I'm moving this post up from 2011 as the disenrollment issue is gaining traction.
Cedric Sunray's column in Indian Country Today has a strong argument that tribes are becoming more "social clubs" that the nations they purport to be.
Since the Cherokee Freedmen have been in the news this past month, his column focuses on them, righfully so. Here is what one Cherokee person who is 1/256th Cherokee has to say:
This is not a club; you can’t just claim to be Cherokee and show up and be included,” says Cara Cowan Watts, a vocal member of the Cherokees’ tribal council.
The Cherokee Nation is the largest of three federally recognized Cherokee tribes.
“This is absolutely something that we have to defend. And the Cherokee people overwhelmingly voted in the Constitution that we want to remain an Indian tribe made up of Indians,” Watts says.
“It appears that Marilyn Vann [one of the leaders of the Cherokee Freedmen] is a non-Indian insurgent terrorizing Cherokee nation families, children, elders and leadership. She and her allied terrorists attack the Cherokee people with weapons of mass disinformation and falsehoods. Marilyn is aligned with anti-Indian sovereignty groups and inside self-serving malcontents who seek to destroy the Cherokee Nation if the Cherokee Nation doesn’t give them what they want…her fellow Indian Freedmen allies want $50,000,000.00, allotment land, and apparently the right to operate gaming facilities
Cedric points out:
Sovereignty.. a word that many of these tribe’s officials couldn’t spell ten years ago, much less manipulate into its current genocidal form. Sovereignty demands ethical practice for it to hold any merit.
We continue to stand on the sidelines when we define disenrollment as an internal issue. “Internal Issue” has become the coined phrase for the removal of many people who have been generationally involved in their tribal communities. These removals are not paper resolutions batted around in the council chambers of various tribes regarding which new firm to hire for the new “addition to the casino”. These decisions directly impact the social, cultural, and at times economic well-being of actual people. If the decision of Indian country is to place sovereignty over humanity, then we all stand condemned.
OP: Our California Senator's Boxer and Feinstein have steadfastly refused to get involved, even using the term "internal matter" in correspondence back to constituents. One of our commenters wondered what their position was on South Africa? Did they side with the white Botha government against Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu? Or were their vocal about the issues of THAT SOVEREIGN NATION? The Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians practice apartheid practice apartheid on their reservation and what do we hear from Boxer and Feinstein? Crickets chirping
Read the article at the link above. The list of tribes that have stripped the citizenship from their people is painfully long. They are not worthy of your respect, nor the respect of the U.S. government. And certainly, they should not recieve government funds when they use sovereignty like a club to batter the weak and helpless.
Each sovereign government should be treated differently.
ReplyDeleteIf they harm their people, or "screw them over", the government should not give them land, or money. Right now, the only reason the Cherokee Nation is doing the right thing towards the Freedmen, is because the Feds threatened to withhold money.
Hey, if that works, all the better.
Indian Country article Today
ReplyDeleteThe case of the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indians in California is a prime example of the level of absurdity that this nouveau disenrollment scheme pushes as self-determination. When elder Lawrence Madriaga’s entire family was dropped, it sent out a reality check. How could a man who had lived on the reservation his entire life be removed? When the tribe hired professional genealogist/anthropologist Jim Johnson to assist them in refuting the family’s ties to the tribe, he determined the opposite. The Madriaga family was Luiseno. Pechanga Chairman Mark Macarro fired back that they did not have to listen to the findings of a professional as they were a sovereign nation. He and his council also proceeded to remove all of the family’s children from the reservation school. Another tribe targeted a twelve year old and told his family that they had previously made a “miscalculation” in enrolling him shortly after his birth.
Sovereignty has become a smokescreen for illegitimate behavior, racism, nepotism, and narcissism. Even tribes who can look back to histories which included banishment know that nations in today’s world cannot simply send away their own or act as though they were never there.
ReplyDelete(stated in article) WOOOOO HOOOO AMEN MOTHER FUCKERS GET IT RIGHT!
Ohoo! It's nice to see an article in Indian country that openly discusses disenrollment and what it really is. This few tribes that have shamed themselves with this practice are not supported by Indian Country. We know who we are, where we're from and this new wave of Casino Indians do not practice the "old ways" or "tradition".
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't even call them INDIAN'S their in it for the money only nothing else even their leader is the same! That day is gonna come when they wished they followed indian law, which they have no clue what it is!Ask any one of them a question about indian heritage, their answer is what's that? where's my money!
ReplyDelete"How could a man who had lived on the reservation his entire life be removed?"
ReplyDeleteNot only that, but his parents, and his parents parents (grandparent), who not only lived on the reservation, but were instrumental in the creation of the very reservation they lived on. They were there at the creation of the reservation, and were recognized as members of the Tribe from its very beginnings. In fact they were recognized as members BEFORE the creation of the reservation.
How can this happen....
Like I said, the good majority of the so called indian's aren't even indians.Thats why they won't re enroll you or lift the moratorium. Their afraid real indians will be back in the tribe again! You guys in the tribe, relax, we want is what truly belongs to us! We can live in harmony! we wont take all your hard unearned money!,After fifteen years, arne't you tired of running to bank every month! does it hurt you that much to have other people enrolled! LIKE THEY SAY, YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU!, So have a heart let us in. From a person that put his application in on time, but who ever sat on it for two weeks, back in good old 1995! Im still waiting and won't give up!
ReplyDeleteWell Things are happening and being exposed on how these tribes are adopting to the Corporate and Big Business way of life. The Media and the outside World is starting to realize that these Casino Indian’s are no different and Indian traditions has nothing too do with anything when it come to greed and corruption. Hey John Macarro you should start on your speech so when the News channels come and ask why you and Mark your brother have destroyed Pechanga by ignoring Tribal Laws and its internal Bylaws by disenrolling your true people and don’t be stupid by responding that you have sovereignty and we can pick and choose who we want. Wait until the news finds out that Pechanga is allowing the Leyva family whom are not even Indian to be enrolled.
ReplyDeleteExplain that one John. You Ignoramus “Moron”
I heard they we're enrolling eighteen year olds within the tribe a few weeks ago, makes alot of sense doesn't it? They busy little bees in the enrollment committie taking pictures for the kids so they can have their hard earned monthly checks! How much do they get? Oh but wait, We in the moratorium have to wait until 2012! go figure, are the qualifications to be on the enrollment board are no brains? My dog has more brains than they do!
ReplyDeleteI'M sorry ,it was 2014 that we have to wait, I'm just so excited that I will be enrolled in 2014,HA,HA,HA.
ReplyDelete"heard they we're enrolling eighteen year olds within the tribe a few weeks ago, makes alot of sense doesn't it? They busy little bees in the enrollment committie taking pictures for the kids so they can have their hard earned monthly checks! How much do they get? Oh but wait, We in the moratorium have to wait until 2012! go figure, are the qualifications to be on the enrollment board are no brains? My dog has more brains than they do!"
ReplyDeleteThey are not enrolling eighteen year olds as that would be in violation of the moratorium, not that they care if it is unconstitutional to have a moratoruim in the first place or not or that they violate the law that outlawed disenrollment everyday they allow the Hunters to remain disenrolled.
Members have been enrolling their minor children all along it is when they turn eighteen that they can start getting per capita.
Boxer and Feinstein won't even venture into "Human Rights Violations" on California's Indian Reservations because they are "Paid Not Too!" Why would they! You have got to know that Pechanga, alone, has bolstered their Cal-der-ons so that they become nothing more then "Puppets On A Sting" and "Dance to the Beat Of Their(Casino Indians) Drums. Pull their string and they dance. Again why wouls they "Bite the Hand that Feeds them?" I call it "Taking a Bribe!"...
ReplyDeleteBribery, a form of corruption, is an act implying money or gift giving that alters the behavior of the recipient. Bribery constitutes a crime and is defined by Black's Law Dictionary as the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official or other person in charge of a public or legal duty.
The bribe is the gift bestowed to influence the recipient's conduct. It may be any money, good, right in action, property, preferment, privilege, emolument, object of value, advantage, or merely a promise or undertaking to induce or influence the action, vote, or influence of a person in an official or public capacity.
You have got to know that these two(2) Political Hacks, and others, routinely take money from Indian Tribes so as to do the bidding of same! So as you can see, they don't have to help the "Oppressed Native American:" "There is no Money in it!"
The article is good as it does describe the situation well. It is sad that many of my family have given up the fight, and that our story has been forgotten. This should be a warning sign to those who still fight. If we do not care enough to fight for ourselves then we should not expect someone else to fight for us much less with us. Pechanga thinks that it will win the waiting game look at the article there was no mention of Manuela or her relationship to Pablo. It is important that people see what’s happening. I know I am not the only one from our family who still cares but for those of you who still visit this site and who are from the Manuela’s family let me know you are still out there.
ReplyDeleteI have placed a link to the Manuela Miranda story on the right sidebar. As there has been one on the moratorium people for years.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to add, you can always email at originalpechanga2 @ yahoo.com
I send links to stories EVERY week to all three families. It's a simple thing to add comments. We have kept Ed Burbee and the Masiel Crime family from enjoying all the fruits of their despicable acts.
They have spent MILLIONS ... I can live with that...
Aamokat, we got our information straight from the donkey's mouth! I don't know where you get your info. But that's what I heard. I got my ways too! DUH!
ReplyDelete"Aamokat, we got our information straight from the donkey's mouth! I don't know where you get your info. But that's what I heard. I got my ways too! DUH!"
ReplyDeleteI got my information because that is what they were doing all along, even during the moratorium, enrolling their minor children but those children don't get per capita until they turn eighteen.
But if they are enrolling eighteen year olds that were not enrolled as minors, that would be a violation of the so called moratorium law.
But don't they pick and choose what laws they follow anyway?
Here’s what the B.I.A. has stated (It is the tribes inherent right to determine it members based on there constitution and by-laws) this is the criteria set by congress and the B.I.A... Now you have tribes like Pechanga disenrolling against what there by laws state. Is it not the responsibility for the B.I.A. and congress to enforce the right to self govern by the letter of the law this would mean that any tribe that disenrolls would have to do so by its constitution and by laws or be subject to an appeal by the B.I.A. or congress. Are you listing to this Mary Mack Bono, Ken Salazar, and Larry Echohawk?
ReplyDeleteYou hit the nail right on the head Aamokat, they do what they want, but not for long. POWER TO THE TRUE INDIANS!
ReplyDeleteHere’s what the B.I.A. has stated
ReplyDeleteMoron's nothing is going to happen its blog talk.
POWER TO THE TRUE INDIANS! haha blog warrior go eat at taco bell.
What are you talking about?
ReplyDelete" haha blog warrior go eat at taco bell."
ReplyDeleteI wish I could afford to eat at Taco Bell like you rich real Indians can. So I guess it's just " haha " on myself. At least I hope I can provide you with a little bit of amusement as you watch me fall apart in my old age. My teeth falling out, diabetes destroying my legs of this former Tribal Elder
Hey Moron (Casino Indian). I tell you what the B.I.A. Is saying. We are sicken too see so many tribes self exterminate themselves by this cancer of greed and power by this so called disease name Hate. Disenrolling your own people will not leave few natives but will extinguish the very existence of ourselves.
ReplyDeleteTell you John Macarro and Mark, you will go down in history as one of the ones who destroyed Sovereignty and the very existence of the California Indians. Just for the Almighty dollar (Blood Money). See you in the history books!
Hey moron,are you enrolled yet?
ReplyDelete