Politics, History, and Semantics: The Federal Recognition of Indian Tribes

32 Pages Posted: 27 Oct 2005 Last revised: 25 Jan 2016

Date Written: 2006

Abstract

This essay reviews the recent books Cash, Color, and Colonialism: The Politics of Tribal Acknowledgment by Renee Ann Cramer, and Forgotten Tribes: Unrecognized Indians and the Federal Acknowledgment Process by Mark Edwin Miller. This essay also provides an overview of the experiences of four Michigan Indian tribes who received federal recognition in the 1980s and 1990s either through the federal administrative process or through an Act of Congress.

This essay lauds the books for their depth of research on specific tribes and states, but argues that neither has developed a realistic theory as to the usefulness of the current federal administrative process. This essay argues that federal recognition is quintessentially political, despite the frequent ugliness of politics, and even necessary.

Suggested Citation

Fletcher, Matthew L. M., Politics, History, and Semantics: The Federal Recognition of Indian Tribes (2006). 82 North Dakota Law Review 487 (2006), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=825685

Matthew L. M. Fletcher (Contact Author)

University of Michigan Law School ( email )

500 S. State Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
United States

HOME PAGE: http://https://michigan.law.umich.edu/faculty-and-scholarship/our-faculty/matthew-lm-fletcher

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