By ROBERT JUMPER
One Feather Editor
There are those of us who are gung-ho about exercising our rights, especially the right to vote, to the fullest. Especially when it comes to tribal elections, because in the EBCI (Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians) Charter & Governing Document, civil rights are almost non-existent. Voting is the one way to make our voice heard, to direct our government in the fashion that a citizenry should be able to do. In the election that we just put to bed, just over 50 percent of the eligible voters turned out to make decisions on the future of our tribe. And, apparently, the other 47 percent who chose not to vote were okay with us deciding their future for them. I hope you enjoy our choices.
You see when you don’t vote, you are making a statement, intentionally or not. You basically place the future, and that includes the future of your kids, and grandkids, in the hands of others. Elections are a major deal. Even the ones we don’t think impact our lives much.
Take the elections that are taking place throughout North Carolina. This is not a governor, or even a state legislature election. It is primarily a municipal election for town aldermen, mayors, etc. In-person early voting for the November 2023 elections in various municipalities begins Oct. 19 and ends Nov. 4. Election day at the polls will be Nov. 7.
It is important for every Eastern Band of Cherokee Indian member to use every opportunity to elect officials that are sympathetic to our people and our needs, even town leadership in our surrounding counties. As neighbors to our tribal lands, we need good relationships with those local municipalities. And even more so, we need to identify and support tribal members who choose to run for election in the surrounding municipalities. It matters to us, who serves in the seats of power, even off the Qualla Boundary.
Our ancestors sacrificed and worked to get the Cherokee people the right to vote in North Carolina elections. The people and government didn’t want us to have the right to vote. For many in North Carolina, our ancestors were looked upon as nothing more than uneducated savages that not only should not but were not intelligent enough to make decisions this important.
I want to share with you an opinion piece that was posted to Native American Netroots in 2011 that chronicles the long journey of our ancestors to obtain the vote in North Carolina for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. It was titled The Eastern Cherokee and the Right to Vote.
“Toward the end of the nineteenth century the United States government decided that American Indians, like immigrants from other countries, should be fully assimilated into American society. However, a series of court rulings and legal opinions declared that not only were American Indians not citizens, but they could also not become citizens without Congressional action. In 1887 Congress passed the Dawes Act which allowed Indians who had taken allotments to become citizens. Following World War I, Congress passed an act making all Indians who had served in the military during the war citizens. Finally, in 1924 Congress passed legislation declaring all Indians to be citizens.
“In 1920, many Eastern Cherokee – including Cherokee women – registered to vote. As a result of Cherokee participation in the election, Republicans won almost every office in Jackson County by narrow margins. The Democrats protested the election results claiming that the Cherokee were not eligible to vote. As a result, Cherokee votes were thrown out on the basis that the Cherokee were non-citizen wards of the United States.
“Two days after passing the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, Congress passed a bill to allot the Eastern Cherokee in North Carolina. The bill, written prior to the passage of the Citizenship Act, provided that the Eastern Cherokee would become citizens only after receiving and registering their allotments. The State Attorney General took the position that the Eastern Cherokee were, therefore, not citizens because this bill superseded the Indian Citizenship Act. The Bureau of Indian Affairs, on the other hand, took the position that they were citizens. Local registrars assumed that the Cherokee were not citizens and did not allow them to register to vote.
“The following year, the federal government assumed trusteeship for Eastern Cherokee land and informed county officials that they could not tax Indian property. This was the first time since the Eastern Cherokee acquired these lands in the 19th century that they had not had to pay property taxes. For those who felt that only taxpayers should be allowed to vote, this provided another reason to prohibit Indians from voting.
“Congress passed an act to clear up the confusion of the citizenship of the Eastern Cherokee in 1929. The act reaffirmed Eastern Cherokee citizenship under the Indian Citizen Act of 1924 and declared that this citizenship had not been repealed or abridged with the passage of the Eastern Cherokee Allotment Act two days later. Local officials in North Carolina, however, ignored Congress and continued to deny the Eastern Cherokee the right to vote.
“The following year, Eastern Cherokee leader Henry M. Owl was denied the right to register to vote. The registrar refused to register Indians because they were not citizens. In response, Congress passed yet another act once again reaffirming citizenship for the Eastern Cherokee. Local newspapers protested Congressional interference with local affairs. Despite the explicit and repeated directives from Congress, county registrars continued to deny Cherokees the right to vote.
“A report by the Solicitor General in 1937 found that North Carolina denied Indians the right to vote claiming that Indians were illiterate. The superintendent of the Cherokee Agency reported: ‘We have had Indian graduates of Carlisle, Haskell, and other schools in stances much better educated than the registrar himself, turned down because they did not read or write to his satisfaction.’
“In 1940, Congress passed the Nationality Act which again conferred citizenship on American Indians and required that Indian men register for the draft. In response, the Eastern Cherokee tribal council drafted a resolution which argued that the fact that the Eastern Cherokee were denied the right to vote in North Carolina also denied them fair treatment and equal rights by county draft boards. The council asserted that ‘any organization or group that would deprive a people of as sacred a right as the right of suffrage would not hesitate to deprive them of other constitutional rights including the three inalienable rights – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, if the opportunity to do so presents itself.’
“Following World War II, county registrars in North Carolina refused to register Eastern Cherokee war veterans to vote. The Cherokee appealed the decisions to the governor and attorney general, but nothing was done. After lawsuits by Indian veterans in Arizona and New Mexico declared that Indians were citizens and had the right to vote, resistance to Indian voting in North Carolina was reduced and the Eastern Cherokee began to participate in American democracy.”
We believe, at least we say we believe, that we should exert our influence to protect our way of life and our livelihood. We need to put our vote where our mouths are. If we want to influence the decisions made in the state regarding who is called a tribe, who is entitled to federal recognition, how adult gaming is continued and our income protected, whether medical and adult use cannabis will be marketable in North Carolina, and a host of other decisions that impact our way of life, we, like our ancestors before us, must realize the value and power of the vote and, when the opportunity comes, cast them to our benefit. The flipside is that once the municipal politicians realize we are in the game through our votes, they will listen to us and consider our needs more readily.
