Wyoming has a very large Indian Reservation, the Wind River Reservation, which is home to part of the Shoshone Tribe* and also home to the Arapaho Tribe. It's also the home to quite a few non Indians as well.
The Wind River Reservation has a fascinating history which includes sort of a smoldering dispute which has run for decades about the proper boundaries of the Reservation. This dispute is complicated, but what it basically surrounds is withdrawals of certain areas from the Reservation by Congress, so that these areas could be opened up for general homesteading outside of Tribal jurisdiction. I'd note here, and it is very significant, that areas of Reservations could be, and were, opened up for settlement within Tribal boundaries. Contrary to what is very evidently the general belief, you do not have to be an Indian to own land within a Reservation. Indeed, the Wind River Reservation includes part of the Midvale Irrigation District, which is a very significant irrigation district which is mostly farmed by non Indian farmers who live within the Reservation.
One of the areas that have long been disputed by the Tribes is the area around the city of Riverton. Riverton is the county seat of Fremont County, and it is located on lands that were opened up for homesteading in 1905 by the United States. It's generally been nearly universally believed by all but the Tribes that this event took the area in and around Riverton outside the Reservation, with the Reservation bordering it. Indeed, the general belief would be that, if you were driving West on the highway, you'd enter the Reservation just outside of Shoshoni, leave it again rapidly, enter the framing belt where Riverton is, and then cross the river back on to the Reservation, and then leave it again just before you entered Hudson. Prior legal decisions support this view.
Recently, however, the Tribes petitioned the EPA for a status equivalent to that of a State in regards to regulating air quality. The EPA granted this petition, but in so doing it went one step further, for reasons I haven't looked into, and held that the1905 act opening up the land for homesteading did not withdraw the lands from the Reservation.
That decision is contrary to prior court rulings and it came as a surprise to everyone including, in my opinion, the Tribes, which haven't really fully reacted to it yet. The Tribes are being careful to take this a bit slowly, as they aren't exactly sure what this would mean. It does have real implications, as it would mean the transfer of some authority in Riverton to the Tribes, such as law enforcement, and potentially taxation. The town is ignoring the ruling, which is probably a solid legal approach to take, and the State of Wyoming is challenging it. Ultimately the question will end up in Federal Court.
What this in no way means, however, is what is being reported on a right wing news oriented website (one I hadn't heard of before a person sent me the link to it). That site reported, amongst other things:
It appears that Obama’s habitual abuse of his executive action is beginning to rub off on the rest of his administration. His EPA soldiers are now telling a town in Wyoming that they no longer have the right to live there. And what’s worse? They’re giving away that land that the residents rightfully bought to other people.
No, that's not accurate at all. Not even close.
You don't have to be an Indian to live on an Indian reservation, and real property on the Reservation works the same way as it does everywhere else in Fremont County. If you buy property, and anyone can, you record the deed in the County courthouse in Lander. Riverton is still in Fremont County and still a town in Wyoming no matter what happens. Just as Ft. Washakie, which has always been a Fremont County town in the Reservation, and Lander which has always been a Fremont County town outside of the Reservation, are.
This is not to say that there wouldn't be a lot of legal implications to the boundary being reestablished. There certainly would be. Most particularly questions regarding law enforcement, civil law, and the taxation, would be present. And there might, or might not, be somethings to work out regarding the schools, although I would note that there are Fremont County school districts which are part of the state system that are inside the Reservation. For some reason, Fremont County has a lot of school districtions.
But what's so interesting here is how quickly this story morphed into a false one in some quarter, and a quarter that apparently had little if any connection with Wyoming. Somebody must falsely believe that only Indians live on Indian Reservations, which is completely inaccurate. Indeed, the Wind River Tribal Court doesn't even bother to determine if jurors it calls are enrolled Tribal members or not, and it calls Indians and non Indians in for jury service, just as the Ninth Judicial District calls in people from inside, and outside, of the Reservation for jury duty.
This sort of thing seems common in the Internet age. Local stories, like the one about New Jersey's George Washington Bridge, get blown up out of proportion as if they are of national importance. And a story like this, which is full of legal nuances, gets reported in some quarter as if the President has some vague relationship to it, and as if this means non Indians are about to be expelled from their homes.
Odd how things become told as stories.
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* The Shoshone were a fairly large Tribe, in releative terms, in the 19th Century and were truly indiginous to the region, unlike the Sioux and Cheyenne which were displaced in the East and moved to the West, becoming Plains Indians in the process of adopting the horse. For this reason, i.e., immigration, the Cheyenne and Sioux were regarded as invaders, as they really were invaders, by the tribes already present in the region, such as the Shoshone and Crow.
The Shoshone were a very widespread tribe and are known by other names, probably not surprisingly. The Bannock, for example, are Shoshone. While regarded as a separate tribe, the Comanche are actually Shoshone as well, distinct culturally as they were the early adopters of the horse in the 18th Century, as opposed to the rest of the tribe which only adopted horses some years later.
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