Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Federal Indian law'

Questions of jurisdiction over Indian lands between tribal and state governments constitute some of the most vexing problems in federal Indian law. The Ute jurisdiction case captures, in one instance, the complexities that surround this important body of law. Many cases concerning Native American jurisdiction rights center on disputed interpretations of antiquated federal laws. In the Ute case, both the State of Utah and the Ute Indian tribe contested the meaning of a series of congressional acts that opened Ute lands to white settlement at the turn of the century. The protracted litigation that marked the Ute case revealed many of the inconsistencies and contradictions that plague the federal courts in their attempts to resolve jurisdiction controversies. This thesis examines the particulars of the Ute ii lawsuit and, using it as a vehicle, investigates the limits of the law in deciding Indian/white jurisdiction disputes.

This dissertation examines eight 21ˢᵗ century high school U.S. history textbooks for content and omission concerning American Indians. The focus of the inquiry is on the Marshall Trilogy cases and other federal Indian law cases. The Marshall Trilogy cases are three cases decided by the U.S. Supreme Court over 180 years ago that remain the foundational legal principles that guide governmental relations with Native peoples. The treatment afforded these cases is evaluated in light of a master national narrative for the United States. The Marshall Trilogy cases and the master national narrative have had and continue to have global consequences. The way federal Indian law is presented in textbooks impacts the way citizens treat American Indian peoples and their support for various foreign policy options. In addition, the content of high school history curriculum can affect the way students perceive history, Native America, and schooling. By examining history curriculum critically and establishing a truly inclusive narrative, the hope is that schooling and history become legitimate for all students. The primary approach is to use both a quantitative and qualitative critical content analysis using an indigenized critical discourse approach. Generally, the analysis will move from the focused text within each textbook, to other text within each textbook, to text across the textbooks, and finally to larger socio-cultural phenomena. The APPRAISAL analysis (Coffin, 2006) allows a discerning of linguistic attributes that allows for the exposition of the narrative of the specific text concerning the Marshall Trilogy. The general content analysis is given a critical lens by Brayboy's Tribal Critical Theory (2005) and Grande's Red Pedagogy (2004). The curriculum work of Apple (2004) and Hall's (1986) exposition of Gramsci's hegemony add to our understanding of the nature of textbooks and the knowledge that counts for society. Fairclough's (1995) Dialectic-Relational Approach guides the study to determining whether there is a social wrong, and if so, what it is. The wrong is then examined to determine what obstacles are in the way of addressing the wrong and whether the society needs the wrong. Finally, various ways of correcting the social wrong are addressed.

In this paper, the author looks at the impact of the policy of federal recognition on a Los Angeles basin Native community: the Gabrielino Tongva. The first section, the literature review focuses on the difficulties of defining “indigenousness” in the academic and political realms, as well as looking at Native scholars’ conceptualization of this unique and multifaceted identity. After a consideration of the theoretical framework of the study, the crossroads between anthropology and public policy analysis, the author presents the tools she used in her study, namely: participant observation, key-informant interviews, and the analysis of published documents and personal files. The section ends with a review of ethical concerns pertaining to doing research with indigenous people. The historical section comprises an analysis of archives and published works about the Tongva and the federal recognition process. Starting by a brief report of major policies that have impacted Native American rights in the U.S. and the evolution of government relations with indigenous communities, the author looks at the legacy of the Tongva people in L.A. today, paying special attention to past efforts at obtaining federal recognition and political divides within the tribe. The analysis is structured according to the different levels of recognition that the author perceived through her research. “Capital R”, or federal recognition is explored through its impact on the individual and the group, and followed by an account of current efforts towards community recognition – “lower-case r.” The paper ends on recommendations for future policies and a personal reflection about the research and its results.

The Theory of Regulation and the Economic Theory of Regulatory Constraint have not yet been adapted by American Indian Studies scholars to explain and analyze the federal regulations connected with Federal Indian Law and Policy. It is the intention of this thesis to prove the applicability of these theories to the law and policy concentration of American Indian Studies. The adaptation of these two theories could impact how federal regulations affecting Indian Country are viewed and interpreted. An examination of Federal Indian policy, specifically the regulations (43 CFR 10) promulgated for the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) and the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) Section 106 tribal consultation processes (36 CFR PART 800) can provide a case study for understanding the applicability of the Theory of Regulation and the Economic Theory of Regulatory Constraint to a common regulatory process in Federal Indian Law.

Indigenous cartography is based on a relational epistemology that works within a system where "place" and "ways of knowing" are intimately tied to Native communities' notions of kinship, oral tradition, and traditional ecological knowledge acquired over the millennia. It brings to life a place where mapping and geography cease to be simply Cartesian coordinates on a Euclidean plane and instead become storied landscapes. Indigenous cartography can be described as "radical" because it represents a departure from traditional Western ways of mapping and affirms an Indigenous political, economic and cultural sovereignty. As an intensely political act, Indigenous cartography can be an important tool used by Indigenous people to assert sovereignty in a bottom-up approach to land claims, in the management of cultural resources, and even to claim human remains for repatriation and reburial. If Indigenous groups wish to successfully utilize geospatial technologies as legal strategies, it will first require the development of the necessary infrastructure and training of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) specialists from within. In much the same way that colonial practices of the past worked to achieve hegemony through the making of political and cultural boundaries, Indigenous cartography can work to dismantle these same colonial boundaries. A theory and methodology of Indigenous cartographic praxis is in use among some First Nations in British Columbia. However no "best practices" yet exist for the Indigenous use-and-mapping discipline. Consequently in the United States, Indigenous mapping is still considered an emerging approach. Therefore, can American Indian political and cultural sovereignty be supported by the implementation of Indigenous geospatial technologies? This dissertation will examine the British Columbian model and distill principles that can be successfully implemented by U. S. Native American communities who wish to develop capacity for this emerging geospatial technology based on the success of the First Nations model.

In the last 30 years many changes have taken place within the Cowlitz Indian Tribe. These changes involve the tribe’s sovereignty and have greatly impacted the emic identity of the tribe. Previous identity research with the Cowlitz predates these changes and no longer accurately describe the Cowlitz. The question for this research was how have these changes affected the emic identity of the Cowlitz today as seen in their community and interactions? And how does their identity now compare with their identity in the times of pre-contact and initial contact with whites? This research uses Manuel DeLanda’s assemblage theory to assess and compare the emic identity of the contemporary and historical tribe in terms of sovereignty, identity, and cultural rejuvenation. When the structure, relationships, activities, and purposes of the tribe and groups within the contemporary tribe were analyzed, there was a striking resemblance to the community system described in early settler journals and histories of the Cowlitz. The research was cross-sectional, including ethnographic study, interviews of tribal members, document analysis, and historical analysis. In an attempt to allow the Cowlitz people to speak for themselves rather than project ideas onto the tribe, each section of the research first allows tribal members to voice their opinions and then relies on Cowlitz voices to confirm the analysis. The final dissertation was then submitted to the tribe for comment.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-27T16:32:42Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Moacir Ferreira Ribeiro.pdf: 9250314 bytes, checksum: 8f1b8ea7e979f11f824253711a361094 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-09-25
Our interest in developing this research was raised by the Brazilian Federal Law No.11,645/08, which determines the mandatory inclusion of African-Brazilian and Indian History and Culture studies in the official curriculum of elementary and secondary schools. This paper aims at analyzing and describing the actions taken by various educational institutions in São Paulo metropolitan area in order to effectively include the subject of this law in the curriculums, specifically the issue of Indian history and culture. Our research focused on continuing teacher education courses provided by the aforementioned institutions from 2011 to 2012 by analyzing and describing how they were built and who were the people involved in them. When analyzing these courses, we considered the proposed innovations, and the controversy that the subject raises in the teaching of History. Our methodological procedures in studying the law and its effects on the curriculum were based on Canclini, Gatti, Fernandes, Gomes, Ghon, Hobsbawn, Forquin and Goodson. Canen and Moreira, Candau and Tardif were reference in continuing teacher education. The analysis of the courses was based on different documentary sources, such as notices, syllabi, contracts etc, and on the works of Ribeiro, Sacristán and Gomez, Todorov and Vidal. We structured questionnaires based on the work of Triviños and distributed them to the people involved in the process in order to know them better and to identify their point of view on the issue. We have found that the obedience to the law, at best, consists of a poor effort to create the respect for ethnic diversity in education
O interesse em desenvolver essa pesquisa surgiu com a Lei Federal Nº 11.645/08, que estabelece as diretrizes e bases da educação brasileira para incluir no currículo oficial das redes de ensino a obrigatoriedade da temática História e Cultura Afro-Brasileira e Indígena . O estudo aqui relatado possui a finalidade de investigar e descrever as ações que os mais variados órgãos de ensino da Capital e Grande São Paulo, têm promovido para efetivar essa lei nos currículos, especificamente, no tocante à História e Cultura Indígena. A pesquisa privilegiou os cursos de formação continuada oferecidos por esses órgãos entre os anos de 2011 e 2012, trazendo como foco central de análise a descrição de como têm sido realizados e quais os diversos sujeitos envolvidos. Buscou-se caracterizar essa especificidade de formação considerando as pressupostas inovações curriculares inerentes a um tema polêmico, principalmente, na área do ensino da História. Os procedimentos metodológicos para a análise da lei e suas imbricações nos currículos, tem como base os suportes teóricos de autores como Canclini, Gatti, Fernandes, Gomes, Ghon, Hobsbawn, Forquin e Goodson. Com relação à formação continuada de professores foram utilizados os referenciais teóricos de Canen e Moreira, Candau e Tardif. A análise dos cursos baseou-se em fontes documentais diversas (editais, ementas de cursos, contratos etc.) e autores como Ribeiro, Sacristán e Gomez, Todorov e Vidal. Para identificar quem são os sujeitos envolvidos nesses processos e quais as diferentes visões que possuem, a metodologia se deu pela distribuição de questionários semiestruturados com base no referencial teórico de Triviños. Esse todo articulado, permitiu constatar que o cumprimento da lei nos órgãos de ensino, quando muito, se trata de um esforço tênue para a construção de uma educação centrada no respeito à diversidade étnica.

The role risk taking has played in American history has helped shape current legislation concerning gambling. This thesis attempts to explain the discrepancies in legislation regarding distinct forms of gambling. While casinos are heavily regulated by state and federal laws, most statutes dealing with lotteries strive to regulate the activities of other parties instead of those of the lottery institutions. Incidentally, lotteries are the only form of gambling completely managed by the government. It can be inferred that the United States government is more concerned with people exploiting gambling than with the actual practice of wagering. In an effort to more fully understand the gambling debate, whether it should be allowed or banned, I examined different types of sources. Historical sources demonstrate how ingrained in American culture risk taking, the core of gambling, has been since the formation of this nation. Sources dealing with the economic implications of gambling were also studied. Additionally, sources dealings with the political and legal aspects of gambling were essential for this thesis. Legislature has tried to reconcile distinct problems associated with gambling, including corruption. For this reason sports gambling scandals and Mafia connections to gambling have also been examined. The American government has created much needed legislature to address different concerns relating to gambling. It is apparent that statutes will continue to be passed to help regulate the gambling industry. A possible consideration is the legalization of sports wagering to better regulate that sector of the industry.

Assessing the effect of race on crime is an important topic of criminology and criminal justice research. Prior investigations have sought to uncover if racial disparities exist within certain aspects of the criminal justice system, such as arrests, trials, and sentencing. The existing scholarship, however, has largely focused on assessing differences between Black and Hispanic offenders in relation to White offenders. There has been little academic exploration to examine if racial disparities exist among American Indian offenders during criminal justice processing. To address this gap in knowledge, this study analyzes data collected from the United States Sentencing Commission to assess if American Indians receive different sentencing outcomes, when compared to other racial groups. The findings from a series of binary logistic and ordinary least square regression analyses suggest that American Indians are sentenced to prison more often than White, Black, and Hispanic offenders, but receive similar sentence lengths compared to Whites and shorter sentence lengths compared to Blacks and Hispanics. The implications of these results are discussed.

Cette étude repose sur l’hypothèse selon laquelle, de l’adoption de la constitution fédérale à la Première Guerre Mondiale, l’expansion territoriale des États-Unis d’Amérique, de même que le projet fédéral, ont appelé une « construction » des règles et principes du droit international au sein même des frontières américaines. Car, en 1789 déjà, tant les États-Unis,que les États membres de la Fédération ou les Nations indiennes, revendiquent sur tout ou partie de cet espace la souveraineté que reconnaît le droit international à tout « État ». C’est alors en définissant, en aménageant, en repensant, les notions d’ « État » ou de « souveraineté » sur un territoire, les conditions de détention et de formation d’un titre territorial, ou encore en fixant la valeur juridique interne du droit international, que ces revendications seront – ou non –satisfaites. Fondé sur l’analyse de la pratique, de la doctrine et de la jurisprudence américaines durant le « long XIXe siècle », ce travail a ainsi pour objet d’interroger la question du territoire telle qu’elle se pose au sein de cet « État fédéral » territorialement souverain que constitueraient les États-Unis. Il espère ce faisant mettre au jour des constructions du droit international dont l’actualité tient à leur objet : la question du territoire aux États-Unis entre 1789 et 1914interroge en effet les principales notions et problématiques de ce droit – au premier rang desquelles celle de l’articulation spatiale des compétences
This study is based upon the hypothesis that, from the entry into force of the federal constitution to the First World War, the United States territorial expansion, as well as the federal project, called for a « construction » of international law’s rules and principles within the American boundaries. It is to be remembered that, in 1789, the United States, the member States and the Indian Nations claimed for themselves, on parts or the whole of that space, the sovereignty that every « State » is entitled to according to international law. It is therefore by defining, adapting, or rethinking the notions of « State » or « territorial sovereignty », the conditions required for a territorial title to be held or formed, and by setting the legal status of international law, that those claims have been enforced – or not. Grounded upon the analysis of the American doctrine, practice and case law, the purpose of this study is thus to inquire about territorial issues as raised within what is usually described as a « federal State », sovereign on its territory. Because those issues, and mainly jurisdictional ones, are fundamental to international law, this work hopes to bring to light constructions of international law which are still relevant today

Federal government, states and tribal governments may invoke criminal jurisdiction over Indian country in the USA. The complexity of relationship of these entities creates legal vacuum, impression of lawlessness, which is harmful for the safety of American Indian women. Native American and Alaskan Native women are more than 2.5 times more likely to be raped than women in the USA in general.

abstract: Advancements in marine and aerospace technology drive legal reform in admiralty and air law. The increased accessibility and affordability of these technologies demand and motivate lawmakers and federal agencies to anticipate potential threats to peoples’ rights and resources in the seas and skies. Given the recent applications of unmanned aircraft in the public and private sectors, developments in aircraft and air law are rapidly becoming more relevant to American Indian and Alaska Native tribes. In anticipation of legal reform, tribal nations are taking steps to assert, expand, and secure their air rights before agencies or the courts attempt to divest their sovereign authority. An analysis of two case studies through a lens of water and federal Indian law locates spaces in American jurisprudence that have the legal foundation and structural capacity to support a greater presence of Indigeneity in airspace. Research findings from these studies answer the following inquiries about tribal airspace sovereignty: where does Indigeneity reside in the US national airspace system and domestic air law, how are tribal air rights strengthened or weakened by American jurisprudence, what strategies do tribes employ to exercise their sovereignty in airspace, and how are tribes planning for future developments in aircraft and air law? Answers lead to proof of how meaningful consultation through collaborative rulemaking produces far greater mutual benefits than burdens for federal agencies and tribes, and much more. Most importantly, these discoveries celebrate a diverse and accumulative strategic legacy of strengthening and expanding tribal sovereignty in the face of imminent threats and possibilities in tribal airspace.
Dissertation/Thesis
Masters Thesis American Indian Studies 2019