Scholarship

Online Documents of Maori Legal History

Kate Fort

From the Legal History Blog:

The New Zealand Legal Text Centre had recently launched an on-line archive of documents relating to the legal history of the Maori, the indigenous people of the islands. Here is the announcement:

The New Zealand Electronic Text Centre is proud to announce the launch of the Legal Maori Archive, a collection of more than 14,000 pages of around 250 19th century documents that illustrate the bi-lingual nature of New Zealand’s legal history. The Legal Maori Archive is freely available to the public and can be accessed via the NZETC website.

Among the many documents featured in this collection are the following:

The Proceedings of the Kotahitanga Parliaments

Henry Hanson Turton’s Maori Deeds of Land Purchases in the North Island of New Zealand

Maori translations of Acts and Bills circulated among Maori communities by the Crown

The Archive has been created in conjunction with Mamari Stephens from the Victoria University of Wellington’s School of Law as part of a project to establish a corpus of legal Maori documents, which will allow the analysis of the language and eventually a dictionary of legal Maori terms and concepts. It is the first time the documents have been brought together in one place and is the largest collection of separate documents that the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre has digitised. The Legal Maori Project seeks to resource speakers of te reo Maori who may not currently have access to a shared vocabulary to describe Western legal concepts. This Project will collate, develop and make available the terminology from Legal Maori texts, including those from the Legal Maori Archive, to all speakers and learners of te reo Maori and all researchers

Student Note on IGRA and Tribal Criminal Jurisdiction

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the Arizona Journal of International and Comparative Law:

Notes

“Jurisdictional Ambiguities Among Sovereigns: The Impact of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act on Criminal Jurisdiction on Tribal Lands”
Guadalupe Gutierrez, Ph.D.

NNALSA Writing Competition — Winning Essay Published

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

The Arizona Journal of Comparative and International Law has published the winning essay in the NNALSA writing competition.

National Native American Law Students Association 8th Annual Writing Competition

Introduction
NNALSA

Foreword
Melissa L. Tatum

“The Coquille Indian Tribe, Same-Sex Marriage, and Spousal Benefits: A Practical Guide”
Julie Bushyhead

Alistair Bonnett on Black Indians

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is a short article about black Indians called “Shades of Difference,” published in the Dec. 2008 issue of History Today.

Bonnett — Shades of Difference

Book Review of “Race and the Cherokee Nation”

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From H-Net (h/t to Legal History Blog):

Fay A. Yarbrough. Race and the Cherokee Nation: Sovereignty in the
Nineteenth Century. Philadephia University of Pennsylvania Press,
2008. x + 184 pp. ISBN 978-0-8122-4056-6; $55.00 (cloth), ISBN
978-0-8122-4056-6.

Reviewed by John Gesick
Published on H-Genocide (March, 2009)
Commissioned by Elisa G. von Joeden-Forgey

Nineteenth-Century Practices, Twenty-First Century Decisions

This seminal study of Cherokee race relations during the antebellum
and post-Civil War eras and their consequences in the twentieth and
twenty-first centuries has broad applications across many
disciplines–not just to history or sociology or anthropology, but to
the legal and educational fields as well. The author has approached
this subject with sensitivity and pragmatic analysis. She has drawn
thoughtful conclusions based on the empirical analysis of a host of
available documents and of numerical data that she collected from
census records, marriage records, and other demographic sources.
Where the results might be inconclusive, Yarbrough offers avenues for
further investigation and analysis.
Continue reading →

Rebecca Tsosie Postings on SSRN

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Rebecca Tsosie has posted several of her past articles on SSRN:

Incl. Electronic Paper Challenges to Sacred Sites Protection
Denver University Law Review, Vol. 83, p. 963, 2006
 Rebecca A. Tsosie
Arizona State University – College of Law
Date Posted: May 7, 2009
Last Revised: May 7, 2009
Accepted Paper Series

Incl. Electronic Paper Cultural Challenges to Biotechnology: Native American Genetic Resources and the Concept of Cultural Harm
Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, Vol. 35, p. 396, 2007
 Rebecca A. Tsosie
Arizona State University – College of Law
Date Posted: May 7, 2009
Last Revised: May 19, 2009
Accepted Paper Series

Incl. Electronic Paper Indigenous People and Environmental Justice: The Impact of Climate Change
University of Colorado Law Review, Vol. 78, p. 1625, 2007
 Rebecca A. Tsosie
Arizona State University – College of Law
Date Posted: May 7, 2009
Last Revised: May 7, 2009
Accepted Paper Series

GLIFWC Report on Efficacy of Walleye Advisories to Great Lakes Tribes

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Adam D. DeWeese, Neil E. Kmiecik, Esteban D. Chiriboga, and Jeffery A. Foran have published “Efficacy of Risk-Based, Culturally Sensitive Ogaa (Walleye) Consumption Advice for Anishinaabe Tribal Members in the Great Lakes Region.(Report)” in Risk Analysis, May 2009 (GLIFWC Report on Walleye Advisories). Here is the abstract:

The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) has produced Ogaa (walleye-Sander vitreus) consumption advisories since 1996 for Anishinaabe from GLIFWC member tribes in the 1837 and 1842 ceded territories of Wisconsin. GLIFWC’s advisory maps were revised in 2005 to address cultural sensitivities (to protect tribal lifeways), to utilize recent mercury exposure information, and to incorporate changes in advisory levels for methyl mercury. Lake-specific, risk-based, culturally sensitive consumption advice was provided on color-coded maps for two groups: children under age 15 years and females of childbearing age, and males 15 years and older and females beyond childbearing age. The maps were distributed to, and a behavioral intervention program developed for, the six GLIFWC member tribes in Wisconsin as well as member tribes in Minnesota and the 1842 ceded territory of Michigan. Tribal fish harvesters, tribal health care providers, women of childbearing age or with young children, tribal leaders, elders, and children were targeted specifically for the behavioral intervention. The efficacy of the behavioral intervention was assessed using surveys of 275 tribal fish harvesters from Wisconsin, 139 tribal harvesters from Michigan and Minnesota, and 156 Wisconsin women of childbearing age. Significant increases in the percentage of survey participants who indicated awareness of advisory maps occurred among Wisconsin harvesters (increase from 60% to 77%), Michigan and Minnesota harvesters (29% to 51%), and women of childbearing age in Wisconsin (40% to 87%). A significant increase in preference for smaller Ogaa occurred among tribal harvesters in Wisconsin (41% to 72%) and tribal harvesters in Michigan and Minnesota (49% to 71%), although not among women of childbearing age. The GLIFWC map-based advisory program did not adversely affect tribal harvest of Ogaa, which increased from 63,000 to 88,000 fish in the three states after the intervention.

Fiander on Tort Claims and American Indian Plaintiffs

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the Washington State Bar News:

Representing My People

by Jack Fiander

This article is intended to be helpful to my fellow attorneys who may find themselves in the position of representing my people in personal-injury or wrongful-death cases. I also hope that the information here is helpful to my fellow tribal members in Washington state who may find themselves the victim of a tort or who have experienced personal injuries or a wrongful death in the family.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, my people live quietly among you in large numbers. Therefore, it is not unlikely that at some point in your legal career you will have the opportunity to represent them. This has been implicitly recognized since 2005, when the Board of Governors of the Washington State Bar Association made testing on the topic of federal Indian law part of the curriculum of the Washington State Bar examination. According to the Washington State Governor’s Office of Indian Affairs, there are no fewer than 29 federally recognized tribes in Washington. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 164,481 residents of the state of Washington identify themselves as Native American or Alaskan Native.

I realize that it can raise uncomfortable issues such as discrimination or stereotyping by generalizing about my people. By the same token, I shall undoubtedly receive some opprobrium for sharing information regarding certain cultural beliefs with those outside the tribe. On the whole, however, I have come down on the side that it is important to the welfare of my people that I try to convey the important considerations which you should take into account when calculating damages in cases involving tribal clients, because they are easily overlooked.

Continue reading →

Onion: Fifth Grade Science Paper Doesn’t Stand Up to Peer Review

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the Onion:

DECATUR, IL—A three-member panel of 10-year-old Michael Nogroski’s fellow classmates at Nathaniel Macon Elementary School unanimously agreed Tuesday that his 327-word essay “Otters” did not meet the requirements for peer approval.

Enlarge Image PaperFifth-grade panel members express disapproval of Nogroski’s paper (below).

Nogroski presented his results before the entire fifth-grade science community Monday, in partial fulfillment of his seventh-period research project. According to the review panel, which convened in the lunchroom Tuesday, “Otters” was fundamentally flawed by Nogroski’s failure to identify a significant research gap.

“When Mike said, ‘Otters,’ I almost puked,” said 11-year-old peer examiner Lacey Swain, taking the lettuce out of her sandwich. “Why would you want to spend a whole page talking about otters?”

“It’s probably only the dumbest topic in the history of the entire world,” 10-year-old Duane LaMott added.

Members of the three-person panel had many concerns about Nogroski’s work, foremost among them their belief that the fifth-grader did not substantiate his thesis. Two panel members even suggested that Nogroski’s thesis was erroneous.

“Otters are not interesting!” 10-year-old peer examiner Jonathan Glass said.

Continue reading →