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Editorial See other Editorial Articles Title: Bury My Heart at Wounded Negro On Monday, the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court upheld a voter-approved constitutional amendment that revoked tribal membership for the so-called Cherokee Freedmen, the modern descendants of black slaves whom Cherokee tribesmen had owned prior to the Civil War. The 16-page ruling argued that the Cherokee, and only the Cherokee, had a right to define exactly who is a Cherokee. The ruling was handed down in the tiny town of Tahlequah, OK. It came exactly 150 years and a day after the Cherokee Nation formally allied themselves with the Confederacy in the Civil War in a declaration that, as fate would have it, was also signed in teeny-weeny Tahlequah. Most Americans these days probably don’t know that several “Native American” tribes allied with the Confederacy during the Civil War. Then again, most of them probably aren’t aware that Injuns also owned slaves, even before Paleface’s ivory-colored toes landed on America’s shores. Most of them also aren’t likely to know that thousands of black freedmen also owned slaves in antebellum America. To be blunt, most Americans these days don’t know much of anything besides what they’re spoon-fed from the boob tube. It’s nearly impossible to conceive that anyone would choose to live in Oklahoma on purpose. Accordingly, the Cherokee arrived in that flat, dusty, brownish plain of misery at gunpoint in the 1830s after being driven from the East Coast along the notorious “Trail of Tears.” Slave-owning Cherokees brought their black servants along with them, in many cases forcing them to carry their luggage. The Cherokee—members of what are known as the “Five Civilized Tribes,” a term that seems, quite frankly, like a slap in the face to all the other tribes—held an estimated 4,600 black slaves in 1860, more than any other tribe in the Indian Territory. Monday’s ruling came as a slap in the face to the estimated 2,800 “non-Indian” Afro-American Cherokee Freedmen who previously had been entitled to free healthcare and educational benefits as a result of their conceptual, rather than genetic, membership in the Cherokee tribe. “This is racism and apartheid in the 21st century,” wailed Marilyn Vann, president of the Descendants of the Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes, who are attempting to Sioux sue the Cherokee Nation for what cynics might view as an egregious act of Indian-giving. “This is a continuation of our Trail of Tears as we fight for our rights,” Vann said in a fit of hyperbole. Her organization has planned an emergency meeting at 2PM on Saturday to discuss strategies for overturning the recent ruling. Vann has invited “anybody who is interested in civil rights and the law” to attend the meeting at the Martin Luther King Center in Muskogee, OK, a town which Merle Haggard famously sang he was proud to be from but was actually lying since he was from California. “I think that is horrible, I think it’s deplorable, I think it is unjust. And a travesty of justice,” said Kenneth Payton, a black man who says he’s upset that the wagon-burners have cut off his gravy train. “It’s my humane right. This is more of a human-rights issue than anything else. So this, to me, in my lifetime, this is the biggest human-rights issue,” said Payton, who added something about blacks and Injuns being part of a “big quilt”—one that is hopefully not infected with smallpox. The Congressional Black Caucus and the National Congress of Black Women are also rankled about the recent decision, but to be honest, when aren’t they rankled? The Cherokee tribe, whose chieftains have boasted such spicy monikers as Dennis Wolf Bushyhead and Wilma Mankiller, declared the black Freedmen to be Cherokee citizens as far back as 1863. In the intervening years, repeated attempts were made to distinguish those who were Cherokee “by blood” from those who were Cherokee in name only. The issue grew more complex in the 1970s when the federally funded Bureau of Indian Affairs extended financial benefits to all tribespersons, including the Freedmen. In the early 1980s, Chief Ross O. Swimmer issued an order that reserved Cherokee Nation voting rights only to those who could present a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood, effectively snatching away the peace pipe from the Freedmen’s mouths. The US government continues to fund the Cherokee Nation to the tune of about $300 million per annum. In 2006, a federal US judge ruled that the Freedmen’s descendants were entitled to sue for disenfranchisement. In 2007, Cherokee Nation voters lobbed a razor-edged tomahawk through that decision and by a 3-1 margin supported an amendment that defined a “Cherokee” only as someone with a Cherokee ancestor. Defending Monday’s ruling that upheld the 2007 amendment, Cherokee Nation Attorney General Diane Hammons explained that “you have to have just one ancestor that has some Indian blood. You have to be Indian to be a member of an Indian tribe.” Monday’s legal ruling includes several instances of the phrase “Cherokees by Blood.” The Cherokees, may the Great Spirit bless their ruddy cojones, insist they have a sovereign right to determine tribal membership along genetic bloodlines. Such a sentiment seems simultaneously antiquated and refreshing. There are likely some economic reasons for denying tribal membership to the Freedmen, but there’s also an apparent will to preserve a genetic and cultural heritage that was nearly obliterated. For the Freedmen’s descendants, despite their yakety-yak about human rights, it strains belief to think they really care that much about sweat lodges and stomp dances. For them, it appears to be all about the Wampum.
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#5. To: Dakmar (#0)
“I think that is horrible, I think it’s deplorable, I think it is unjust. And a travesty of justice,” said Kenneth Payton, a black man who says he’s upset that the wagon-burners have cut off his gravy train. “It’s my humane right. This is more of a human-rights issue than anything else. So this, to me, in my lifetime, this is the biggest human-rights issue,” Great Zeus!!! Somebody done gone and gave a kneegrow a Roget's Thesaurus!!!!
More likely an SPLC press release.
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