In this CNN story, it syas that they are members of a tribe no longer recognized by the government.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/LAW/08/06/court.eaglefeathers.ap/index.html
How did it come to pass that?
Neither is my spell checker recognized.
It explains it here.
http://www.boulderweekly.com/archive/050202/newsspin.html
Basically, when the Chiricahua Apaches got into a war with the US under Geronimo, they lost federally recognized status. Most surrendered, and got federal recognition back, but some fled into Mexico, and their descendants aren’t recognized today.
Or, as the 10th Circuit put it, when deciding for Mr. Saenz:
{quote]Although originally recognized as a tribe by the United States government and restricted to a reservation, the Chiricahua reservation was dissolved in 1886 after the outbreak of warfare between the Apache and the U.S. Aplee. App. at 66-69. After many leaders of the Apache surrendered to the U.S., many Chiricahua, including Mr. Saenz’s ancestors, refused to surrender and fled to Mexico. Mr. Saenz’s family returned to the U.S. in the 1930s. Aplee. Br. at 5. The Chiricahua Indians are not currently a federally-recognized Indian tribe.
[/quote]
Just working mostly from memory here. The Chiricahua Apaches were taken captive as prisoners of war and held for 27 years. They were held somewhere in Florida for awhile and then later were moved to Fort Sill. I think that during those 27 years tribal members had the option to join up with other Apache bands, such as the Jicarilla and Mescalero.
The major successor in interest to the original Chiricahua band is probably the Fort Sill Apache Tribe, which is a federally recognized tribe today. I see that on their own web page they style themselves the “Fort Sill-Chiricahua-Warm Springs Apache Nation.”
If I get a chance tonight I’ll take a look at the book Wild Justice to see if I can put together a basic synopsis of what happened, but my general impression is that the Chiricahua tribe wasn’t terminated, it was just imprisioned, fragmented, generally treated poorly, and came out the other side with a different name.
There are plenty of folks out there who are of American Indian descent, and who still practice American Indian religions, but who are not tribal members either by preference or sometimes because they do not meet a tribe’s membership requirements, which often requires meeting a blood quantum.
Heh, I think Captain Amazing did a far better job of explaining that than I did.
[Gilda]Nevermind.[/Gilda]