Indian Country turns Against Itself

What we need is Leadership and Unity

Leadership and unity is something as a Nation we sorely need, and the same can be said for Indian Country, right now.

Ostracism, insecurity about one’s identity, or maybe even the Stockholm Syndrome, may all be at play in the current political war in Indian Country, all over the “honor” of being federally recognized by the U.S. government. The political cartoon published in “Indian Country Today” more than two decades ago, is an accurate parody of the legal process. (See political cartoon above.)

The federal government has failed to federally recognize the tribe of Chief Seattle,¹ and up until 2015, not even the tribe of Pocahontas had been federally recognized!²

Tribes may establish federal relationships with treaties, but they also have to establish continuity since first contact, while battling genocide and forced assimilation as well as criminalization of the very customs and practices that they are required to demonstrate that they continuously observed since contact. (See the political cartoon above.)

Lumbee Indian Tribe History

The Lumbee Indian Tribe (which encompasses descendants of coastal tribes including the Cheraw) was among the first to meet the Spanish explorers Hernando de Soto and Juan Pardo by 1586, on the front line of colonization.

The written history begins with the story of the arrival of the Roanoke Colonists.³ The indigenous people who met Sir Walter Raleigh’s colonists were the Croatan, the Chowan and other coastal tribes. The story goes that the colonists (who had failed at growing crops and had run out of supplies) joined with the coastal tribes to survive.⁴ This is a story more about the establishment of American than a story about the origin of the Lumbee Indian Tribe.

As an early front to resist genocide and assimilation, the structure of these tribes evolved and so did the coalitions. The Lumbee Indian Tribe was a refuge for coastal tribes to join the Cheraw in that region. They moved around quite a bit, including staying with the Catawba Indian Nation on the N.C. and S.C. border. All of this movement of individuals and deaths of complete tribes and bands due to smallpox, war and political alignments makes it difficult to document for purposes of federal recognition for a federal agency with little interest in learning about one of the dark chapters in American history.

Lumbee Indians were not regulated as an Indian Tribe, despite continuation of that structure, but as “people of color” as the 1700s moved into the 1800s. This legal strategy effectively stripped away their identity intentionally reducing the documentation for federally recognition and to avoid taking control from the state. Laws restricted movement, owning a gun, prohibiting serving as a witness and proscribing who you could marry.⁵ During the U.S. Civil War, the Lumbee Indians were literally kidnapped/conscripted and taken to work on a canal in eastern North Carolina at Ft. Fisher as part of the Confederacy’s earthworks. Many died there in deplorable work conditions from heat, starvation and disease.⁶

From the Home Guard that enforced these racial codes and meted out punishment including hangings on the spot, came a senseless shooting of a Lumbee family in 1865. The backlash was epic, and the family began what was called the “Lowry War”⁷ led by three brothers avenging not only their father and brother’s deaths but the oppression of all the Lumbee people.

For western tribes, they revere as legendary heros, Geronimo, Apache Kid and Crazy Horse who carried out similar retributional campaigns. The Lumbee Indian Tribe’s legendary hero is Henry Berry Lowry, the leader of the “Lowry Band”. Lowry was never caught and said to have lived out his life still visiting in the shadows at public gatherings.⁸ Similar stories are told about Apache Kid by the San Carlos Apache people.

To confront the challenges of the Lumbee Indian Tribe, a strong tradition of education developed to build toward a more level playing field using the power of education. Part of the movement arose with the establishment of the Croatan Normal School in 1887 through a request to the state to train Lumbee Indian teachers and then the name was changed to Pembroke State College in 1942. It was the first Indian run school in the nation and is now a branch of the UNC University system, UNC at Pembroke.⁹

The Lumbee Indian Tribe and all other East coast tribes, unlike the western tribes who lived on federal lands, were part of the civil rights era history subject to discriminatory state law. The Lumbee Indian Tribe (at the time known as the Croatan Indian Tribe) lived under a government defining them as a third “race” in their respective states in the East. During that civil rights era, a landmark in Lumbee Indian Tribe history is a battle of epic resistance to the KKK in eastern North Carolina rallies. Like western Indian Wars, such as the Red River War commemorated by Plains Tribes, the Lumbee Indian Tribe commemorates the Battle at Hayes Pond. Here, the KKK intruders were physically confronted in the night amidst their burning crosses by the Lumbee warriors of the 1950s (with an always absent local sheriff’s support). The KKK were driven off some say in abject fear of the resistance from the Lumbee that they saw, and never returned.

In the mid-1940s, Native Nations across the country saw the efforts to terminate tribes which meant treaties established in exchange for all the land in American would be simply “terminated”.¹⁰ Native Nations united under one new organization called the National Congress of American Indians arose from that threat to Nation Nations continuation. They all signed a “Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Mutual Assistance” in Albuquerque in 1947 to agree to defend each other and form a coalition to support each other.¹¹ Leadership from such giants in Native American advocacy as Vine DeLoria, Ron Andrade and Susan Shown Harjo¹² ensured that state recognized tribes as well as federally recognized tribes all were united with their common goals and needs.

By 1956, when Pres. Eisenhower had continued the implementation of one of the most destructive Indian policies of any President, the Termination Era, as fate would have it, the Lumbee Indian Tribe was recognized by the federal government in 1956, but limited by legislating that the tribe should never receive any benefits from the federal government in keeping with the Termination Era policy. It was definitely poor timing for recognition legislation. This statute while one the one hand has recognized the Lumbee Indian Tribe as a tribe of Indians, it has has also blocked efforts for full federal recognition for the last 60+ years.

Another hero emerged in the 1980s. A Lumbee leader rose to prominence in his fight for justice, Julian Pierce, who was a lawyer. He was the first director of Lumber River Legal Services and petitioned for federal recognition and was denied, but he made he case for the Lumbee Indian Tribe. He was the first Lumbee to challenge the district attorney in a political election but during the campaign, he was mysteriously assassinated outside his home and many believe the perpetrators were sent by local law enforcement. Investigators insisted it was a personal murder not a political assassination.¹³ It is still in dispute today. In 1973, around that same time, the occupation of Wounded Knee, a Lakota reservation, involved a shootout with the FBI leaving some Lakotas dead and one incarcerated for life, while no FBI agent was ever prosecuted for the shooting.¹⁴

The 1990s has continued a movement of self-determination for Native Nations in federal Indian policy. Federal recognition also means the opportunity to participate in gaming if all of the processes of the Indian Gaming and Regulatory Act (IGRA) are followed (absent legislation to the contrary for a particular Tribe). So the politics often revolve around the interest in protecting territory for gaming, reliving ancient territorial battles but playing out in the courtroom or Congress. The Lumbee Indian Tribe has implicitly agreed to forego gaming in exchange for full recognition.¹⁵

The Lumbee Indian Tribe is the only Native Nation in the United States to be in this status — federally recognized, except for the purpose of receiving services and resources. All as a function of the federal policy era in which the legislation was introduced in Congress. But other state recognized tribes (of which there are about 500) have as many stories of their existence, and have historically supported for the same objectives and goals as federally recognized tribes. Many are engaged in the process of federal recognition (see political cartoon above).

The Tribes that Become the Oppressor/Conquerers

This national coalition of Native Nations, the National Congress of American Indians has undergone some instability in the last five years, with three Executive Directors in almost as many years. So in a clandestinely planned movement to expel all tribes from voting status, who are not already federally recognized, the Eastern Band of Cherokees, the Shawnee and the Ute Tribes have proposed to amend the NCAI Constitution to exclude anyone not carrying this federally-recognized designation from the federal government.

Federal recognition means support and resources for Native people and Nation Nations which is part of the forced agreement to give up occupied lands. But if you have already given up your land and have no further legal leverage, the federal government is not interested in recognizing that tribe. So it is an artificial construct to even pretend this process is validating for identity. See political cartoon above.

The confrontation is coming in November in New Orleans where the voting will take place. It is a dark cross roads in NCAI history and one that will either lead to stronger unity or will lead to fracturing any hope of a coalition for Indian Country.

Despite the agreement in the “Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Mutual Assistance,” the foundation document of NCAI (“Treaty”), obligates the members of NCAI to assist other members in their struggle for rights, liberties or property; and the Treaty further prohibits members from hostile designs toward any other member in that struggle for rights, liberties or property; and tribal members are obligated to give notice of any reported such hostility by any member, at the earliest time so that “measures may be taken to prevent their ill effects.”. ¹⁶

Ignoring the Treaty that is the foundation of the entire organization in order to rip apart the organization into political factions is exactly what the founders in 1947 sought to avoid. It is highly likely that they did not foresee the process that has become federal recognition bureaucracy (See political cartoon above.) at the heart of the broken system that would lead to fatal factionalization.

Let’s hope that the wisdom of unity will prevail.

1. https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/real-duwamish-seattles-first-people-and-the-bitter-fight-over-federal-recognition/

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pocahontas The Pamunkey Tribe of Virginia was finally federally recognized in 2015.

3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roanoke_Colony

4. Lee Miller, Roanoke (2000, 2012).

5. https://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/slavesfree/summary.html

6. https://www.ncpedia.org/lumbee/19th-century

7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowry_War

8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Berry_Lowry

9. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_North_Carolina_at_Pembroke

10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_termination_policy

11. https://www.ncai.org/resources/ncai-publications/ncai-annual-reports/2009_NCAI_Annual_Report.pdf

12. https://www.ncai.org/about-ncai/ncai-leadership/previous-ncai-leadership

13. https://www.usmarshals.gov/who-we-are/history/historical-reading-room/incident-wounded-knee

14. https://www.usmarshals.gov/who-we-are/history/historical-reading-room/incident-wounded-knee

15. Several bills have been introduced over the past decade that stipulation recognition for the Lumbee Indian Tribe would exclude the right to engage in gaming.

16. https://www.ncai.org/resources/ncai-publications/ncai-annual-reports/2009_NCAI_Annual_Report.pdf