tradition is a powerful legal concept, appearing in a wide variety of legal contexts relating to natural-resource and public-lands activities. Both state and federal laws in the United States assign privileges and exemptions to individuals engaged in “traditional” activities using otherwise off-limits land and resources. But in spite of its prevalence in statutory law, the term “tradition” is rarely defined. Instead, there seems to be a presumption that its meaning is obvious. Failure to define “tradition” clearly in written law has given rise to problematic and inconsistent legal results.

One of the most prevalent ideas associated with the term “tradition” in the law is that tradition is based on long-standing practice, where “long-standing” refers not only to the passage of time but also to the continuity and regularity of a practice. But two recent court cases involving indigenous use of sea otter pelts illustrate the problems that can arise in the application of this sense of “traditional.”

The hunting of sea otters was initially prohibited by the Fur Seal Treaty of 1910. The Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) of 1972 continued the prohibition, but it also included an Alaska Native exemption, which allowed takings of protected animals for use in creating authentic native articles by means of “traditional native handicrafts.” The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) subsequently issued regulations defining authentic native articles as those “commonly produced” before 1972, when the MMPA took effect. Not covered by the exemption, according to the FWS, were items produced from sea otter pelts, because Alaska Natives had not produced such handicrafts “within living memory.”

In 1986, FWS agents seized articles of clothing made from sea otter pelts from Marina Katelnikoff, an Aleut. She sued, but the district court upheld the FWS regulations. Then in 1991 Katelnikoff joined a similar suit brought by Boyd Dickinson, a Tlingit from whom articles of clothing made from sea otter pelts had also been seized. After hearing testimony establishing that Alaska Natives had made many uses of sea otters before the occupation of the territory by Russia in the late 1700s, the court reconsidered what constituted a traditional item under the statute. The court now held that the FWS’s regulations were based on a “strained interpretation” of the word “traditional,” and that the reference to “living memory” imposed an excessively restrictive time frame. The court stated, “The fact that Alaskan natives were prevented, by circumstances beyond their control, from exercising a tradition for a given period of time does not mean that it has been lost forever or that it has become any less a ‘tradition.’ It defies common sense to define ‘traditional’ in such a way that only those traditions that were exercised during a comparatively short period in history could qualify as ‘traditional.”

“In Alaska, tradition is a powerful legal concept, appearing in a wide variety of legal contexts”- is a GMAT reading comprehension passage with answers. Candidates need a strong knowledge of English GMAT reading comprehension.

This GMAT Reading Comprehension consists of 7 comprehension questions. The GMAT Reading Comprehension questions are designed for the purpose of testing candidates’ abilities in understanding, analyzing, and applying information or concepts. Candidates can actively prepare with the help of GMAT Reading Comprehension Practice Questions.

Solution and Explanation

Question 1
Which one of the following most accurately expresses the main point of the passage?

(A) Two cases involving the use of sea otter pelts by Alaska Natives illustrate the difficulties surrounding the application of the legal concept of tradition in Alaska.
(B) Two court decisions have challenged the notion that for an activity to be considered “traditional,” it must be shown to be a long-standing activity that has been regularly and continually practiced.
(C) Two court cases involving the use of sea otter pelts by Alaska Natives exemplify the wave of lawsuits that are now occurring in response to changes in natural-resource and public-lands regulations.
(D) Definitions of certain legal terms long taken for granted are being reviewed in light of new evidence that has come from historical sources relating to Alaska Native culture.
(E) Alaskan state laws and U.S. federal laws are being challenged by Alaska Natives because the laws are not sufficiently sensitive to indigenous peoples’ concerns.

Question 2
The court in the 1991 case referred to the FWS’s interpretation of the term “traditional” as “strained” (Highlighted) because, in the court’s view, the interpretation

(A) ignored the ways in which Alaska Natives have historically understood the term “traditional”
(B) was not consonant with any dictionary definition of “traditional”
(C) was inconsistent with what the term “traditional” is normally understood to mean
(D) led the FWS to use the word “traditional” to describe a practice that should not have been described as such
(E) failed to specify which handicrafts qualified to be designated as “traditional”

Question 3
According to the passage, the court’s decision in the 1991 case was based on which one of the following?

(A) a narrow interpretation of the term “long-standing”
(B) a common-sense interpretation of the phrase “within living memory”
(C) strict adherence to the intent of FWS regulations
(D) a new interpretation of the Fur Seal Treaty of 1910
(E) testimony establishing certain historical facts

Question 4
The passage most strongly suggests that the court in the 1986 case believed that “traditional” should be defined in a way that

(A) reflects a compromise between the competing concerns surrounding the issue at hand
(B) emphasizes the continuity and regularity of practices to which the term is applied
(C) reflects the term’s usage in everyday discourse
(D) encourages the term’s application to recently developed, as well as age-old, activities
(E) reflects the concerns of the people engaging in what they consider to be traditional activities

Question 5
Which one of the following is most strongly suggested by the passage?

(A) Between 1910 and 1972, Alaska Natives were prohibited from hunting sea otters.
(B) Traditional items made from sea otter pelts were specifically mentioned in the Alaska Native exemption of the MMPA.
(C) In the late 1700s, Russian hunters pressured the Russian government to bar Alaska Natives from hunting sea otters.
(D) By 1972, the sea otter population in Alaska had returned to the levels at which it had been prior to the late 1700s.
(E) Prior to the late 1700s, sea otters were the marine animal most often hunted by Alaska Natives.

Question 6
The author’s reference to the Fur Seal Treaty (Highlighted) primarily serves to

(A) establish the earliest point in time at which fur seals were considered to be on the brink of extinction
(B) indicate that several animals in addition to sea otters were covered by various regulatory exemptions issued over the years
(C) demonstrate that there is a well-known legal precedent for prohibiting the hunting of protected animals
(D) suggest that the sea otter population was imperiled by Russian seal hunters and not by Alaska Natives
(E) help explain the evolution of Alaska Natives’ legal rights with respect to handicrafts defined as “traditional”

Question 7
The ruling in the 1991 case would be most relevant as a precedent for deciding in a future case that which one of the following is a “traditional” Alaska Native handicraft?

(A) A handicraft no longer practiced but shown by archaeological evidence to have been common among indigenous peoples several millennia ago
(B) A handicraft that commonly involves taking the pelts of more than one species that has been designated as endangered
(C) A handicraft that was once common but was discontinued when herd animals necessary for its practice abandoned their local habitat due to industrial development
(D) A handicraft about which only a very few indigenous craftspeople were historically in possession of any knowledge
(E) A handicraft about which young Alaska Natives know little because, while it was once common, few elder Alaska Natives still practice it

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