What is American Indian Sovereignty and why is it so important to American Indian nations?
Sovereignty, according to Webster, is "a : supreme power esp. over a body politic
b : freedom from external control : AUTONOMY." How does this definition of sovereignty apply to indigenous nations?
To American Indians, sovereignty means the right to make their own laws without interference from other governments. In the US Indians enjoy some degree of sovereignty, but it is strictly limited and Indian nations are subject to the plenary powers of Congress.
Early American Indian Sovereignty
Early European explorers, and later settlers, landed on continents populated by diverse sovereign nations with varied social and political frameworks. Each nation, or league of nations, in cases like the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois League), maintained systems of law and order, even if they were not written down. Intra-tribal "crimes" might be handled differently than inter-tribal "crimes," but each nation had the sovereign power to execute its laws and customs as it saw fit, whether against other Indian nations or European trappers and settlers.
European Notions of Sovereignty
Europeans began almost immediately to claim sovereignty over Indian nations by way of the a href="http://www.healingtheland.com/research/discovery/"Doctrine of Discovery. Taking the law into their own hands early colonies deemed it not just a right but a Christian duty to impose their own rules of law on what they saw as Indian on settler crimes and eventually even Indian on Indian crimes.
American Indian Sovereignty and the New Nation
Early in the history of the US, it became necessary to clarify the position of Indian nations with regard to states and the federal government. a href="http://aboriginalhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/themarshalltrilogy"The Marshall Trilogy as it came to be known, characterized Indian nations as separate but not foreign, terming them "domestic dependent nations." However, Marshall's pronouncements remained vague and states and municipalities continued to claim and fight legal battles for jurisdiction over Indian nations and do to this day.
Current State of American Indian Sovereignty
The failure of the US Constitution to deal specifically with the status of Indian nations; the checker boarding of reservations resulting from the a href="http://aboriginalhistory.suite101.com/article.cfm/the_dawes_act" Dawes Act and other factors; and more than two centuries of conflicting court decisions have led to a confusing maze of laws and enforcement. American Indians favor the Webster definition of sovereignty--freedom from external control--and tend to see it as inherent. The US federal government sees American Indian sovereignty as separate from the states but subject to the plenary power of Congress. Individual states often challenge American Indian sovereignty in any form within their borders.
