The Clause Of Indian Land

“Akwesasne: This is Indian Land” is a documentary film created in 1969 and it is about the confrontation between the Mohawk of the St. Regis Reservation and the police. The events take place on Mohawk land near Cornwall, Ontario on a bridge that connects Canada and the United States. There are many differences between the two forms of political power in the movie. One relates to state-centered institutions, which in this case are represented by the police and the political power that is enforced by the indigenous people.

They were declared a dependent sovereign state and only the federal government had any say so in their affairs. Treaties were signed and land was sacrificed in order to retain some semblance of independence but the states got greedy and wanted it all. It was the Indians who followed the treaties and never went after their lost land or left their borders but the Americans continued to encroach on them. The Memorial Of the Cherokee Nation explained how Indians were tricked into selling land that belonged to the Nation so that Indian territory became American territory despite the people having no right to sell land given to the Cherokee Nation. The Cherokee government fought the breaks in the treaties but the judicial decision was overruled and the Cherokees were still forced to move. Besides the breaches in the treaties, the Cherokee tribe was one of the five assimilated tribes meaning they adopted European customs and religions. The Cherokee had become civilized as was the European’s goal and they fought their battle through the legal system not in a war. In this sense, the Indian Removal was unjust and

The government offered 3 million dollars for the land, but the Tuscarora’s refused. In the perspective of the natives, they wanted to at least keep the land they were forced to survive on. Since the war, they had molded their new lives and experiences on the reservation and did not want the government to control where they could roam once again. This case made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, but not surprisingly, the court ruled against the tribe. It was stated that the land had belonged to a tribe and not the government, thus making the land something the government did not have to federally protect.

In chapter 4 the author characterize reserved rights as those rights a tribe never explicitly surrendered or surrendered in a settlement or comparative assertion. The reason for this definition comes from the tenth Amendment to the US Constitution and US Supreme Court choices, for example, U.S. v. WINANS, WINTERS v. U.S. In the United States, people of Native American plunge possess a novel lawful position. From one viewpoint, they are U.S. residents and are qualified for the same lawful rights and insurances under the Constitution that all many U.S. people appreciate. Then again, they are individuals from self-administering tribes whose presence far originates before the landing of Europeans on American shores. They are the relatives of

There has always been a big debate on whether the Cherokee Indians should have or should not have been removed from the land they resided on. Although the common consensus of the whites was for removal, and for the Cherokees it was against removal, there were some individuals on each side that disagreed with their groups’ decision. The Cherokee Indians should have been removed from their homeland because the Cherokees would not have been able to survive on their own with the way they were living, they would not have been able to exist amidst a white population, and if they were removed, the whites would have helped them create a new and prosperous civilization.

Although many people are ignorant of this fact, the United States Constitution is derived from the Iroquois's Great Binding Law. The Iroquois, also know as the Confederacy of Five Nations, are a Native American tribe which was formed when five warring tribes were brought together, with the help of  Dekanawida and Hiawatha, to promote peace. Before becoming allies, the five tribes were constantly fighting among themselves and competing for resources; the Great Binding Law created harmony, unity, and respect among the tribes. The recognition of Justice and individual liberty included in the Great Law exceeds that of many other doctrines. It is no surprise that the Founding Fathers based the United States Constitution off of the Great Law.

In 1831, the Cherokee nation went to court against the state of Georgia. They were disputing the state’s attempt to hold jurisdiction over their territory. Unfortunately, because they are not under the laws of the constitution, the Indian’s right to court was denied. It was not until 1835 that the Cherokee finally agreed to sign the treaty, giving up their Georgia land for that of Oklahoma.

The Indian Territory is admitted to compose part of the United States. In all our maps, geographical treatises, histories, and laws, it is so considered. In all our intercourse with foreign nations, in our commercial regulations, in any attempt at intercourse between Indians and foreign nations, they are considered as within the jurisdictional limits of the United States, subject to many of those restraints which are imposed upon our own citizens. They acknowledge themselves in their treaties to be under the protection of the United States; they admit that the United States shall have the sole and exclusive right of regulating the trade with them and managing all their affairs as they think proper; and the Cherokees in particular were allowed by the Treaty of Hopewell, which preceded the Constitution, to send a deputy of their choice, whenever they think fit, to Congress.

The lecture covered the basis on Indians’ treaties, the government, and how both (the treaties and government) clashed with the Native’s culture. The guest speaker was Gillian Allen, a lawyer, who worked on First Nations treaty-related affairs in Canada and an Aboriginal. She presented a lecture on Indian Treaty Rights in Canada and the U.S. During the lecture, I learned interesting information about the Natives and recognized some aspects of cognitive psychology. The aspects of cognitive psychology that were present were priming, categories of knowledge, and surface features/deep structure.

Sovereignty is a nation’s “relative independence from and among other states” (Cobb, 2005). In this case, tribal sovereignty of Native nations depends upon recognition by the United States. This is ironic; their tribal sovereignty has been “granted” to them by the Unites States federal government. No single nation is completely independent of foreign influence. Tribal nations more so

The Indian Act was enacted in 1867 by the Parliament of Canada. The Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development administered the act. The act defines who an “Indian” is and the legal rights of the Aboriginal people in Canada. Regulation of the economic system between aboriginal people and the government of Canada is included in the Indian Act. It also includes the power the ministers have on the aboriginal people including children and disabled Aboriginals. If the laws are not obeyed, the punishment is written in the act. The Indian Act was influenced by the legislative foundation of the Royal Proclamation, 1763, which recognized Aboriginals as a distinct political unit (Residential schools). The Royal Proclamation, 1763, thought that it was their duty to protect the Aboriginal people from the Canadian society. The Royal Proclamation, 1763, had the responsibility for Aboriginal affairs in Canada with British imperial authorities. However, by the mid-1800s Britain began to transfer this responsibility to Canadian colonies. Then the Canadian authorities passed the First Indian Act. Over the years many amendments have been made to the Indian Act.The Indian act passed out a law that any children under the ages of 16 had to study at Residential schools (Residential schools), the children there were physically abused, especially girls. (Churchill, 55-56). The Indian act is significant today because on June, 11 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, on behalf of the

. . regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.” The Constitution further enumerates these powers denied to the states in Article I section x. The state of Georgia challenged the federal government’s power over states rights, a precursor to the Civil War, when it challenged the trust relationship and the autonomy of the Cherokee. Supreme Court Justice John Marshall in three decisions (Marshall Trilogy) upheld the United States’ federal power, defined the responsibility of the doctrine of federal trust, and clarified the sovereignty of Indian nations: Johnson v McIntosh 1823, Cherokee v Georgia 1831, Worcester v Georgia 1832.

With globalization and colonization taking over almost the entire known world, native tribes who are indigenous to their lands are losing control of the lands that their people have lived in for ages to the hands of foreign colonizers who claim the land as their own. Now, indigenous people all around the world are struggling to reclaim the lands and rights that were taken away from them through non-violent social relations with national governments and large corporations. Anthropologists have recorded how indigenous people across the globe attempt to create relations with national governments to reclaim rights and lands that they once had before the colonization of their ancestral homeland.

Power can be viewed as the ability to influence and/or control others. Another flaw about reservations is the fact that they are not totally governed by Native American representatives. The U.S. government actually has tight control over the majority, if not all, reservations (Perry, 2002, p 233). This tight control has left the Native American population powerless in terms of self- regulation. Despite the fact that Native American government do exist,

When European people began to settle in North America, one of the major issues they experienced was learning to coexist with the Native Americans. The Spanish conquistadors first sought to exploit the Native peoples. In contrast, the English settlers wanted to convert and civilize the Native people. Both conquers and settlers did not see a solution in allowing Native people to live as they had before the discovery of America. This was a major factor in the discourse between the Native Americans and the European settlers. In turn, Andrew Jackson believed that the Native Americans should be relocated to Oklahoma in order to reach a resolution that would both benefit the American Republic and the Native Americans. His decision was influenced greatly by previous European settlers and their experiences with Native people.