Posted on 11/29/2018 2:31:07 AM PST by T-Bird45
A Supreme Court case about jurisdiction in an obscure murder has huge implications for tribes.
On the morning of June 22, 1839, the Cherokee leader John Ridge was pulled from his bed, dragged into his front yard and stabbed 84 times while his family watched. He was assassinated for signing the Cherokee Nation’s removal treaty, a document that — in exchange for the tribe’s homelands — promised uninterrupted sovereignty over a third of the land in present-day Oklahoma. That promise was not kept.
Sixty-seven years later, federal agents questioned John’s grandson, William D. Polson. They needed to add him to a list of every Cherokee living in Indian Territory to start the process of land allotments. Through allotment, all land belonging to the Cherokee Nation — the land John had signed his life for — would be split up between individual citizens and then opened up for white settlement. And by this grand act of bureaucratic theft, Oklahoma became a state.
(Excerpt) Read more at outline.com ...
posts there by paul r jones are enlightening.
Not happening folks.
By those criteria there wouldn’t be enough left to raise a good stomp dance.
The Cherokee were very intermarried with whites before the removal. They tried to hold on to their culture while trying to become part of Georgia. It was not going to be allowed as the governor of Georgia absolutely hated the Indians.
Also, as far as I can tell, no Indian alive today has ever had any land taken from them by the government. Like slavery, the actual victims of the policy are long gone. Indians have every opportunity to participate in society and the economic development in America today. If they want land, they can but it just like every one else.
It's absurd that after more than a 100 years of Oklahoma statehood, a group of people can exist in that state without being subject to the laws of the land. The people of the Indian nations have no right to sovereignty just because their ancestors were conquered centuries ago.
Before forced relocation, the Cherokee Nation was a very advanced culture, having a written language and even a newspaper.
Actually, they didn’t knowingly “sell” their land. The government gave a small amount of acreage to each family. The problem was, “agents”, white men, usually lawyers, were hired by the government to “manage” the interests of the recipients. They then proceeded to steal the allotments, getting unknowlegable Indians, to sign away rights, then told them, “I’m sorry. There’s no land left. I had to sell it as payment for me managing your allotment”. Which of course, was a lie -— the Indians weren’t required to pay for them to manage their affairs; the agents were paid a fee by the government. But Indians didn’t know that. And some of the recipients were just outright killed for their allotments. One of our town’s former oil magnates, became one of the wealthiest men in our area, by stealing land, which had oil on it, this way. He’s still touted as a great man, and his mansion is open for viewing at Christmastime. Same thing happened to the Osage.
It was a terrible thing that was done to most Indians around here. Until oil was discovered, nobody cared about land around here. It was given to Indians for reparations. But once oil was discovered, those greedy white men had to have it! I had an elderly patient, whose grandfather was told, “ I’m sorry. The value of your land had to be sold to pay my fees, and almost nothing is left, but I’ve brought you a brand new wood stove, that I managed to buy with what was left.”
Having said all that, there’s really no fair way to return the land to the Indians, since a lot of it was purchased by unsuspecting whites over the last 120 years, or so. But there are still vast stretches of land, including huge ranches, held by descendants of those thieves.
What this author proposes is not going to happen. She aspires to be the Wilma Mankiller of her generation I guess. Nice try but no cigar.
What might happen and is creeping in, is Tribal Jurisdiction. Increasingly Tribal Marshals are becoming involved in local law enforcement. Also, the State of Oklahoma is so mismanaged that they are turning over state properties to the tribes to operate. I doubt the tribes are any less corrupt or mismanaged than the State of Oklahoma though. I can see the “District of TribeX” operating like a large county within the state but the state would continue to exist. It would be odd but it could happen in theory someday.
as someone noted, the author fails to mention that her ancestor was acting unilaterally against another larger faction of the tribe who fought removal and would not sign the treaty and swore out a blood oath against anyone who did. The feds found a token indian in Boudinot and declared him legal in signing the treaty. It was huge mess. Jackson and the Governor of Georgia were determined to remove the Cherokee by any means necessary.
The Cherokee were the last of the tribes moved. The Chickasaw moved first with little fanfare, took their money and got their land that was like the Osage Reservation, blessed with oil. The Cherokee were last and got some of the prettier land but just about ZERO oil.
What I have never understood is why the Osage Reservation is still recognized on the maps as a Reservation and little other land in the state is. The Osage were a small tribe with lots of land and most of it was taken since it had so much oil on it.
This thread is already so convoluted though and littered with misinformation and bias it is not worth further attention.
Shame on you! You know very good and well, that the useless trinkets they were given, was NOT “fair market value”! How do you think it went, when those who cheated the natives (all over the world, not just here) when they stood before their Maker, as they faced Him at their deaths? (Hint -— “but Lord, they were savages!” is NOT going to cut it!)
For those interested in OKLAHOMA maps, here is a great page I have found. It shows some old obscure maps which it took me 40 years to find. Some shows the complete reservations, then the land lost when the tribes joined the SOUTH in the Civil War, then the addition of other tribes.
Please notice that right now everyone is moaning and groaning about the 150th year of the WASHITA fight. Also notice on the oldest map that the Washita was NOT on the then (1868) Cheyenne and Arapaho reservation.
Also here are the land run maps.
http://dougdawg.blogspot.com/2010/10/maps-and-history-of-oklahoma-county.html
When pressed..most Indians ..like most everyone else in advanced societies..do not want to go back to hunting and gathering as a way of life.
No tv..no internet..no fast food..no air conditioning..no car..
Otherwise show me one white man in America that truly owns his property and is not leasing it from the government.
Who took it from Spain
***”Trail of Tears”....4000 died from exposure,***
Nonsense. An inflated figure to make whitey feel bad.
400 is more like it, and that was too many deaths.
https://newsok.com/article/2217279/trail-of-tears-death-toll-myths-dispelled
Calling Indians stupid and backwards for losing ‘their’ lands is nothing to the stupidity of Americans today.
The ultimate truth is that you cannot trust government. Government will never represent you, or your interest. The strong take form the weak. The weak perish.
Pray for the Drummond Ranch. Ree and her family has shown us what true Family should be like.
...as long as the grass shall grow, and the rivers flow....
Which is why we have The Army Corps of Engineers and Agent Orange.
I don’t know what to hope for on this case. I live in Oklahoma, but don’t have enough native blood to be a tribal member, and my Native American ancestors were French-Canadian outcasts anyway.
The dishonor of the US government reneging on treaties with numerous indian tribes is a stain on our national history.
Shameless I be. Value is in the eye of the beholder.
LOL
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