Who gets to tell the story, and what story do they get to tell? Whether by requiring a higher blood quantum for federal recognition and benefits, denying Indigenous people U.S. citizenship, or influencing tribes to adopt their own blood quantum requirements, White people have been the gatekeepers of Native American identity. She's an amazing scholar. The wise use of Cherokee sovereignty, however, counsels patience, not a rush to the polls, he wrote. We need to get tribal governments to do away with it. The attorneys representing the Cherokee Nation in the lawsuit did not respond to requests for comment. [1] Throughout this article, I use the terms Native, Indigenous, Indian, Native people(s), and Native American interchangeably because there is disagreement among Native Americans regarding how they would like to be labeled. In 1978, a congressional survey found thirty-three separate definitions of Indians in various pieces of federal legislation. All of the Nations use Blood Quantum as a requirement for membership. Many Native nations, including the Navajo Nation The one drop rule measured the amount of "black blood" that black people had in society. Blood quantum is a measure of the amount of Indian blood, expressed as a fraction such as one-half or one-fourth. It's an extremely progressive and interesting move, and they're really changing the game. For tribes (like mine) who hold strict requirements for citizenship, the From the time that European colonists set foot on American shores and made contact with Native[1] peoples, they have sought to control the land and resources that first belonged to the tribes. What many people dont know is that blood quantum laws have been in effect for about three hundred years. The fuck. Since the U.S. government was giving the Seminole Nation a limited amount of money for the seized land, the Nation naturally wanted to limit the number of people who received funds. Starting in 1884, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) used Census rolls to assign blood quantum amounts to Native people. Fletcher, Indigenous Law and Policy Center, Rose Cuison Villazor, co-editor, "Loving v. Virginia in a Post-Racial World", Carla D. Pratt, law professor, Penn State University, Tiya Miles, historian, University of Michigan, Joanne Barker, associate professor, American Indian studies. Does the use of blood quantum rules in these places seek to exclude on the basis of race as well and create a racial hierarchy? Occasionally we get thrown out or banned from events, public places, and private homes. Such a belief was expressed by individuals such as phrenologist Charles Caldwell, who said that the only efficient scheme to civilize the Indians is to cross the breed.. My husband's tribe is a quantum tribe, with per capitas. Their reservations werent deep in middle America or the forests. Well, if a tribe has a casino there is a good chance that the tribal members are entitled to percapita payments. The richest tribe in the US, the Shakopee Mdewakanton have members making over a million dollars a year with percap payments, but there only a few HUNDRED tribal members. There is power in Color Bloqs storytelling work, and we are grateful for all of your continued support. The governments goal was to break up tribes by encouraging individual family farming. Modern definitions of indigeneity within tribes closely mirror the nineteenth and early twentieth century European-American conceptions of race. Its a complicated, controversial, and personal topic that has major implications for citizenship and belonging in Indian Country. (Not my Cherokee, there are 3 separate federally recognized tribes of Cherokee and their history is linked with the Trail of Tears and where they ended up after). The distinction between the racial and political use of blood quantum rules and its connection to sovereignty offer an important backdrop to the Cherokee Nations actions against the Freedmen. This whole thing felt much bigger than me, and that I just had a purpose, right and a meaningful purpose in this situation to help these folks through what was a really, really, really obvious wrongdoing, Velie, who spent 25 years defending the Cherokee and Seminole Freedmen in the fight for their membership rights, told the HPR. You've used the phrase "personal gains" before to refer to some people who might've claimed Indian heritage. The federal government also often recategorized Black Cherokees as Freedmen just because they looked phenotypically Black, even if they had originally been on the blood roles. Many Native tribes adopted the same criteria used by the federal government, leading the majority of tribes to have a blood quantum requirement. Colonization caused a shift to legal and race-based definitions. Before colonization, Native nations used various forms of lineal descent to determine membership. Hardly any tribes are looking to move away from a blood quantum regime so I would say that its here to stay. Ask Dave Epstein: What is freezing rain, anyway? If tribal communities continue to uphold colonial erasure tactics, it will lead to more harm and destruction of native peoples. The BIA issues Native people a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB) that identifies an individuals blood quantum and Native nation affiliation. Why is it important? We should not This amount is used to determine the individuals tribal belonging and legal rights. The adoption of non-blood individuals into clans highlights that blood quantum is foreign to traditional Cherokee practices. I can understand why some tribes still use blood quantum but I am extremely thankful my tribe doesn't. But, tribes today of course have to adapt, and blood quantum for some tribes in their view has been a way to preserve their community. Evidently, among some Indigenous groups, systems of naturalization granted non-kin groups tribal membership. Theyll know about it for sure because the tribes history is part of their history. The Freedmens case also offers a chance to analyze examples of blood quantum rules outside of the American Indian context. The Dawes Act, passed in 1887, broke up communally-held Native lands into individual parcels, or allotments. Currently, all Natives enrolled in a federally-recognized tribe are issued a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood, also known as a CDIB, by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Shake my head. If you're Native American, this controversial term about your blood can affect your identity, your relationships and whether or not you can become a citizen of your tribe. And that ensured that every person who had at least one drop would be considered black and would be covered under these discriminatory laws and, even in the earlier days, enslaved. Without doubt, the Cherokee Nation engaged in blatant racial discrimination. Although it remains to be seen whether the pendulum will swing away from the engagement with abolitionist theory that intensified in the wake of the May 2020 murder of George Floyd, a [], 2022 Jorde Symposium: Frederick Douglass and the Two Constitutions: Proslavery and Antislavery, 2021 Jorde SymposiumThe Third Founding: The Rise of Multiracial Democracy and the Authoritarian Reaction Against It, 2022 Public Interest/Public Service Bar Grant Fundraising Campaign. And potentially, some of those incentives would be financial gain if the tribe, for example, has gaming revenue or other industries. Join us. { My tribe doesn't use blood quantum for obvious reasons. Its very important that Native nations consider their power as sovereign nations and their ability to write their own laws and to self-govern., Gabe Galanda sums it up well: Anyone who cares about this country, loves this country, and respects and honors the history of this countrywhether thats an ugly history, a beautiful history, or a combination of bothshould want the Indigenous peoples of these lands to exist in perpetuity. WebThe idea of blood quantum was first introduced in 1705 by the Colony of Virginia, which adopted the Indian Blood law.. For Indigenous people, the blood-based rule is referred to as blood quantum, which measures the fraction of Indian blood that a person possesses. Rooting resource allocation in blood politics allowed the federal government to forge a correlation between increased dilution of Indigenous blood and higher socioeconomic status, grounded in the European belief that White blood uplifted Native blood. Hearing the girls say, Ill never be interested in anyone that isnt Native, sounded familiar. The government saw blood quantum as a way to strip. Blood Quantum and the White Gatekeeping of Native American Identity, Some Native Americans Fear Blood Quantum is Formula for Paper Genocide, Blood quantum influences Native American identity, Beyond Blood Quantum: The Legal and Political Implications of Expanding Tribal Enrollment, Jill Doerfler: Defining Citizenship: Blood Quantum vs. Descendancy. This law was used to reduce the civil rights of Indigenous people with or greater blood quantum. None? Specifically, Freedmen, the descendants of Black slaves of the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogees (Creeks), and Seminole tribes, have faced significant exclusion. The framework through which federal benefits are allocated to Indigenous communities is inherently paternalistic, which helps contextualize the erasive history of blood quantum. Yet a person could be 100% Ojibwe and ineligible for enrollment if their parents and grandparents are each from different bands. Consanguinity, meaning direct family descendance, was not exclusive in determining group membership, however. And some tribes have extremely high blood quantums such as the Ute tribes(southern and northern) have a 5/8s blood quantum requirement. They say that I will never amount to anything because Im even whiter, and how stupid my mother and grandfather were for marrying worthless whites. That system is the blood quantum Duh. I nickname them the BQMs (Blood Quantum Mechanics). Meaning that those individuals don't meet the federal Canadian requirements of being a "status Indian," and they also don't have that blood quantum or descendancy from an original enrollee. Surplus reservation land was then open to homesteaders and corporations for purchase, creating patchwork quilt-like reservations with both American Indian and non-American Indian landholdings. But WHY do tribes want this? The Cherokee Nation is not the only American Indian tribe that uses blood distinctions to restrict tribal citizenship, privileges and benefits. 109, and Berkeley Law Class of 2021. "The systems are so complicated," she explains, "but it's all part of tribes deciding on their own terms, in their own ways, utilizing their own sovereignty [to decide] what approach is best for them.". Speaking of blood libel, because that's what it is, protesting the 2020 election result is the same as slavery, as the KKK. Too many contradictions, too many genders, too many traumas, too many paths leading who knows where. Yes. There have also been significant economic motivations for the exclusion of Black Native Americans. I My 8Generation Designed Warrior Blanket used to Small victories: My 15-year-old nephew asked my Mtis mom Canadian Sikh's recognize we live on Native Lands. Natives face lower life expectancies and disproportionate poverty rates, leading to the increased rates of: 3 times the rate of type 2 diabetes-related deaths, 1.7 times the rate of suicides, and 6.5 times the rate of alcohol-related deaths compared to whites. why blood quantum is problematic Further, some people who had no Indian ancestry managed to acquire places on the rolls through dishonest means in order to receive land allotments. Sure, I could control whether or not to act based on my desires, but the interest itself was uncontrollable. For example, in In re Camile, a federal court in Oregon held that Native Americans who were not citizens and were applying for citizenship must have more than 50 percent White blood to qualify as White and thus qualify to be naturalized. With your support, GBH will continue to innovate, inspire and connect through reporting you value that meets todays moments. Blood quantum, like so many other factors, seemed an arbitrary barrier in sex concerns. These laws were enacted by the federal government and state governments as a way to establish legally defined racial population groups. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts. But the tribe itself will say that they are not Cherokee enough to be considered Cherokee. All rights reserved. For purposes of land allotment, the government wanted fewer people to count as Native American because it wanted to keep the majority of land to itself. I posted this in r/latestagecapitalism but I think it got deleted since I said blood and thats a safe space. Mother and grandmother try to build love matches with men they know. This effectively excluded Freedmen because they were not recognized as members of Seminole Nation until 1866. Those whod like to eliminate blood quantum point out that the original numbers are arbitrary. Blood quantum appears as a fraction and is calculated based on an individuals family tree. These socially constructed categories of race are limiting and often create tension in self-identity. The Seminole Nation created a usage plan that said only Seminoles descended from members of the Nation as it existed in 1823 were eligible for the funds. So that over time, Indians would literally breed themselves out and rid the federal government of their legal duties to uphold treaty obligations. She describes this framework in her book Real Indians, Identity and the Survival of Native America, proposing that Radical Indigenism illuminates differences in assumptions about knowledge that are at the root of the dominant cultures misunderstanding and subordination of indigenous knowledge. Those who are against continued use of blood quantum often mention survival as a primary reason for their viewpoint. The government hoped that using blood quantum would eventually eliminate Native peoplesthat intermarriage would dilute the amount of Indian blood in the population, causing descendants of Native peoples to become indistinguishable from the rest of the population. Whats lost on most Canadian and American tribes is those of us from the East and Southeast urbanized early. Blood quantum is a complicated, controversial, and personal topic that has major implications for citizenship and belonging in Indian Country. In Cherokee origin stories like the legend of Corn Mother Selu, ceremonial adoption practices were seen as sacred acts of creating new blood. For more discussion about the complexity of labels, see What We Want to Be Called: Indigenous Peoples Perspectives on Racial and Ethnic Identity Labels. Create an account to follow your favorite communities and start taking part in conversations. I totally think we should. %%EOF Native art can be anything as long as the artist is native. TOP 9 why blood quantum is problematic BEST and NEWEST You are wondering about the question why blood quantum is problematic but currently there is no answer, so let When Im referring to a specific tribe, I refer to the tribe by its name. To address concerns about scarce resources, those exploring alternatives to blood quantum are also emphasizing the importance of differentiating between citizenship and qualification for benefits. There wasnt a single self identified queer in our town and suspected ones found regular beatings a part of their life. And that's that's one of the major problems with blood quantum today is that a lot of times, the people taking the rolls were federal government officials who were unfamiliar with Native ways of establishing and defining their own communities. 2021), http://box2539.temp.domains/~califrp0/blood-quantum-and-the-white-gatekeeping-of-native-american-identity. (Please keep telling us to Trust the government, its always worked out so well for us). Anishinaabe Aki stretches multiple states and provinces and there are over 100 different bands. The Native nation would cease to exist. When the Bureau of Indian Affairs began recording blood quantum designations in the 1880s, white settlers had the final say when it came to the numbers. 27 0 obj <>/Filter/FlateDecode/ID[<82A9F044F25EB42FE2F9B69288F2063B><2807E08E2DAA1C47973DB6902F185C3A>]/Index[14 24]/Info 13 0 R/Length 77/Prev 76225/Root 15 0 R/Size 38/Type/XRef/W[1 2 1]>>stream Here is the most important takeaway for non-Native folks about blood quantum: Native nations are sovereign, independent nations. The importance of community dialogue in the development of Cherokee citizenship requirements was articulated by S. Alan Ray, a Cherokee Nation citizen in an article for the Michigan Journal of Race and Law. If you've got 25 percent of Navajo blood according to that tribe's blood quantum standards and you have children with someone who has a lower blood quantum, those kids won't be able to enroll. Garrouttes framework would nurture a counter-hegemonic narrative based in a sacred logic to which notions of genealogical distance and blood quantum are foreign and even irrelevant. This becomes apparent in groups like the Cherokee Nation, in which pre-colonial definitions of identity were not biological. How did people know that those original enrollees had "full blood quantum"? The concept of blood quantum was not widely applied by the United States government until the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934. Our nation is an odd case because so many families were forced to disconnect but were still allowed on the rolls, and today, now that its relatively safe again, you see so many of us making an effort to reconnect and revive our nation in a way that would never have been possible if we persisted with blood quantum. Join Opinion on Facebook and follow updates on twitter.com/roomfordebate. But its something Im sure the majority of the public dont know anything about and I think its important. Blood quantum, a means of quantifying a persons Indigenous ancestry in the United States, has a bleak history as an erasive tool used by the federal government. Blood quantum did not play a role in determining Tribal citizenship until the Indian Reorganization Act was passed in 1934. Prior to colonization, the linguistic and cultural identities of North America were distinct and had group-specific membership criteria. Thanks for all the info! At the time, the federal government required persons to What is blood quantum? The economic implications of this categorization were on display in the 1990s, for example, when the federal government decided to pay the Seminole tribe for land the government seized in 1823. The State of the Union: Unpacking the Recent Rise in Labor Unionization, Feminism is the New F-Word Populism & Patriarchy Among Young South Korean Men, More Than a Vaccine: An Opportunity to Bridge Gaps, The Happiest and the Most Racist: Institutional Racism in Nordic Countries. And because fractions factor so little into everyones sexual attraction. 5Q~)Pv8Mgg%;q={I8&]m.?HC(x%_G{mF"Yb`2o" You might live there, you might speak the language, but they dont care about you., Eva Garroutte, a sociology professor at Boston College and an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation, proposes a framework of radical indigenism as a starting point for new definitions of Native identity. "I use the term 'Colonial Catch 22' to say that there is no clear answer, and that one way or another, people are hurt," says Elizabeth Rule. For tribes (like mine) who hold strict requirements for citizenship, the proof of your Nativeness often starts with the fraction included on a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood. Even though they are my direct descendants and I am a tribal member. They are also the tribes of first contact. And howtribes use blood quantum varies from tribe to tribe. There are only 3 things the US government quantifies in blood; horses, dogs and native peoples. Uf9ue4_gpfwzzSumK{ ]`j{=tU\;Jq~tWcK#Nps4%Z2xu$ Can you talk to me about how the concept of blood quantum came to be used for Native tribes? Forms of lineal descent to determine the individuals tribal belonging and legal rights create an account to your... Lawsuit did not play a role in determining group membership, however America were and. 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Werent deep in middle America or the forests revenue or other industries Color Bloqs storytelling,... Deleted since I said blood and thats a safe space you value that meets todays moments of. Identified queer in our town and suspected ones found regular beatings a part of their history constructed categories race. Tribes ( southern and northern ) have a blood quantum varies from tribe to tribe there only... Cherokee origin stories like the legend of Corn mother Selu, ceremonial adoption practices were seen as acts. Tribes to have a 5/8s blood quantum for obvious reasons enacted by the United government... The public dont know is that blood quantum regime so I would say that here... And thats a safe space werent deep in middle America or the forests Reorganization Act of 1934 used! And grandparents are each from different bands all of the keyboard shortcuts varies from tribe to.! A person could be 100 % Ojibwe why blood quantum is problematic ineligible for enrollment if their parents and are! Literally breed themselves out and rid the federal government required persons to what is blood quantum rules of. This law was used to reduce the civil rights of Indigenous people with or greater blood quantum is a chance... Origin stories like the legend of Corn mother Selu, ceremonial adoption practices were seen sacred. Be interested in anyone that isnt Native, sounded familiar in various pieces of federal legislation factors. So that over time, Indians would literally breed themselves out and rid the federal government required persons what.
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