Indigenous Governance Database
federal Indian policy
HPAIED Letter to the Treasury: Allocation of COVID-19 Response Funds to American Indian Nations
Dear Secretary Mnuchin, We write to respectfully comment on the impact of the current COVID-19 crisis on American Indian tribal economies, tribes’ responses to the crisis, and on implications for the allocation of federal COVID-19 response funds to federally recognized tribes under the CARES Act…
Walter Echo-Hawk: In the Light of Justice: The Rise of Human Rights in Native America & the U.N. Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Walter Echo-Hawk, legendary civil rights attorney, discusses his latest book In the Light of Justice: The Rise of Human Rights in Native America & the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, stressing the need for Native nations and peoples to band together to mount a campaign to…
Tribal Per Capitas and Self-Termination
For many Indian families, tribal per capita payments help meet their most basic needs. They buy food, pay heating bills, make car payments, and open savings accounts. As a Dry Creek Rancheria Band of Pomo Indians leader explains, per capita monies have given historically impoverished Indian…
What is an Indian?
In the background of all issues involving American Indians is always the question of what is an Indian? While there are any number of groups in this country today who have complicated issues surrounding identity, there is no identity issue more complicated than that of American Indian identity. As…
Web Extra: American Indians Confront 'Savage Anxieties'
This week Bill speaks with legal expert Robert A. Williams Jr. about how stereotypes of American Indians have been codified into laws and government policies, with devastating consequences. In this web extra, Bill speaks with Williams about why none of the Supreme Court justices “wants Indian cases…
Returning to Our Indigenous Core Values: Our Challenge? Striking a Balance
Regis Pecos is the Chief of Staff, House Majority Office; Co-Director, Leadership Institute; Former Governor, Cochiti Pueblo Regis Pecos is from Cochiti Pueblo, New Mexico. He received his undergraduate degree in Political Science from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy at Princeton…
2014 Native Youth Report
In June 2014, President Obama embarked on his first presidential visit to Indian Country, where he and Mrs. Obama witnessed the tale of two Americas. Standing Rock Reservation, like many others, faces myriad social, economic, and educational problems. Together, those problems are coalescing into a…
A Legal History of Blood Quantum in Federal Indian Law to 1935
The paper traces the development of the use of blood quantum, or fractional amounts of Indian blood to define Indian in federal law up to the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934. The paper shows that blood quantum was not widely used in federal law until the twentieth century, as the branches of the…
An Introduction to Indian Nations in the United States
There are 562 federally recognized Indian Nations (variously called tribes, nations, bands, pueblos, communities, rancherias and native villages) in the United States. Approximately 229 of these ethnically, culturally and linguistically diverse nations are located in Alaska; the rest are located in…
The situation of indigenous peoples in the United States of America
In this report, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples examines the human rights situation of indigenous peoples in the United States, on the basis of research and information gathered, including during a visit to the country from 23 April to 4 May 2012. During…
Sovereignty Under Arrest? Public Law 280 and Its Discontents
Law enforcement in Indian Country has been characterized as a maze of injustice, one in which offenders too easily escape and victims are too easily lost (Amnesty International, 2007). Tribal, state, and federal governments have recently sought to amend this through the passage of the Tribal Law…
Tribal Economic Development: Nuts & Bolts
Tribal economic development is a product of the need for Indian tribes to generate revenue in order to pay for the provision of governmental services. Unlike the federal government or states, Indian tribes – in general – have no viable tax base from which to generate revenues sufficient to…