The Northwest Ordinance of 1787

Many scholars today consider The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 to have the language of sovereignty embedded in its text and intent.  According to scholars Wilkins and Lomawaima, doctrines that support tribal sovereignty, including the Trust Doctrine, are key legal pillars for maintaining the nation-to-nation legal status between tribes and the federal government. (252)  This status is constantly in flux, and in danger, and for that reason many people point to the language of the Ordinance in an effort to convince the courts and policymakers to adhere to the obligations regarding land, defense, and peaceful relations with the Nations outlined therein.

Johnson v M’Intosh codified the “right of occupancy” as the only right to which Indian Nations were entitled with regards to their indigenous lands.  At the same time, Chief Justice Marshall underscored the notion of colonial versus Constitutional law, setting a precedent for later decisions that would allow his court to more broadly define the government-to-government relationship between Indian Nations and the U.S.  The case remains controversial in United States Indian law today.

The impact of the Supreme Court’s decision in Cherokee Nation v Georgia was of historic proportion.  Georgia quickly enforced new state laws against the Cherokee people and by 1837 President Martin Van Buren had forcibly relocated thousands of Cherokees into temporary prison camps.  The following year the U.S. military marched over 15,000 Cherokee men, women, and children out of the southeast and into Oklahoma Territory in the horrific incident known as The Trail of Tears when, along the way, many died of disease and exposure.  Chief Justice Marshall noted that the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution distinctly differentiated between foreign nations, states, and the various Indian Tribes.  To Marshall the relationship was “unlike that of any other two people in existence.”  He used this language to frame Indian peoples in the eyes of the law as in a “state of pupilage,” left only to the “kindness and power” of the federal government for redress or relief. 

Cherokee Nation v Georgia stripped Indian Nations of their power to maintain authority over their own lands, and declassified them as foreign entities, denying them access to U.S. Courts to redress wrongs.  Thus, an era of assimilation, removal, and allotment dawned on Native American peoples that would continue well into the 20th century.  With citizenship granted to Indians in 1924, the lingering effects of Cherokee Nation v Georgia include issues surrounding taxation, tribal sovereignty, and the preservation of cultural heritage.

References

Wilkins, David E., and K. Tsianina Lomawaima. Uneven Ground: American Indian Sovereignty  and Federal Law. Norman: U of Oklahoma, 2001. Print.