That doesn’t address the issue of whether they have a right though.
***Then, the other issue is that if you start doing those things as a sovereign nation (just like any state in the U.S. would do upon secession), you’ll find courts and laws say that you can’t do that and you can’t interfere with other elected officials, which the Feds would come down on a state (and/or the Lakotah, too) like a “ton of bricks” to stop them from doing those things that a “sovereign nation” would do — just like what would happen if a “state” seceded.***
I’m sort of confused by what you’re getting at here and I don’t want to misinterpret anything. Would you mind restating it?
Basically it’s that the Lakotah have the strongest “case” for having the actual written and legal right to secede. The U.S. Government refuses to recognize that, in spite of it being written and legal (even though it was an agreement made by the U.S. Government). The Congress has tried to “pay them off” to withdraw their legal right, but the Lakotah have refused it (the money is still being “held” right now and is accruing interest, by the way...).
So, for someone who maintains that there is a legal and justified right for secession from the United States, the Lakotah have the most “advanced” (i.e., how far along it is) case of anyone, and they have been through the “system”, the courts, the Congress, the Supreme Court and so on, and they’re *still* trying to accomplish it.
How long do you think it would take for the states to do this, when they haven’t even been through 1/10 of the process that the Lakotah have been through legally, politically, with the Congress, with the Supreme Court, and so on...?