Can You Lose Your Citizenship?

One of the ironies facing the Native peoples today is the issue of membership.  The Supreme Court has made it clear that only a Tribal government can determine who is qualified for membership and the Tribe's determination cannot be challenged, even if the determination is wrong.

This legal handicap makes it excrutiatingly difficult for Native American's who are about to lose their membership with their Tribe, especially when they know that the Tribe is disenrolling them for monetary gains or for political revenge.  Who can these disenrolled Native American's turn to in their time of need?

To put this matter into better perspective for the non-Native reader, imagine this scenario being played out on you.  Today, you opened your mailbox and discovered a letter from the Immigration Service.  You open it and find that the Immigration Service has determined that your citizenship with the United States was given to you mistakenly and now they are going to terminate that citizenship.  In their graciousness, the Immigration Service shall grant you a single hearing to explain why you should not lose your citizenship.

You prepare your hearing materials to prove that this is some kind of mistake.  You gather family tree information, birth certificates and the like in preparation.  The day of the hearing arrives and you march in to present your case, confident that having been born here in the United States is more than enough qualification for you to win.  When its your turn to present your evidence, the Immigration Service lawyers simply say, "We don't accept that evidence."  The judges in your case side with the Immigration Services.  You are now a non-citizen.

As you wonder out of the hearing, you don't know what just happened or how it could happen.  You consider the ramifications of what just happened over and over, but it only makes you more confused.  You receive a notice from the hearing that confirms the decision to remove your citizenship from you and it also instructs you to move from your current location to make room for "real citizens."

This is the real life scenario facing Native Americans today.  It is most likely to happen to a Native American once their Tribe opens up a Casino operation.  In California, disenrollments are an epidemic.  They have become "paper genocide" against the people who belong with these Tribes.

One has to ask the question: where is the Federal government and why aren't they stepping in to stop this nonsense?  The answer to these questions are almost as strange as the fiction that the Tribe's try to spin with their Public Relations apparatus, but these answers do fit all the questions like a well formed leather shoe, one that doesn't fit anywhere else...

The Tribal government will state that they have the "sovereign right" to determine who will be a member in their Tribe.  The Supreme Court will state that the Tribe is more than capable of making these decisions.  The Bureau of Indian Affairs will state that they are restricted from even commenting on the issue, much less getting involved in the discussion.  The general public only notices something is going on if the Senior Lunch Buffet prices go up to $5.99.

What the Tribe and the federal government isn't telling you is the real truth.  Once the Tribe disenrolls a member from their rolls, this member now becomes an unrecognized Native American.  What this means is that the disenrolled Tribal member is no longer considered a federally-recognized member of a Tribe and therefore doesn't qualify for further benefits in education, housing or health care.  This disenrolled Tribal member can no longer call upon the BIA for assistance.

It is this fact that the federal government and the Tribes have been keeping away from the press and from the public at large.  One of the primary reasons that a Tribe is granted federal recognition is for them to provide for their own people.  The Casino's are given to the Tribe's to provide the economic engine to make this happen.

However, what is actually happening is the Tribal governments are taking advantage of the laws that protect them from lawsuits so that they can disenroll their own people from their Tribes for the sole purpose of reducing the number of members on the books when the time comes to pay out the profits from the Casino operations.

The federal government is standing by in the wings doing nothing about this blatant grab at the money because it is serving their financial interests as well: less federally-recognized members equates to less federal outlays to subsidize their care and upkeep.

The fact that the federal government is allowing the Tribes to be operated as dictatorships is a clear indication of what their opinion on the matter is.  The federal government even allows the Tribes to violate the civil rights of their non-Native employees that work in the Casino's.  Yes, the federal government will even allow a Tribe to violate your rights as a visitor and guest to a Casino.

In recent months, the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians from Southern California has petitioned the US Federal Court for complete immunity from all labor laws, specifically immunity from laws that favor unionization of their workers.  Currently, Indian Tribes are already immune to just about every labor law on the books, but this is the last little thorn in their side that they had to agree to to get their Compacts approved and now this case could jeopardize what little oversight exists to protect American workers in any Indian Casino.

The next time you visit a Tribal Casino, you should keep this in mind: you aren't worth anything to the Tribe except the money you plan on losing.  The Tribe you are supporting with your gaming dollar is using that money to exploit their own people and to buy politicians who will keep them in the money for as long as the public allows it to go on.

If you don't feel it's wrong to violate the rights of Native Americans, American workers and the American public, then by all means, keep spending your money at the Casino's.  However, if you do see that what is going on is wrong, and you do think something should change, then stop spending your money with the Indian Casino's.  Take a trip to Vegas and spend it at a corporate Casino instead.  You'll feel better about it!

Comments

[for all nations]

CAN YOU LOSE YOUR CITIZENSHIP: YES YOU CAN!!!...AND THERE ARE MANY LAW FIRMS--INCLUDING THOSE CLAIMING TO BE INDIAN OWNED--WHO ARE PERFECTLY WILLING TO MAKE IT HAPPEN IF THE PRICE IS RIGHT!!!

from an article posted december 5th, 2006 on indianz.com by none other than harold monteau...of MONTEAU and peebles law firm representing picayune rancheria of the chukchansi indians tribal council

"monteau: montana governor wrong on igra"

"Economic discrimination in the form of economic racism is economic terrorism. No legal or moral argument can be made to sustain this reprehensible treatment of Montana’s Native Americans."

well now, harold...many people around indian country also believe that no legal or moral argument can be made to sustain the reprehensible treatment of the dismembered citizens of the picayune rancheria of the chukchansi indians, nor can your legal representation and validification of what is continuing to occur there be justified in any way...you are leading the way, and participating in, the economic discrimination, economic racism, and economic terrorism (not to mention--more importantly-- the SPIRITUAL and CULTURAL discrimination and terrorism) of the 250 chukchansi people disenrolled thus far at picayune and the 400 or so yet to go through your sanctioned paper genocide....your design of, and assistance in, the picayune tribal councils denial of constitutional and civil rights of our chukchansi citizens amounts to spiritual, cultural, and economic rape of indian families...you--and your "honorable" indian law firm are every bit as responsible as the tribal council...YOUR behavior is reprehensible...apparently, you and your firm find "economics" more important than being "indian" and honoring your ancestors and traditions...Back to top

[FEATHERHEAD]

Hi! I just dropped by to see your site, because you visited me...thank you...and I was really taken aback over this situation! Like most folks, I had no idea this was happening!What a terrible mess the government has allowed to occur.I would like to do something to help, so I am adding you to my people list, if that's okay?

[Steel]

TINA, aka FEATHERHEAD, brought me here.

I am mostly Indian.

I have an attitude.

I have a fairly well-viewed site.

Would you do me the favor of visiting my site and telling me how I can help?

Or better yet, send me an email, the address is on my site.

I can be very ... effective.

Ask TINA.

I tried to use an HTML link and it did not work.

The Steel Deal.

Google it.

[Pained Reader]

Not to lessen the value of what you're reporting, but do your future readers a favor - figure out where an apostrophe belongs before you hit "Submit" next time, ok?

[Bill Hayes (Hawa)]

I was disenrolled in September of 2006 from the Chukchansi Tribe. In my hearing with the Tribal Council, I was told that even though I was of Chukchansi decent I did not enroll in time. Now, a year later, my brother is being called in for a hearing. He did submit all the required documents for enrollment before the required timeframe and was listed on the 1988 enrollments. The Tribe will not tell him why he needs to come in for a hearing. All of his paperwork is in order, according to the tribe but will not tell him why the hearing is taking place. I think we all know that the dividends are soon to be payed and the select few want more of their share. By the way, my Great,Great Grandmother was a Princess of the tribe. If I'm not Native then what am I?

[Sharon]

Standard Governmental Policy: It is much easier and cheaper to watch infighting than it is to defend and establish federal policy.
They are happy to provide you with paper and proof and are delighted to see that you now are requiring it of yourselves.

This is the new war and it is not about land. Know your battlefield and your opponents. Ultimately indiginous people will be the source of their own undoing if they are not careful. Stop alienating yourselves from your peers and segregating your culture.
Your battles are and have been won by groups, not individuals. Disection by individual identification undermines your varied culture. Indiginous people are undoing their own governance and group power. Command respect not demand respect.
Top down, not bottom up in this one. You are more than 'indian' and should capitalize and promote those assets rather than attack them, or allow attacks on them, by opinion or conjecture. You are your own best advocate. Defend yourselves, protect your culture, and further your efforts for no one else will. Time to figure it out is not your ally. The wolves are at your door. Be they friend or foe ?

[sildenafil citrate]

I would like to do something to help, so I am adding you to my people list, if that's okay?