Welcome back to The Other Side of American History I'm your host

and today we’re talking bout sovereignty and how it’s changed over the
past 5-6 centuries. Depends on how you count it but for obvious reasons
we’re talking about 1492 to the current day or 532 years. This timeline of
events was taken from the book The Rights of Native Americans and
Tribes.
First, we have the “Tribal Independence” period this period lasted
from 1492-1787. It was a time of wars, alliances, backstabbing, etc. The
major points are Columbus “discovered” the Americas then European
rulers thought to themselves “Ooh land and resources all for me”. Because
of so, many Natives died and those who survived were forced to help these
colonizers for little bits of freedom or to still even exist. Two of the important
wars were The Seven Years’ War and the American Revolutionary War.
These resulted in a free U.S.A. and peace between them and Native
Americans in their country (this isn’t fully true while the Newborn U.S. was
afraid to get into conflict At the time General Washington attacked the
Onondaga then later Cayuga and Seneca bound westward leading them to
flee toward the British Fort Niagara because he felt the Haudenosaunee
were a threat to his power).
The second is “Agreements Between Equals” lasting from 1787-1828
this period was one of utter “peace” laws-wise. After the Revolutionary War,
the U.S. was in a weak place militaristically so they treaded carefully when
it came to local tribes and how they interacted with them. This may sound
odd but at that time if Native Americans had worked together they could’ve
easily overthrown the young country's government. To keep this peace the
U.S. passed laws to “protect the tribes' sovereignty” These were enforced
very loosely if at all.
Thirdly, the “Relocation of the Native Americans” extended from 1828
to 1887 this era began when President Andrew Jackson made Manifest
Destiny, a public goal. This change in the dominant federal Native
American policy with laws like the Indian Removal Act of 1830. This made it
easier for southeastern states to negotiate with local tribes to force them
west and resulted in “The infamous Trail of Tears”. It also made boarding
schools where they’d violently kill and beat Native American children into
assimilating into white society these boarding schools still existed until the
late 1970s when they were finally ended with laws of their own. This time
also led to tribes not having the decision of whether they signed a treaty or
not leaving the decision to Congress whether or not these people would
lose land that they were promised.
We continue to our last change that lasted more than 2 decades,
“Allotment and Assimilation” lasting from 1887 to 1934. This period is
known for its ideas of taking Native land, as well as trying to make them
farmers. More specifically, the main goal of the era of Allotment and
Assimilation was to give Non-Natives the Native land, and by doing so
make Natives assimilate into white farmer society. Giving the land away
worked, for example, loads of whites moved onto the Native lands but, the
Natives were too poor to be farmers so they either lost their land or sold it
to whites because they were so deep in poverty. They lost it because of
foreclosure, just not wanting to live in a white farmer society, not having
enough money to pay for farming equipment, etc. Finally, a turning point in
the federal policy ICA (Indian Citizenship Act) law in 1924 gave Native
Americans who didn’t already have it through treaties or statutes citizenship
in hopes it would help assimilation.
Now we’ve made it to the positive but quick changing policies with
“Indian Reorganization” (1934-1953). this positive change happened for a
multitude of reasons. First, the Depression caused a lower purchase rate of
Non-Natives buying Native land. Secondly, more news outlets were writing
about the poor conditions that Natives lived in. These conditions included
epidemics, inadequate food, inadequate education, and most importantly
extreme poverty. These conditions led to public criticism and the want for
tribal independence to be restored was growing at an unprecedented rate.
With F.D.R. the government made radical changes to how Natives were
treated compared to previous administrations. F.D.R. appointed John
Collier who’d previously criticized the government's control of Native
American religious beliefs compared to how they treated other cultures.
Colliers established the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) to give Native
Americans economic support and bring forth independent governing for the
nations. This group of policies was massively criticized for being
paternalistic but it still was a big step in the right direction for a better life for
the Natives.
 Now we’ve gotten to what is considered the last time a Native
American policy was used to hurt the Natives and not help. It was known as
the “Era of Termination”, it started in 1953 and ended in 1968. This era was
purely done to undo everything that the IRA set, starting with Herbert
Hoover, saying something along the lines of The best way to help Native
Americans and save the government loads is to assimilate Natives into
society. However, the actual changes started with Eisenhower outright
abandoning the goals the IRA set leading to a near extinction of Native
American governments and Reservations. In 1953 Congress adopted
House Concurrent Resolution No. 108 whose whole goal was to end
funding and support for Native Americans as rapidly as humanly possible,
this led to 109 tribal governments disappearing and dispersing their land to
tribal members. To twist the knife on their destructive rampage Congress
passed Public Law 83-280 or P.L. 280 which gave six states the power and
criminal jurisdiction over Indian reservations giving them the power to arrest
Native Americans and prosecute them in State courts as they so please.
This final shift so far has been a massive and long-lasting one “Tribal
Self-Determination” 1968 to the present day. Started by President Lyndon
Johnson when he declared that he and the U.S. government should use
their power to protect the culture and independence of Native American
governments and their citizens. This shift has led to the most positive time
in Native American history since pre-Columbus. One of the first things went
from the 1960s to the 70s that was the work of Hank Adams he was “The
Most Important Indian” as said by Vine Deloria Jr. a native activist. He was
very influential in his time he participated in what is called the fish wars in
which the State of Washington and multiple Northwest tribes fought over
fishing rights on reservations. The tribes called out the fact that the U.S.
went into multiple treaties where they said that the natives had a right to
fish on their land however, non-native fishers were fishing where they
weren’t supposed to so these tribes got mad and tried to do something
about it. But they couldn’t and it caused these tribes to argue that the
treaties supersede any state regulation so the Pacific Northwest Fish wars
happened Adams was both shot and arrested during this time since it was
still a bad time to be native. He was a legal advisor to many tribal leaders at
the time, At last, it finally ended in 1974 when the court of appeals case
U.S. v. Washington decided that yes the treaties had superseded the state
and they had no authority to allow fisher on the reservations without Native
consent. Leading to the large changes that still happen and exist today.
The federal outlook toward Native Americans meant that many things were
going well like the end of boarding schools with ICWA (Indian Child Welfare
Act(1978). They also restored all the nations lost during the era of
termination and when President Nixon, vice president during the era of
termination, vowed to make Congress reassure Native Rights. There were
also non-legal changes like making negotiations more
government-to-government than they had been previously. More laws also
stopped states from taking land whenever they wanted without consent,
and even more were passed in the name of autonomy establishing
healthcare, police, etc.
As you can see this evolution in the ways that Native Americans have
been treated and how their rights have appeared and disappeared. It’s
quite scary that even in this time of positivity the government can change at
any time who knows what the future will hold? Even just a year ago they
tried to overturn ICWA nearly causing another change in federal policy
thankfully it didn’t go through and was stopped before it went too far.
Looking back on these events see how bad those bad times were with
genocides, assimilation, and god knows what. Heck as mentioned the
“Good times” aren’t even that good there was still murder just not as much,
is a good time good if you still cause mass murder? Imagine back then
sending your child to a boarding school just for them never to come back or
come back nothing like how they were when they left. That’s horrible, or
being the one going to a school it’s easy to say they were good at doing
what the government wanted making the Natives act like white Christians.
In the present day we deal with murders MMIW is a problem that
extends past borders. In both Canada and The States you can look at a
map and see everywhere where a native person has gone missing then
you see these huge blobs or lines along highways. I worry every day about
my and my family’s safety but you have to keep pushing on the world will
happen no matter what and I’d rather see it than hide from it. It isn’t even
just women a couple of weeks ago Cole Brings Plenty passed away. This is
not a rare occasion for Indigenous peoples to disappear this is a
once-weekly thing at least. However, it’s such a common occurrence that
most Native people will go on and off the rez at times that it can be hard to
get organizations to work together to find these missing people. Or at least
that is what they say, I’m not saying they’re lying it’s just odd that missing
P.O.C. while taking up less of the population but, on average go missing at
a higher percent and are less likely to be found or even looked for
compared to Non-POC.
Even with sovereignty, it’s purely circumstantial, and the
government-to-government negotiations are just for show and mean very
little the U.S. says that they have our best hopes in mind while they
murdered swathes of us and took our land now they try to take our money.
In 2022 The Seneca Nation and New York State were in negotiations about
a new Gaming Compact and for about a year at that point they were in an
ongoing dispute about slot payments. At one point the Nation had a lawsuit
going but they dropped that they then sent in the details to The National
Indian Gaming Commission. Since they were waiting for the ruling the
council decided to pause payments to The State in response the state froze
The Nation's bank accounts. This gave the Nation no choice but to give the
$564 million payments to The State, as well as this movement to freeze put
the Seneca people along with thousands across western New York along
their families at risk. Then Kathy Hochul used the the money to pay for the
new bills stadium along with saying “Upon taking office, I sought to
negotiate in good faith, and we have met every hurdle. I am pleased to
have finally reached a resolution,”. In response, people protested at
Niagara Square in Buffalo with signs talking about the economic footprint
The Gaming Corporation along with Reservation has “4,500 jobs, $2.3
billion, NO state subsidies, NO Investment.” and another saying things
along the lines of “first it was a land grab now a cash grab. What's next?”
and these protestors validly said that this is an act of war a “financial
blockade”. Another message they had was that “Tesla got loads of financial
help for only about 1,400 jobs while The State takes $1.1 billion from The
Nation which gives 4,500 jobs.” Overall this situation was a net negative for
the Nation nothing good came of it besides awareness for problems that
native nations face in the current day.
 Later around January of 2023, The Seneca Nation sued the state
over the 3 miles of reservation that it goes through saying that in the 50s
they were coerced into doing so by the lawyer that THE STATE gave them.
which in my eyes looks like a conflict of interest, I may be wrong though but
that seems like common sense. They also called out the fact the deal was
never ratified and therefore shouldn’t count but U.S. Circuit Judge Richard
Sullivan argued that the 11th Amendment should bar the Nation from
pursuing this lawsuit. The Nation made it past this point with a 2-1 vote that
their claim is valid and other judges and this 3-person panel said that it
doesn’t fall under the 11th amendment. This is because the 11th
Amendment states that a person cannot sue a state in which they do not
reside. In this case, however, this doesn’t apply. Later in December 2023,
the Cayuga nation filed a similar lawsuit claiming a similar thing that the
state illegally built the troughway through their reservation without consent.
They want the money that’s owed to them as declared by The Secretary of
the Interior and also for them to approve the throughway to go through their
reservation. And they want to help set a precedent in stone of fixing
problems that happened many years ago using laws that have been
passed or were already in existence like the Right-of-Way Act of 1948. This
applies because it states that a state or similar has to have both consent
from a tribe to make a road through their reservation and approval from the
Secretary of Interior. Both nations also claimed that these violations were
attacks on their sovereignty as Native Nations established by the
Canandaigua Treaty.
And like I mentioned before there’s the “Most Important Indian” Hank
Adams who worked alongside Northwestern tribes to get them their fishing
rights back and even did so while going through the era of termination.