Mike Myers: Sovereign rights at risk in the courts of the settlers

Monday, July 18, 2016  

Native women rallied on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court as the justices heard Dollar General Corporation v. Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, a tribal jurisdiction case, on December 7, 2015. Photo by Indianz.Com

Indian Country fared surprisingly well as U.S. Supreme Court took up cases that tested the inherent sovereignty of indigenous nations. But the racist underpinnings of federal Indian law and policy remain, observes Mike Myers (Seneca Nation) of the Network for Native Futures:

Anyone watching the American Supreme Court knew something was up because it was taking them so long to render a decision in the Dollar General v. Mississippi Band of Choctaw case. So it wasn’t too surprising that they deadlocked in a 4-4 split on the issues.

Regardless, this is the fourth Supreme Court decision in favor of Indigenous nations and governments and two of them were unanimous. Each has addressed some aspect of retained inherent rights.

Over the years I’ve come to understand that there is a huge difference between inherent rights and interests as opposed to what is often wrongly defined as “treaty rights”. Treaties create obligations and conditions between the parties through which there is an agreement that a new relationship now exists until something happens to change that relationship.

Treaties could impact inherent rights but only if the parties clearly decide to do this. What most commonly happens in treaty negotiations is that the parties create some sort of joint mechanism, process or protocol by which they will jointly exercise or put their inherent rights on hold. In any event, whatever is negotiated is not perpetual nor does it spell the end of these rights.

Get the Story:
Mike Myers: Inherent Rights at Stake (Indian Country Today 7/18)

U.S. Supreme Court Decisions, October 2015 Term:
Dollar General v. Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians (June 23, 2016)
US v. Bryant (June 13, 2016)
Nebraska v. Parker (March 22, 2016)
Menominee Tribe of Wisconsin v. United States (January 25, 2016)

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