Do they want 14 more years?
Idaho State Journal Editorial
Elouise Cobell, a member of the Blackfoot Tribe in Montana, has been trying for 14 years to get a settlement from the federal government for swindling Indian tribes out of royalties for oil, gas and grazing leases.
There’s a settlement in the works, provided tribal and government attorneys can stop squabbling. U.S. District Judge James Robertson has reluctantly granted what he says will be a final delay, to May 28, on the part of Congress to approve a $3.4 billion settlement.
“From where I sit, the settlement appears to be a win-win proposition,” Judge Robertson said at a court hearing Thursday. “It needs to be done.”
The proposed settlement calls for the Interior Department to distribute $1.4 billion to more than 300,000 Indian tribe members across nearly all 50 states. And the government also will have to spend $2 billion to buy back and consolidate tribal land broken up in previous generations and create a $60 million Indian Education Scholarship fund. Most lawsuit participants would receive at least $l,500 and many would get considerably more. That’s the largest Indian claim every approved against the U.S. government, exceeding the combined total of all previous settlement of Indian claims.
Still, there are opponents who complain the settlement favors the government and the Cobell team. And Cobell herself says “we were owed much more money.”
But she also says the fight could go on for hundreds of years. Or at least 14, and surely neither side wants that.
This whole episode is nothing more than a giant ripoff of the taxpayers by the Indians and their lawyers.
Anybody who knows anything about the BIA and the people who run it will tell you that nobody in recent times at least has ever intentionally tried to rob the Indians.
What did the Indians expect to happen when they started demanding to see documented proof of where every penny went that was or should have been paid to Indians going back generations, before computers and microfilm ever existed. Of course generations of government paper work had been lost, misplaced or discarded. No organization, public or private, could ever produce written records from that far back.
This is simply a case of the government caving in because it’s easier than fighting in court.
Mr. Stucki,
Sometimes I read your articles and understand where you are coming from with your information, not always agreeing, but trying to understand. In this case however, I must say, you haven’t the foggiest idea what you are talking about. For the last hundred years the natural resources on Indian reservations have been exploited by nne indians, and was suppose to be under the watchful eyes of the federal govt. (BIA). Due to verious types and levels of conflicts of interest pertaining to those that were in trust obligation positions, things occurred that were unlawful, or at least against the vary trust obligations as outlined in the CFR.
Thats not to say that Tribes/members did not have some type of play in some of those situations, but a majority of the situations were not under their control.
rdt –
Inasmuch as you elect to question my knowledge of this subject anonymously, I shall refrain from attempting to pass judgment on your own opinions of the situation, foggy or otherwise.
Actually, you may well be selling me short on the matter, as I have personal friends and relatives who have labored their entire lifetimes on behalf of various tribes.
I am very well aware that the early history of the U.S. government’s relations with the natives evidenced some truly egregious examples of the whites taking unfair advantage of the Indians, but that goes back much further than 100 yrs.
And I’m also not so naive as to not realize that current and recent past history likely also saw some nefarious characters involved in managing the tribal resources, but at no higher rate than dishonesty was and is found in contemporary bureaucracies throughout the U.S. government.
Basically, I stand by my appraisal of the matter, but recognize that others will disagree.
And I would point out that those who disagree anonymously automatically forfeit the majority of whatever credibility they may have before they even touch their keyboard.
Oh, and BTW, who exactly are the “nne Indians”?
C.R. Stucki,
I agree with you, anonymously however. I still think I can raise your 49% you give me for the effort.
I especially agree with the ‘cave in’ remark.
I really have a problem when the logic put forth against an Indian or Tribal issue is that other corporations or governments have had worse or as bad. By that thinking, nothing would ever happen.
The lack of records of an agency that was supposed to be upholding trust obligations is one thing, but it shouldn’t take many of your Indian-affiliated friends around Reservations for many years to know that graft and bid fixing collusion was the standard for grazing, farm, mineral, and water usage in the Pacific Northwest.
I’m proud of Elouise, the Sho-Ban Nation, and all my fellow Indians for finally standing up for their own rights and place in this contemporary world!
It is wholly-inappropriate for the sitting judge in this matter to try to implore Congress
to act-in either direction-it is undue solicitude of the common variety in US politico
sewer lines [i.e..being railroaded]! All this matter did was clog up Native self-determina- tion for 14 yrs by legitimating US’s dilatory practices-they’d cite cobell litigation as [flaccid!] as an excuse to not act! cobell is so rapaciously greed-driven that she agrees to embedded ‘reverter clauses’ which American jurisprudence has long held are bad faith/ frivolous in class-action cases! This judge-who has shown his true [anti-Native] colors already needs to be disqualified and sanctioned
for unbecoming conduct but this is a kangaroo
court anyway so they’ll push it on us!
I’m jst bummed because some want to paint cobell as some kind of ‘big shot’ or ‘big-time operator’ for Native causes when to me I think she just kept her eye on her-does that make sense? What about this biased judge’s irrespon-sible public remarks-isn’t he the goofball who “awarded’ cobell plaintiffs like $450 million before major backroom [in-camera] dealings began which resulted in this top heavy ‘settlement’ which has the Defs ‘holding the $$?’ [like they’re going to really work to spend more $ they don’t have to! No cobell has made her mark in history as the most notable collaborator of this century so far! Let it rot on the vine as far as I’m concerned-most of my relatives-Lakota-are [adversely] affect- ed parties too. 14 yrs is not even a yawn to those who believe in tribal soveriegnty/self-determination! Shame on you cobell!
First, Mr. Stucki has said *exactly* what everyone should question about the Cobell litigation.
Back to the “editorial”– Journalists should have a MUCH better handle on a case before they write about it. The Cobell litigation does NOT involve tribes; it is a class-action on behalf of IIM account holders– individual persons having an account due to being an allottee, an heir of an allottee, or recipient of tribal judgment funds. Tribal trust cases are 1) different and 2) not a class-action.
The *real* problem that no one seems to want to address is the fractionalization of the allotted lands. If you only own 1/2,309,430 of 120 acres (or fewer), you are NOT going to have any usable income from say, grazing or agricultural leases. THIS is why so many IIM acounts have so little. BIA staff does a heroic job with very few resources. Yes, mistakes were/are/can be made, but there are checks in the system.
There are also many questions about the settlement that need to be addressed. Were I an account holder, I would certainly take the opt out and review my own account records. $15 million to a “non-profit” that the lead plaintiff just happens to head up?? Hmmmmm…
The hasatan is in the details-here’s an IIM tale for you all! A brother of mine was adopted
to a White couple as an infant-his adoption was near secretive-this was the 60’s. Our parents both die in the interim. He’s reunited with us mid-90s. He’s given back his tribal enrollment # from birth etc..checks with BIA/ OST about IIM. OST tells him he has .57 cents from our dad’s probate which we all were told did not have a probate at all…it’s by design
‘complicated’ because therein lies the desired
‘smoke screen’ to take $$s off the back end-much like cobell is trying to do here [and with ‘derivatives market’ TOO COMPLICATED]! How many besides cobell/her relatives/etc think DOI is going to rush to buy back the aforementioned ‘fractionated’ interest as written in the settlement. cobell is just being White when she DEMANDS we take HER sweet deal! DOI has had 150 yrs to say ‘guess what this method doesn’t work & we’re a ‘christian nation’ so let’s try something else which may work/fair & is within our fiduciary trust responsibilities but they didn’t and can’t now in 2010! They’ve waved a large carrot in front of cobell so now she’s the only answer/gig in town on IIM! No I can wait til haddes freezes over for DOI/US to do the right thing! Yes, cobell shame on you!Yes 14 more yrs is no biggy
-give those disrespectful DC attys a taste of waiting on justice-it’ll build their characters
Somebody is drunk or high on pot. Your story makes no sense. Read what you wrote before you hit submit.
I would like to see only Indians who have at least 20 years working with the BIA speak.
After seeing the dance with words go on until the Indian finally dies.
Our country should be ashamed of how it treats the Indians today.
My mom is 99 and still waiting and hoping for fair treatment.
E. Davis
Chinook