On Saturday, September 23rd, Ryan Dreveskracht will lead a "Tribal Panel," titled "From Fishing Rights to the Torts Claim Act, at the Tacoma-Pierce County Bar Association's Annual Convention.
A Native American's Immigrant Song
"We may be different in color or origin but we are connected in one way or another." -- Lower Elwha Klallam Chairwoman Frances Charles, Canoe Journey 2017
The Dreamer controversy got me thinking, about how we Natives are in fact more connected to immigrants than we might realize, or admit.
So I wrote a "song" about it. Here's my riff on it all:
First, I'm no fan of the barbs or memes that Indians are the only people who are not immigrants to the United States.
That may have been true in 1492 but unless you're a full-blooded Indian---the overwhelming majority of us aren't---you descend from immigrants too.
Speaking of 1492, there are oral accounts of Columbus' arrival to Haiti, wherein the "Indios" actually welcomed him and his people ashore. Indeed, as the image above suggests, America's Indigenous Peoples have generally been more inclusive of immigrants than we might believe.
So let's end all of the divisive rhetoric about "us" (Indians) versus "them" (immigrants).
Second, let's realize that birthright citizenship, as guaranteed by both the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment and 8 U.S.C. 1401, is a tie that binds certain undocumented persons---like so-called anchor babies---and Indians.
Simply, if you are "a person born in the United States," you are a citizen of the United States. 8 U.S.C. 1401(a). Anchor babies, i.e., born unto the land, are United States citizens even though their parents may be "unauthorized." Id.
Likewise, if you are "a person born in the United States to a member of an Indian, Eskimo, Aleutian, or other aboriginal tribe," you are a citizen of the United States (8 U.S.C. 1401(b)). Indian babies, born unto the land, are also United States citizens under federal law (id.), and may also be a Tribal citizen under many Tribal laws like IRA constitutions that guarantee citizenship at birth.
Third, let's recognize that Indians also immigrate, from one tribal nation to another, through a process called relinquishment. With tribal peoples having inter-married for generations, it is very common for an Indian to have ancestral ties to multiple tribal nations.
In this day and age, Indians are frequently relinquishing their citizenship with one tribal nation, and becoming a citizen of another. Although this mode of immigration is often fueled by per capita dollars, it is nonetheless an Indian's prerogative to relinquish and enroll elsewhere.
Fourth, let's also appreciate the potential commonality between Dreamers and too many Indians. Dreamers are persons who were brought to America as children by undocumented parents or others. To many Dreamers, America is the only home they have ever known.
Many Indian children are born away from their Tribe's homelands---as the United States has intended since 1887---but "brought home" to their Tribe and enrolled by their parents or others. To those Indians, their Tribe is the only home they have ever known. Now several of those Indians are being told, by "leaders" of their Tribe, that they don't belong; they are being disenrolled.
President Trump threat to deport 800,000 Dreamers after ending DACA makes me think of those Indians. Much like Autocrat #45, who stands poised to jettison Dreamers from their only home, tribal autocrats are today kicking out thousands and thousands of Indians from their only homes.
Unconscionably, what President Trump proposes to do, and what as many as 80 tribal autocrats (or autocracies) have already done, is to separate children from their parents and families, and nuclear families from their extended families; and to displace them all from their homes.
We as Native people, knowing full well the traumatic effects of separation and displacement, should raise our voice against the injustice we are witnessing throughout the land.
This is my immigration song.
Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California. He is also of Austrian, Scandinavian and Portugese descent.
Indian Country Today Helped Shatter the Disenrollment Taboo
For nearly the last decade, as disenrollment turned into an epidemic throughout Indian Country, our leading news outlet, Indian Country Today/Media Network, tackled the subject head on.
When ICT began doing so, disenrollment was taboo---as Dave Palermo put it, disenrollment was our "dirtiest secret." And for the most part, disenrollment was being carried out by tribes---gaming tribes---who might buy advertisements with ICT. But ICT never shied away.
Take a look for yourself. Go to ICTMN's website and search "disenrollment." Then peruse any of the 452 search hits. You'll find:
- Leading disenrollment scholarship by Prof. David Wilkins, which led to his recent publication of a book on the topic, "Dismembered";
- Incisive political cartoons, at least six, by Marty Two Bulls, like:
- Powerful op-eds, like Robert Chanate's "Trickster Teaches the Prairie Dogs How to Disenroll Their Members," and Cedric Sunray's "Disenrollment Clubs";
- Hard-hitting news coverage of particularly horrific disenrollments, at places like Elem, Paskenta and Nooksack;
- Pointed interviews on the subject with the likes of former Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs Kevin Washburn; and
- Entertaining coverage of the disenrollment counter-movement, including the #StopDisenrollment visual advocacy campaign that began in early 2016 and continued in 2017, and the historic "Who Belongs?" conference in Tucson this past March.
Meanwhile, Indianz.com and Pechanga.net not only posted ICT's stories, but those tribal news sites also wrote or posted various other disenrollment stories over the last several years.
Most recently, Tribal Business Journal and Global Gaming Business Magazine commissioned and published disenrollment features. For its part, Tribal Business Journal ran a three-part series. Those ad-dependent news magazines would not have touched the subject even three years ago.
ICT is not giving itself too much credit when, announcing its "hiatus" today, it says:
ICTMN’s reporting has also helped shape political debates and policy decisions around our community’s priorities—and that will have an enduring impact on those debates and decisions in the coming years.
ICT's reporting has helped us realize, quite simply, that disenrollment is not our way; and never has been. ICT has helped cast shame upon the practice---specifically those tribal "leaders" who seek to get rid of their kin with ulterior motive---and emboldened many other Indians to also cast shame upon those of our peers who deserve it. ICT has helped helped deter the cancer that is disenrollment from spreading further, to more tribal reservation or rancheria communities.
Indeed, since early 2016, there has not been a new mass disenrollment that I know of. That's after nearly 80 tribes engaged in the practice over the prior decade---approximately 8 tribes per year.
Maybe ICT was too honest for it's own good. Maybe that's why, unlike certain other tribal magazines, ICT couldn't sustain itself with lucrative gaming advertising dollars. Maybe.
In any event, "ICTMN proved that we do not have to sit idly by." ICT most certainly did not sit silent amidst the disenrollment epidemic. Neither should any of us.
Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California. I prefer Indian Country Today, to Media Network; thus the "ICT" references.
