> Trouble is, as far as your question goes, various government entities including the Justice Dept. and the CIA, etc. were the ones taking advantage of the territorial immunity of the tribe concerned.
I just had the scary thought of the US setting up Guantanamo-like prisons on reservations. If it was legally possible, they probably would have done it already.
> In Florida, the Seminole tribes distribute thousands of dollars/month, to each of their members just for being alive. Many of them end up having chronic issues with drug and alcohol abuse.
Okay I was with you for a little bit but this part of your comment is completely off the mark. The casinos are built on tribal land. And in many cases owned by the tribe. For all intents and purposes the tribe is a corporation. Members get a monthly dividend based on their percentage of native american blood. It is not UBI and not a welfare. If you or I, assuming you aren't NA, move to tribal land we still wouldn't be entitled to that money, nor through marriage. We aren't a stakeholder.
I've been to Miccosoukee and Seminole country before and after the casinos. The additional income has made a lot of difference in improving their way of life. Hurricane hardened homes, fully funded schools, and reliable cars.
As for alcohol and drug abuse. That is an issue with tribes who don't receive any money at all. That is a separate issue related to education, job prospects, and, yes still, racism.
BTW, the Seminoles didn't just spend their dividend money on alcohol and opiates. They've been busy investing that money as well. They have bought the entire chain of Hard Rock restaurants and resorts.
Then it should be the case that the US Government should start removing Casinos from Native American Land as it brings in, on a massive scale, drugs, alcoholism, and crime, and find other methods and ways to promote a healthy economy for the Native Americans.
This should be first and foremost.
But by reading this do you agree with empathy, or do you get filled with antagonism because I'm supplying "whataboutism" (what a redditor move), or because I'm not fulfilling my patriotic duty to hate China.
>Wait, you think Native Americans are confined in reservations? Like there's a big fence around the reservation, and they can't go out?
Good one, no.
I think that the lands they lived and had autonomy and their rule of law etc, have been taken from them as their ancestral places, and have been confined to the reservations.
The fact that they can move "freely" to New York or the greater South Dakota are irrelevant. It's like someone coming over, taking your house, handing you over the "right" to live and rule over the backyard, but also giving you the "freedom" to rent/buy/live in a room on their own old house if they want.
And that's with tons of shady behavior from the federal/state level even for them living there and their resources (e.g. when uranium was discovered in those places).
>70% of the land is not the U.S. Government's to give.
"The federal Indian trust responsibility is [...] a legally enforceable fiduciary obligation on the part of the United States to protect tribal treaty rights, lands, assets, and resources." [0]
The questions of armies and building bases I'm not sure have been raised, so the legal precedents might not exist. Sufficed to say, however, that the GP's hypothetical sale to Canada would be wholly infeasible in light of the treaties between the sovereign tribes and the US, as well as the legal complexities those entail.
Yes, that's absolutely true. I'm not much of an expert in that policy area, although it does seem the Bureau of Indian Affairs isn't working out well in some ways.
> My own perception is that corruption within the bands is rife, with chiefs and their family/friends benefiting from the rent-seeking and pretty much everyone else in the band losing out.
Look far north. The village doesn't have clean water, but the local chief has two hummers and brand new ATVs on the front lawn. Guess where your tax money went...
> You want to honor the Natives? Do something that helps them legislatively, e.g. change the boundary conditions that would allow for houses to be bought and generational wealth be accumulated in Reservations.
at least here in South Dakota, the problems with the reservations are not of the legislative variety
> Because the states are not the owners of that land. Those are other countries, and they get to set their own rules.
I expect it is more complicated than that, and less adversarial. The states really could make life more unpleasant for the reservations if they wanted, and the feds couldn't necessarily keep that from happening. It's in everyone's best interest to play along.
> Many people do. Native American nations are magnets for scam artists and various criminals.
Wanna back that one up with some statistics?
> They are immune from state prosecution, so if they operate at a level below whatever the federal authorities care about, it’s lower risk.
Well, not quite. It really depends on what you are talking about. Besides, NA preying on NA is often ignored, but don't screw with the non-NA because then you get the Feds and State cooperating.
Lol. If the US government could do that, it would happily have done so.
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