Files from all phases of the case consisting of legal briefs, research, correspondence, trial manuscripts, and exhibits created by the offices of the various Assistant Attorney Generals that argued the case before Judges James Doyle and Barbara Crabb in Federal District Court. The records also include files concerning early treaty rights cases from the 1970s such as the Ben Ruby land rights case and the State's various legal actions against Ford, Miller, and White as well as Cecil and Leonard Peterson, all of which involved off-reservation hunting and fishing.

The Lac Courte Oreille (LCO) Band's March 1975 suit against Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Secretary Lester Voigt in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin marked the beginning of the much larger LCO proceedings. In March 1976 LCO vs. Voigt and U.S. vs. Ben Ruby were combined and put before Judge James Doyle and in October 1978 both cases were decided, along with another case, in U.S. vs. Bouchard. In that decision Judge Doyle concluded that while the Presidential removal order of 1850 was not valid, the Band's off-reservation rights had been terminated by the 1854 treaty. Both the State and the LCO Band appealed this decision. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago decided LCO I, or the Voigt Decision, on January 25, 1983 concluding that Judge Doyle was correct regarding the removal order but found that the Chippewa (Ojibwe) had not given up their off-reservation hunting rights in the 1854 treaty. Appeals of that decision were declined by the Supreme Court and the case was returned to Judge Doyle in December 1983 so that the extent of the treaty rights and state regulation of the rights could be determined.

The LCO case was divided into three phases (Declaratory, Regulatory, and Damages) consisting of nine main decisions (LCO I-LCO IX) as well as a series of interim agreements and other stipulations. Judge Doyle's partial summary judgment regarding the lands available to the tribes was vacated by the Seventh Circuit Court on April 24, 1985 (LCO II) and a trial was held over December 9-16, 1985 to determine the scope of the treaty rights in question resulting in LCO III, the February 18, 1987 decision that treaty rights include all the resources utilized by the Chippewa (Ojibwe) when the treaties were signed and specified what lands were open to tribal use.

Judge Doyle presided over LCO I-III until his death in March of 1987, after which Judge Barbara Crabb was assigned to the case and ruled on LCO IV-IX. The first decision of the Regulatory Phase of the case was handed down on August 21, 1987, when Judge Crabb ruled in LCO IV that the State was allowed to regulate treaty rights with the interests of conservation, health, and safety in mind. Over March 21-24, 1988, a trial was held to determine what the term “moderate” or “modest standard of living” meant with regard to the harvest of natural resources. The resulting LCO v. decision of June 3, 1988 stated that “modest living” was not a credible standard and that the ceded territories did not hold enough resources for such a living and that there was no need for allocation of limits to harvests. A trial held over October 11th and November 2, 1988 focused on the harvesting of walleye and muskellunge resulting in the LCO VI decision of March 3, 1989 that established the idea of “safe harvest” through the enforcement of tribal conservation standards. Between August 7 and 10, 1989 a trial considering the harvest of deer, small game, and other fur bearers was held and on May 9, 1990 Judge Crabb ruled in LCO VII that, as with fish, the tribes could conduct their own regulation of hunting and harvesting. There was no trial regarding the harvest of wild rice but Judge Crabb issued a stipulation in September of 1989 and the tribes agreed to continue to share the resource.

The Damages Phase of the case began after the conclusion of the Regulatory Phase and on October 11th, 1990, Judge Crabb issued LCO VIII which contended that states are protected from tribal suits under the Eleventh Amendment of the Constitution. The final decision in the case (LCO IX) considered the harvest of timber by the tribes. Judge Crabb ruled on February 21, 1991, that timber harvest was not a traditional tribal practice and accordingly the tribes were not entitled to special commercial timber rights. Following the timber decision, Judge Crabb issued her final judgment on March 19, 1991. The case was officially concluded on May 20, 1991 when both the State and the LCO Band issued statements agreeing not to appeal any of the nine LCO decisions or the final judgment.