Freedmen vs Cherokee Nation

Tribes need own meeting laws Rapid City Journal - Online 03/31/2011 When federal officials from the Department of Health and Human Services last week ousted a Journal reporter from a meeting with tribal leaders to discuss Indian Health Services, the reason cited was tribal leaders requested the meeting be closed. It turns out, that reason doesn't necessarily pass legal muster. The line between federal and tribal law regarding public records and open meetings is a murky one, with reams of inconsistent case law. In 2001, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that information requested by the U.S. Department of Interior and turned over by Indian tribes was a matter of public record. The Federal Advisory Committee Act also requires that groups providing advice to federal agencies must hold open meetings, unless certain exemptions apply. The fact that tribal leaders request a closed meeting isn't sufficient reason, in and of itself, to close such meetings. (especially when it involves health...

(We get it from all sides!! Wannabees are really something!) CNE overhaul needed Cherokee Phoenix - Online 03/01/2011 I am an employee of Cherokee Nation and at one time was proud to work with and for my tribe. I am writing on an issue that is a tragedy that has been happening to us as a people, tribe and our self-being. Some managers at our new Hard Rock Casino, which we so proudly advertise, are mistreating Native Americans everyday. Management constantly say to our faces that if it were up to them they wouldn’t hire “a damn lazy Indian” and then laugh at the comment to each other. It’s one thing to run a huge business like a casino, but another to have it ran by 65 percent non-Native Americans who bought Missouri tribal cards and who look down on our people. If it weren’t for our people, there wouldn’t be a huge salary to give them. The majority of the employees barely make it on what is being paid to them. The managers remedy that by creating a program canlled a pickup shift, which...

Oklahoma tribal judge grants injunction request By: The Associated Press 02/19/11 3:48 PM The Associated Press http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/2011/02/oklahoma-tribal-judge-grants-injunction-request A tribal district court judge has ruled that tribal citizenship applications from descendants of Cherokee freedmen won't be processed until the appeals process is complete. Judge John Cripps decided Friday in favor of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma's request to extend a temporary injunction against processing new applications from the group. In January, Cripps ruled the tribe had to accept applications from freedmen descendants who lost their tribal citizenship following a March 2007 referendum. Cripps' Jan. 14 ruling nullified the voter-approved constitutional amendment requiring tribal citizens to have a Native American ancestor listed on the Dawes Roll on the grounds it violated an 1866 treaty between the tribe and the federal government that granted citizenship to the fr...

Tribe files appeal in Freedmen decision Tahlequah Daily Press Tahlequah, OK Teddye Snell 01/26/2011 TAHLEQUAH — Cherokee Nation Attorney General Diane Hammons on Tuesday filed an appeal of a tribal district court decision that called for re-instating Freedmen descendants as citizens. The tribal district court nullified a Constitutional amendment requiring tribal citizens to have an Indian ancestor listed on the federally recognized Dawes Roll. That ruling affirmed the citizenship status of approximately 2,800 Freedmen descendants, and requires the tribe to begin processing citizenship applications within 30 days. Tribal District Court Judge John Cripps overturned the amendment of 2007 on Jan. 14, citing the tribe’s Treaty of 1866, which states that Freedmen and their descendants “shall have all the rights of native Cherokees.” The Cherokee Nation has also filed an application for a delay in the implementation of the district court ruling until the appeal is finalized. The delay would r...

Wednesday, 16 February 2011 16:02 Tragedy and the Ghost Dance’s demise Written by George Ellison (Editor’s note: This is the second of a two-part series regarding the Cherokee Ghost Dance.) http://www.smokymountainnews.com/news/item/3275-tragedy-and-the-ghost-dance%E2%80%99s-demise A recent column focused on a so-called Ghost Dance movement that took place among the Cherokees in 1811-13. That, of course, was almost 80 years before the infamous era in the American West that culminated in the Indian massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890. The western Indians initially believed the dance would unite them with friends and relatives in the ghost world. As the movement spread from tribe to tribe, however, the dancers began to imagine that the dance would make them invincible. The unity and fervor that the Ghost Dance movement inspired, however, only brought fear and hysteria to white settlers and contributed to the events ending in the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890. When the smoke cleared and t...

January 14, 2011 Tribal District Court Rules Citizenship Amendment Invalid In a lower court ruling today, Cherokee Nation District Court Judge John Cripps overturned an amendment to the Cherokee Nation Constitution passed by the Cherokee people with 77% of the vote in 2007, which denied citizenship to about 2,800 non-Indian freedmen descendants who had gained citizenship since a previous court ruling in 2006. “We have received the district court decision with which we respectfully disagree,” said Cherokee Nation Attorney General Diane Hammons. “We believe that the Cherokee people can change our Constitution, and that the Cherokee citizenry clearly and lawfully enunciated their intentions to do so in the 2007 Amendment. We are considering all options, including our right to appeal to the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court." "We believe that there are some legal decisions affecting the interpretation of the 1866 Treaty which the District Judge ignored, but no decision on an appeal h...

Tribal ruling raises dispute over slaves owned by Indians By Ben Fenwick OKLAHOMA CITY Sat Jan 15, 2011 3:49pm EST http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70E1YW20110115 OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - A tribal court ruling that the Cherokee Nation must allow descendants of former slaves owned by Indians to be tribal members, has again raised the painful history of the forcible removal of the Indians to Oklahoma in the nineteenth century. A Cherokee Nation tribal court ruled on Friday that the nation cannot exclude the so-called "Freedmen" from tribal membership even though some of them are not blood descendants of the Indians. The issue arises because when the U.S. government forced Indian tribes to walk from the Southeast U.S. to Oklahoma in 1831, in what the Indians described as the "Trail of Tears", some of them brought their African-American slaves with them. They brought them because the Cherokee owned plantations in the U.S. South. When the tribe was ejected from the...