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New York Times
The Shame of the
Cherokee Nation
EDITORIAL,
nytimes.com from the Web, June 10, 2007
Many members of Congress were rightly
outraged by the Cherokee Nation’s decision earlier this year to revoke the
tribal citizenship of about 2,800 descendants of slaves once owned by the tribe.
The tribe’s leaders have since tried to avoid any punishment by restoring
partial rights to some black members. Congress should disregard that ruse
and move ahead with legislation that would force the Cherokee to comply with
their treaty obligations and court decisions that guarantee black members full
citizenship rights, including the right to vote and hold tribal office.
This dispute dates back to the 19th century, when Cherokee, Seminole and Creek
signed treaties with the federal government that required them to accept their
freedmen — many of whom had mixed black and Indian parentage — as full tribal
members in return for recognition as sovereign nations. The tribes have
repeatedly sought to abridge black Indian rights, but the treaties have been
repeatedly upheld in federal court.
Black tribal rights were also upheld last year in the Cherokee tribe’s own
supreme court. Then the tribe voted to expel black members. This
could potentially deprive them of their cherished tribal identities, along with
access to medical, housing and tribal benefits.
Representative Diane Watson, Democrat of California, is circulating a draft of a
bill that would strip the Cherokee of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal
aid, and suspend the tribe’s gaming rights, until it returns black members to
full citizenship. The bill would also require the Department of the
Interior — which has dragged its feet on this issue — to report to Congress on
the status of freedmen’s rights in all tribes.
It is shameful that the Cherokee have to be pressured into restoring the rights
of their own black citizens. But that clearly is what is needed.
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