Basically, what happened is the Narragansett tribe has been trying to open a tax-free smoke shop on its own lands her in RI. The governor has been opposing it. They finally did it anyway and, yesterday, the state police went in and siezed it, some say with more force than was warrented.
As a rabid anti-smoking nazi, I’m against the shop, but I have to say, I really don’t know how good I feel about the police going in. What do you think?
There are plenty of indian reservations selling cigarettes on the internet. Only a stupid person would buy retail in a state with high cigarette taxes. Every smoker I know, buys from cheap states or from the indians. I dont know anybody who still buys retail in high cigarette taxed states.
Indian reservation selling of cigarettes is a great business, greatly benefiting both the indians, and the smoking consumers. It also helps non-smokers by giving the indians more money to spend at other businesses, and leaving smokers with more money to spend at other businesses, boosting the eonomy quite a bit. Every dollar saved by purchasing cigarettes at an indian reservation, is spent at other businesses causing more jobs and a healthier economy for everyone.
How can this one tribe be prevented from doing what all the other tribes are doing? How can it be legal?
This is really weird. I live in southeastern Connecticut and I was just reading the newspaper here and saw this story…
See here . The photo’s are pretty graphic.
Cowboy’s and Indians bull shit if you ask me. Those Narraganssetts are federally recognized Sovereign Nation, and this is not over. A big Mess is brewing. They want essentially what the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans have, Which is this Huge Casino and this Huge Casino.
For those who have never heard of Foxwoods, or Mohegan Sun, (both linked) they are two huge casinos in the forests of Connecticut. Foxwoods is the largest single casino on the planet.
The Narraganssets want this to happen to their reservation in Rhode Island.
I’m still not clear on the details of this. The RI governor has called this action of the State Troopers shutting down the cigarette shop as regrettable but necessary, accusing the Indians of breaking RI laws.
But not far away from there are the huge casinos of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, which are certainly breaking Connecticut laws against gambling. They get away with it, of course, by not being part of Connecticut. One would think that the Narragansett land was not part of Rhode Island, but maybe that’s what’s under dispute.
This just awful. I don’t know who authorized the state police to go charging in there the way they did, but that was totally out of line. Didn’t anyone think to get a restraining order and handle this civilly instead of criminally?! And it’s not like they didn’t know the Narragansetts were going to open the shop–they notified the state two months ago.
The state is also fighting the casino that the Narragansetts want to open, but at the same time is giving breaks and incentives to the floundering Jai Lai business in Newport and the dog track in Lincoln (there are articles on this at www.projo.com, but you have to register to read the paper there)–I don’t understand how they can justify this. The treatment of the Narragansetts has been shameful.
The treatment of the narrafanssetts has been shameful.
Cal - the Narraganssetts just got federal recognition IIRC. Check the link to the paper, I believe it is in the article. The picture of the Gung-ho trooper sitting on the woman is absolutely Horrid. Disgusting in fact. This is 2003, not 1863. I’m thinking of writing a letter to the editor.
The treatment of the narraganssetts has been shameful.
Cal - the Narraganssetts just got federal recognition IIRC. Check the link to the paper, I believe it is in the article. The picture of the Gung-ho trooper sitting on the woman is absolutely Horrid. Disgusting in fact. This is 2003, not 1863. I’m thinking of writing a letter to the editor.
Cal, this site explains a little bit more about the casino situation.
Apparently this is the situation now. RI has restrictions, but they’ve modified these restrictions to allow Newport and Lincoln to have slot machines because dog racing and jai lai were’t bringing in the money they used to.
Kinda unrelated, but it may end up being related: In Minnesota, an indian tribe got taken to task for spear fishing. The Governer and sportsmen groups pushed the issue, a conflict arose, and the whole mess ended up in court.
The Indians won at every single turn in court. They were not the transgressors here. They never wanted to push the issue. But in the end, they hit the jackpot.
If the Narraganssetts have the same type of historical treatment that the Minnesota tribe had, they may end up rather happy that the whole issue came to a head.
Umm… did you look at all the pics on that page Phlosphr? Right to sell cigarettes aside the Indians were apparently quite forcibly resisting arrest. If you were a Rhode Island law enforcement officer sworn to carry out judicial orders, please tell me in detail the kinder, gentler method you would use to restrain someone (male or female) who insists on grappling with you when you are arresting them?
We may have a similar situation brewing in Western New York. The NY State government, strapped for cash, wants to shut down the smoke shops on Seneca and Tuscarora land. The Tuscarora case is of particular interest to me, as I live a mile and a half from one of their shops.
The last time they tried it, the Senecas ended up blocking the Southern Tier Expressway, there was a huge mess, and the State government eventually backed down on collecting taxes on the smoke shops. The Senecas have threatened similar protests if anything happens.
Personally I have sympathy with both sides. No, the native merchants shouldn’t have to pay taxes. But it seems disingenous to then say that they can sell tax-free to non-natives, since that was never part of the (18th-century!) treaties which set up the reservations. OTOH, since tobacco taxes weren’t being collected in the 18th century when the treaties were drawn up, it’s a gray area.
I actually figure there’s some room for compromise which doesn’t involve shutting down the shops or levying taxes on non-natives. NY State is already halting tobacco sales on the internet. Perhaps there should also be a bar on advertising off the reservations. (You see signs for the biggest smoke shops miles away.) One hopes that there will be some satisfactory conclusion which is still of benefit to the Seneca and Tuscarora Nations.
I do have to agree with this, if in fact that’s really how it happened. The correct thing to do would be to submit quietly to the arrest, get bailed out and let the courts handle it, preferable Federal court. Resisting arrest pretty much never works out the way one might hope; if the police come to arrest you, it’s going to happen. I am not certain if those arrested were responding to police agression or showing resistance from the outset.
Here’s a little, tiny personal update. I work in Providence and, at lunch, I saw a Narragansett man standing around downtown accompanied by a member of the tribal police. (He was wearing a head-dress, that’s how you could tell.) He didn’t appear to be demonstrating except through his presence on Westminster Street and many people came up to give him words of support; nobody made any negative comments. The message board on www.projo.com also seems to be very much in favor of the Narragansetts.
I just got back from lunch and all I heard while I was out, Caricci was how much everyone supports the Narragansetts. Even people who don’t think they should be selling cigarettes still think this was handled horribly. It’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out.
Now I see the people I saw on the street on the projo site. They were in town to sue the state! I did see some action in front of the Federal Court with the news cameras and what not. Now I see that’s where they were either headed or coming from. It was really nice what I saw the people doing. They were patting the guy on the back, shaking his hand. I kind of see that the governor is doing a little backpedaling with his opinion on the handling of the case.
While I’d read about all this in the papers, I hadn’t seen the t.v. news reports on it till last night and I am just stunned. Okay, I can understand that the Narragansetts shouldn’t have resisted arrest because when the state police come to get you, it’s going to happen. But the police had attack dogs that you could see, on camera, biting the people as they were being held down and hand cuffed! And the governor decided this was the way to handle the situation! What was he thinking?!
Now I’m seeing where Gov. Carcieri may be doing a little back peddling. He is now claiming there were “explicit instructions” not to use force in the face of resistance. It doesn’t seem to go along with what he was saying the day it happened.
If they weren’t going to use force, why did they send the state police in the first place? Why not just handle it civilly and get a restraining order? They had two months lead time on this to have taken legal action sooner without it turning into the mess that it has.