"The disparate racial treatment of Native American Freedmen began and must end with Congress, not the courts.

Congress created the Dawes Rolls under the Allotment Act of 1887 to document tribal citizenship. The rolls discriminated against African-Native American offspring by labeling them Freedmen without documenting degree of Native American ancestry. Interracial Caucasian Native American offspring were identified by blood quantum to 1/32nd degree, creating a “paper bag” test for Native American identity, and reinforcing the stigma against anyone “tainted” by African blood.

Freedmen challenged their segregation from “Indians by Blood,” but in 1906 Congress barred the transfer of Freedmen to the “by-blood” rolls. Thus began a century of Freedmen litigation seeking equality with “Indians-by-Blood,” who were granted the advantage of using the Dawes Rolls for documenting lineage. Congress inflamed racial tensions by apportioning government benefits based on blood quantum rather than treaties and the historical context from which they arose. For example, Congress excluded Seminole Freedmen in apportioning money between Florida and Oklahoma Seminoles in the Seminole Indians Judgment Funds Act of 1990. This fractured relations between Oklahoman Seminole Freedmen and Seminole-by-Bloods, which ended with the BIA siding with tribal leaders in denying Freedmen their share."

Get the Story:
Kevin James: Freedmen a fed issue (The Tahlequah Daily Press 6/12)

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Editorial: 'Shameful' posturing on Freedmen issue (5/7)
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African-American lawmakers seek Freedmen probe (5/5)