Steven Newcomb: Supreme Court justices put tribes on notice

On May 27, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court delivered a 5-4 decision in the case State of Michigan v. Bay Mills Indian Community. A five justice majority issued a ruling that works in favor of the Bay Mills Indian Community. While a great deal of commentary is likely to be focused in the majority decision, this column is about the dissent by justices, Thomas, Alito, Ginsburg, and Scalia, and their tacit acknowledgment that a system of domination has been and is still being used by the United States against our nations and peoples. Here’s the damning sentence:

Despite the Indian tribes' subjection to the authority and protection of the United States Government, this Court has deemed them "domestic dependent nations" that retain limited attributes of their historic sovereignty. (emphasis added)

A question arises: What kind of existence did our nations have before the onset of what Thomas, Alito, Ginsberg, and Scalia characterized as the “subjection” of our nations by the United States government? Answer: Our nations existed originally free and independent of any “subjecting” domination by political powers from Europe or by the U.S. government on the basis of a distinction between unbaptized “heathens” and “infidels” (our ancestors) and Christians (their ancestors).

Christian political powers considered themselves to have the right to take over, dominate, and subjugate lands that were inhabited by unbaptized nations and peoples so long as the lands were uninhabited and, or, not possessed by Christians. It is this history that the four dissenting justices are invoking by their use of the word “subjection” in their Bay Mills dissent.