Siding with a Valley Center tribe, a federal judge ruled this week the state should make available more than 13,000 new slot machine licenses for California Indian casinos.

The case stems from a long-running dispute between gambling tribes and the state on the total number of slot machines Indian casinos are legally allowed to operate in California. An agreement struck between the two sides in 1999 was vaguely worded and has been interpreted differently by tribes and the state.

State regulators had set a cap at 32,151 machines. A judge in a separate case ordered the state to raise the cap to 42,700 last year.

Under the ruling issued Wednesday in the Rincon case, Judge William McCurine Jr. raised the total to 55,952.

The Rincon Band of Mission Indians, which owns the Harrah's Rincon Casino and Resort near Valley Center, sued the state in federal court to settle the question, saying the governor was using the lower slot machine cap to force tribes to negotiate larger payments for the state.

The tribe said those payments amounted to an illegal tax on tribes