Federal District Court Judge Paul L. Friedman was clearly sympathetic toward the tribe during oral arguments. It became pretty obvious as the tribe’s attorney who is on the Genting payroll, repeated the same primary argument that has been rejected…..that tribal members attended Carlisle Indian Industrial School, the federal boarding school. That was the cornerstone of the effort to prove that we were under
Jim Thorpe romanticized Carlisle and made it famous. The Mashpee already knew what their cousins were about to learn. Tough lessons.
federal recognition before 1934. Not real convincing. In 2009 the US Supreme Court said that the Department of Interior could only take land into trust of tribes that were under federal jurisdiction prior to 1934. Carlisle was the strongest angle the tribe had other than the fact that the US Secretary of War decided to let the Mashpee Wampanoag stay on their land during the Indian Removal Act.
The whole Carlisle thing had a lot of missing parts. Indian students, the majority from western tribes, were torn from their families by the droves between 1879-1919 and forced to go to the boarding school that would train them and erase their culture. It was called assimilation. Well, we had our own school, unlike the western tribes. We lived in the ‘Old Indian Town’ of Mashpee. We
At the Old Indian Church built in 1684. Our remarkable legacy is disappearing.
wore the White man’s clothes and regalia during pow wow and at ceremonies at the Old Indian Church. We had already assimilated to a point because for centuries we lived among the British, the colonists, the Yankee Cape Codders and survived with traditions intact. We ran our own lives.
Back to our relationship with Carlisle. We had young tribal members sent off to Carlisle in the early 1900s and one of them was sent to Pennsylvania because he was mischievous and didn’t mind. He was sent by his family. It wasn’t about Christianity or assimilation or by order of the DOI. Well he didn’t stay long. He ran away and came back to Mashpee.
At the Mashpee school in 1910. Steve Peters’ (top 2nd right) brother Charlie was the rascal sent to Carlisle and didn’t stay long. It was a vintage Peters move. Defiant Mashpee.
So the government, attorney Costello argued that Carlisle was considered but it was not conclusive. And that we had no treaty with the federal government. That’s because we were a tribe of people living in a state township, formally a plantation or reservation in modern times, in the state of Massachusetts.
The judge seemed pretty disturbed by the governments’ poorly produced documents. He exploded about the typos and grammatical errors. He was also thinking out loud saying.” If I rule against the government and remand it back to the government how do you maintain the status quo?” He was looking for a way to keep the land in trust. And the tribal attorney threw him a softball saying, ” There’s no procedure to take the land out of trust.” Like that would stop it.
The conference call dropped off so there really was no end to the hearing. But it was clear that the judge was looking to rule for the tribe. That means sending it back to the Department of Interior or not ruling at all, which will delay things. The trouble is it’s impossible for the DOI to defy the US Supreme Court. The tribe cannot appeal the Supreme Court’s decision…to who?
We will remain a recognized tribe. That was confirmed during the hearing. But we all know that was not in jeopardy. But Genting will own the Taunton land if the land does not go in trust. And we paid for it dearly $82 m at 27% interest and a second loan of the casino-less property.AND Cedric Cromwell wants to pay the Taunton bill of $500K out of the Corona money. He really did.
Now, we’ve been down this road with Cedric for years. The guy is just so damned shady. He keeps, borrowing, begging and stealing from grants to keep getting paid.
Genting is not giving Cedric any more money they made that clear recently so that well is dry. But he’s stalling again, you know why. The covid money keeps on gving him and his cronies a salary.
This is real people. We know how this ends. And Cedric has been running a criminal enterprise right in our face. He never had a plan to keep the tribe alive. But he never missed a paycheck in 11 years. That’s quite a record.
Word to the wise Ceddie Lou, when the man comes knocking, there ain’t no back door.
