When is enough, enough? What prompted this question was American Indian “holy mountains” and such. American Indians have “Special Status” under US law. They can have their own police forces, travel on US passports, fish when the rest of us can’t, the list goes on and on. When does it stop?
My position is: pick a side. Either you (as an Amind) are a citizen of the US, and therefore get absolutely zero special treatment (no reservations, no “holy places,” no special hunting/fishing rights, no casinos, etc.) or you aren’t, in which case you better set up passport controls outside of Foxwoods, and sacrifice all US Govt. support of any sort.
Yes, we conquered their country. Big F***ing deal. Boo-hoo. When does the collective guilt trip end? My people had genocide practised on them this century, killing some 36 million of us, but you don’t see us whining about “special rights.” (Ukrainian, for those who ask.) When do we say enough is enough?
I am interested in the defense of either side. What are the valid arguments for or against special treatment for AmInds?
I now claim your house as part of the great pravnik nation. Don’t worry, as part of our treaty agreement you will recieve the special treatment due to a conquered people. I’m still going to let you live in your shed out back and fish in your pond.
The utter hostility of your OP aside, the reason Native Americans have “special status” as you call it, is because they are sovereign nations. The U.S. has a treaty with them. We basically gave them a little bit of crappy land that we didn’t want so they could have their own country. They are not subject to all of our laws because they are sovereign. When does it end? I guess when we go back on our word, which we seem to like doing.
Indian tribes have always been recognized by law as sovereign entities, and federal government’s relationship with recognized tribes are defined by treaty. While the American Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 granted citizenship to all American Indians born in the US, that didn’t abrogate the treaties signed between the various tribes and the US government.
BTW, I remember once meeting a very disagreeable woman from Germany who constantly complained about the “special treatment” that Jews get. Does that help put this in perspective?
I’ve got no problem with total sovereignty. Go for it, Mission Indians. Declare independence. You’ve got my vote. But surrender your California Driver’s License, your right to vote, your passports, etc. I just think it should be one or the other. Half measures serve no-one well. Assimilation or separation would work, but halfway measures just cause more problems.
Actually, half measures seem to be working pretty well. Native Americans have plenty of reason to be upset. We’ve broken plenty of treaties and forced them as a people in to some pretty bad situations in the name of “manifest destiny”, which is a pretty indefencable policy.
Other conquered people of the last couple of centuries have either gained independence with the end of colonialism, or are now in the throws of some pretty violent conflicts. Our system has managed to avoid the kinds of violence associated with, say, the Kurds or the Chechens or any number of people who’s ancesteral land is now under the government of someone else. If the price of the imperfect peace we have with Native Americans is a few “half-measures”, then I think it is worth it.
Plus, we made treaties with them. This cannot be ignored. People are stil alive today who were around when some of these treaties were formed. These arn’t dusty documents signed centuries ago which affect no one’s lives. There were nations here. We conquered them. In the course of settling peace with them, we made agreements. The people we made these agreements with still exist, and still consider them important. We cannot go back on these agreements just because we’ve ignored Native Americans to the point that they feel irrellevent. Our government has just as much an obligation to honor it’s promises to Native Americans as it does to any other country we’ve signed treaties with.
But you’re missing the point. The treaty agreements did not require complete independence. Are you suggesting that we abrogate the treaties (yet again)?
A sovereign nation completely inside another sovereign nation can’t work. The current situation may not be optimal, but it’s what we agreed to.
The real racket is that the tribes get to decide who is and who isn’t a member, and it can be used as a political tool for personal gain or vengence. Seems like that could be cleaned up, although I only have a “60 Minutes” type understanding of the situation, so I it’s probably more complicated than I realize.