Indigenous, Indian, and Aboriginal Law Commons^™

Tribal-State Affairs: The Next Proving Ground?, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

While these more profound issues of structure and perception beg for solution, a more immediate problem has arisen with the advent of Republican dominance in the Congress. One of the likely outgrowths of this transference of political power is that Congress, along with the Supreme Court, which has been doing it for some time, may funnel more issues to the States and their subsidiary governments for resolution or administration. Such a transfer does not bode well for tribes. Remember the allotment of Indian lands (1880s-1930s) and the Termination of tribes (1950s-1960s)? Those policies essentially made tribes and their citizens subject …

The Cloaking Of Justice: The Supreme Court's Role In The Application Of Western Law To America's Indigenous Peoples, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The debate over which legal Indigenous Peoples should govern Native American political power and property rights, or even whether they should be protected by law at all, caused conflicts challenging the autonomy of the legal system and led to changes of the original principles of Indian rights. The outcome of that conflict raises two questions of federal Indian law. One is where its principles contributed to the survival of Native Americans in the United States; the other is whether the same legal principles are responsible for the perpetual inferiority of Natives Americans in their own land. More starkly, the question …

Reconsidering The Tribal-State Compact Process, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

This essay evaluates the tribal‐state compact process, as one of several alternative, nonadversarial processes, warranting attention. It argues that, because of its binding character and relatively low cost (in contrast to litigation), and because it is based in the idea of tribes and states exhibiting mutual respect, the compact process is an advanced version of negotiation and bargaining that tribes and states should consider where appropriate.

The U.S. Supreme Court's Explication Of "Federal Plenary Power": An Analysis Of Case Law Affecting Tribal Sovereignty, 1886-1914, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The concept of tribal sovereignty frequently conflicts with that of congressional plenary power, depending on the definition and basis of plenary power. Analysis of 107 federal court cases between 1886 and 1914 suggests that when plenary power is seen in terms of preemption and exclusivity, it may help to protect tribal sovereignty from private or state incursions. However, if plenary power is defined as absolute and unlimited, tribal rights are not constitutionally protected against federal actions. Although tribes are properly regarded as extra-constitutional entities, they are often treated as inferior in relation to Congress by the courts.

Intra-Tribal Confrontations: What Is To Be Done?, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Racial, ethnic, and religious wars and conflicts have plagued humanity since the primordial past. But since the thawing of the Cold War, there has literally been an explosion of devastating conflicts that seem far more complex than those which erupted in earlier eras. These are also potentially more threatening to international peace because of their breadth, scope, and probable duration.

These and the multitude of other ethnic, racial, and religious conflicts around the world are far more brutal and ruinous than anything most indigenous people have experienced since the federal government's aberrant and fortunately short-lived policy of Termination and Relocation, …

Guatemalan Political History: National Indian Policy, 1532-1954, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The relationship between the Spanish and later the Guatemalan state with the Mayan Indians over the past four centuries is a fundamental component of Guatemalan political history. Since the beginnings of the nation, when the Mayans were political and military entities of power and independence with whom the Spanish had to come to terms; to the 1944-1954 "Revolutionary Era," when Indian communities were finally conceded limited social, economic, and political rights; and the period from 1979 to 1984 in which the military regimes killed "tens of thousands by some estimates as high as 80,000" Indians; the Indian population has been …

Transformations In Supreme Court Thought: The Irresistible Force (Federal Indian Law & Policy) Meets The Movable Object (American Indian Tribal Status), David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

This article is a content analysis examination of 107 federal court cases involving American Indian tribal sovereignty and federal plenary power rendered between 1870 and 1921. Our focus, however, is the U.S. Supreme Court's Indian Law jurisprudence; thus ninety of the cases analyzed were Supreme Court opinions. The cases seemingly entail two separate braces of opinions. One brace included decisions which affirmed tribal sovereignty. The other brace entailed cases which negatively affected tribal sovereignty. These negative decisions generally relied on doctrines such as plenary power, the political question doctrine, or the so- called “guardian-ward” relationship. We argue that the Supreme …

Indian Tribal Sovereignty And The Environment, Sarah P. Campbell

University of Richmond Law Review

States and Indian tribes alike have compelling reasons for demanding regulatory jurisdiction over the Indian reservations' environments. Proponents of state regulation argue that "[a] state's ability to coordinate a successful and comprehensive hazardous waste management plan depends at least in part on state control of all hazardous waste activity within its borders." In some states, the reservations are not isolated from the activities and residents of the state. In Washington state, for example, some Indian reservations have a high percentage of non-Indian residents, and others contain cities, municipalities, and heavily industrialized areas. This "checkerboard" reservation developed from the federal government's …

Breaking Into The Intergovernmental Matrix: The Lumbee Tribe's Efforts To Secure Federal Acknowledgment, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

This article discusses the concept of political recognition (both federal and state) of Indian tribes; explains the difference between administrative and legislative recognition; examines who is or should be empowered to extend federal recognition, the Congress or the executive branch; discusses the major factors that have compelled the Lumbees to seek federal recognition when they were already acknowledged by the state; and examines the major factors that have precluded them from securing complete federal recognition.

Who's In Charge Of U.S. Indian Policy?: Congress And The Supreme Court At Loggerheads Over American Indian Religious Freedom, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The federal government's three branches—executive, legislative, judicial, and that unwieldy mass known simply as "the bureaucracy" have, during the last half-decade—1987-1991—produced a dizzying crop of laws, policies, proclamations, regulations, and court decisions which have served simultaneously to 1) reaffirm tribal sovereignty; 2) permit and encourage greater state interference within Indian Country; 3) enhance federal legislative authority over tribes; and 4) deny constitutional free-exercise protections both to individual Indians and to tribes.

On the legislative side, Congress has established the experimental Tribal Self-Governance Demonstration Project which is a major step towards restoring the tribal right of self-determination, and is discussing the …

Internal Tribal Fragmentation: An Examination Of A Normative Model Of Democratic Decision-Making, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

A recent commentary by Gerald A. Alfred in the spring 1991 edition of the Northeast Indian Quarterly dealt with a subject matter which is either ignored or radically exaggerated when it is broached in Indian Country: political fragmentation (or segments or cleavages) and ideological conflict within North American Indian tribes and the ramifications of such internal conflict on tribal identity.

This paper, after restating Alfred's major points about Mohawk segmentation at Kahnawake, describes and then analyzes a viable alternative democratic decision-making model which has been specifically designed to address the problems of how not only to restore, but also to …

[Introduction To] Diné Bibeehaz'aanii: A Handbook Of Navajo Government, David E. Wilkins

Bookshelf

The Diné (Navajos) inhabit a vast land of beauty and grace. It is a sprawling territory, bounded by sacred mountains and great rivers. The Navajo Reservation, first delineated in the 1868 treaty, has nearly quadrupled in size since then through some twenty-five additions. Today, the Diné land base is some 25,000 square miles (sixteen million acres roughly), encompassing a large portion of northeastern Arizona, a part of northwester New Mexico, and some 1,900 square miles in southeastern Utah. This tremendous stretch of land, the largest Indian reservation in the county, is slightly larger than the state of West Virginia.

Navajo …

Diné Bibee Haz' Áanii: An Analysis Of The Navajo Political System, David E. Wilkins

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The Diné (Navajo) people have a representative/legislative form of government modeled loosely after the American system. The present governmental structure, established in 1938 by the Secretary of Interior, is outlined in the Navajo Tribal Code. This article encompasses the background of the Code, describes the efforts of tribal and federal officials to enact a tribal constitution, and discusses the key functions of government: legislative, executive and judicial. It also examines the various subunits of government operating within the reservation. Finally, it contains recommendations that, if enacted, could strengthen and legitimize Navajo government.

Economic Development Of Indian Lands, Roger L. Tuttle

University of Richmond Law Review

If anything be true of the United States in the second half of the Twentieth Century, it is the rise of humanism and social consciousness on the part of most Americans. The near-universal test applied today to one's personal or group relationships is whether justice is served. The salient examples of the fruit of this concern are the achievements which have been made toward bringing "first class citizenship" to the Negro-American through school desegregation, establishment of uniform nondiscriminatory voting requirements, abolition of separate rest rooms and waiting rooms, and the opening of housing and transportation facilities equally to all. The …