A few weeks ago, I read the following paragraph in an NPR article about the Cherokee Freedmen:

"This is not a club; you can't just claim to be Cherokee and show up and be included," says Cara Cowan Watts, a vocal member of the Cherokees' tribal council....

The Cherokee Nation based out of Tahlequah, Oklahoma has decided to strip “Freedmen” of their Cherokee rights and to expel them from their nation. Freedmen are African American descendants of slaves....

Like most Indians who give thought to our relationship with the United States, I dream of Indian treaties as sacred promises or, at least, what the Constitution says in so many words: “all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of...