"Indian Nations", Their Reservations, and My Rights

One of the stranger parts of the election process is that prisoners are allowed to vote. So if you're in the normal Arizona jail or prison system, you would be bussed in to the polls in jumpsuits and handcuffs/legirons and shuffle into the polling place to vote. They believed in maintaining as many social connections to the incarcerated as possible and that included elections.
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In eleven years of state corrections, I have never seen this, heard of it, or read it in any of our policies, including Transportation. Sorry, restricted policy, can't discuss it. :) It's an interesting idea, but not one I have ever heard of before, having been in AZ for approx 45+ years so far. :)
Reservations are governed by treaty, and each treaty is different. There is no one special way to approahc ALL the tribal lands, as you will have to check with each individual tribe to find out what they're laws/treaty requirements are. The Navajos have a VERY strong treaty - they managed to get an exemption to the draft for Vietnam, as I've been told, even though reportedly several tribal members volunteered. As for tribal police being close knit members of society, perhaps that reservation is true for that, but Tohono O'odham hires many non tribal members for their PD, which covers a HUGE area. I had a few buddies who worked there, great pay.
I stay out of the reservations, as an AZ CCW is no good there, and even my Dept ID might not be enough to get off a carry problem. I also don't gamble, which eases many problems. When I worked armored trucking, we picked up the first casinos in southern Arizona, and we had permission to carry our sidearms and long guns on tribal lands, but only for money pickup. I saw enough money coming in from the casinos every day to realize the odds are terrible.:cool::cool:
 
In eleven years of state corrections, I have never seen this, heard of it,
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Do they send prisoners from reservation to state prison? They had their own facility, although not super big, in the TV show. It looked more like a "county lock-up" than a "prison." The Ohio prisons have dozens of times the capacity. The population of Ohio is probably dozens of times as large also.
 
1. All Indian reservations are different and have different laws and relationships with the state or states they are located within.

2. Specific to the Navajo Nation: the Navajo Nation recognizes the right of safe passage through the Nation under Federal Law (Firearm Owner's Protection Act). As long as you are on a highway right-of-way, you may have an unloaded gun in your possession as follows.

When traveling through the Navajo Nation, the gun must be unloaded and locked in the trunk, with the ammunition in a different location. If you do not have a trunk, then the unloaded firearm must be in a locked gun case with the ammunition in a separate, locked case.

If you are pulled over by the Navajo Tribal Police and they find a loaded weapon, they will confiscate the weapon and ammunition. In order to get the weapon and ammunition back from the Navajo Nation, you must provide a bill of sale in your name for the gun and the ammunition.
 
And who "owns" the land isn't material. Not all governments own the land their embassies are located on. They are still that nation's territory. You won't an arm of the US Government invade an embassy we want to continue to have relations with any time soon.
 
In eleven years of state corrections, I have never seen this, heard of it, or read it in any of our policies, including Transportation. Sorry, restricted policy, can't discuss it.
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I saw these guys shuffle off of a bus with county jail markings.
 
johnwilliamson, yes, we have Native Americans in AZ state prison, 5% of our current population. The reality TV shows have little to do with reality. The only groups we segregate are minors, and sex offenders are separated from General Population. Keeps the murders down. Protective Segregation is another thing entirely.
Jim March, I'll believe it, because I am very willing to bet they weren't ours.
JimDandy, could you clarify your post? It's a little confusing. The land an accredited embassy stands on is SUPPOSED to be treated as sovereign lands of the nation it represents, but as we saw in Tehran and Benghazi, that is little protection against the mobs.
 
You won't an arm of the US Government invade an embassy we want to continue to have relations with any time soon.
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Foreign embassies are totally different. Besides, the US government was forcibly removing native children from their parents without cause into the 1970s. You can't get much more invasive than that.

The point I am making with the "public land" comment is internal. It isn't that the US gov't owns the land, it is that the "tribe" owns the land. Not the individual living in a house on the land. How can you say a police officer doesn't have the right to search your private property when it isn't your private property? I;m not sure how the leases work and haven't found much information on it, but it certainly seems like the "tribe" effectively owns all real property.
 
"One of the stranger parts of the election process is that prisoners are allowed to vote."

I believe that's a pretty common thread among many of the Southwestern tribes. As Aguilla Blanca mentions, "law breakers" (open ended term not just for those accused/convicted of breaking legal statutes) are often seen to be out of step with, or alienated from, the tribe (often due to harmful outside influences) and everyone needs to work to bring that person back into the fold.

It's also fairly common in other nations.

I was absolutely shocked when I found out that the guy who assassinated Yitzhak Rabin was voting in the elections not long after he killed Rabin, and if I'm not mistaken, while he was still either on trial or involved in appeals.
 
Land Status on Reservations:

Tribal Trust Land: Land owned by a Tribe, placed in Trust by the US Government. All Tribal Trust Land is considered property of the Tribe, but the BIA manages it for the Tribe, with input from the Tribe. Tribal Trust Land is Tax Exempt.

Tribal Allotted Land: Allotted Land is land owned by an individual Tribal member or his family (heirs). This is land "given" to individuals for the purpose of farming and ranching among other things. This land is also in Trust. The government (BIA) has the responsibility to manage all income from this land for the various ownership heirs. This land is also Tax Exempt.

Fee Land: Also known as deeded land, is property owned by people living with in the exterior boundaries of the reservation that hold title to their property. Fee land is not held in Trust by the BIA. Fee Land is subject to taxes from the county where it is located. Most non-Indian landowners living on the reservation own fee land.

There are several other sub types of property, but these three are the major types of reservation land.

Most Tribes have their own "Law and Order" code. These are a set of laws like any other city, county or state may have. Most reservations are not obligated to follow State law, but many have similar laws to the States they are located in.

Most Tribal Law deals with misdemeanor crime that happens within their boundaries. On most Reservations, felonious crime is tried by the Federal DOJ in federal court. Some reservations have their own police force, but others still rely on the BIA to provide police officers.

State and local police jurisdictions also sometimes have MOU's with Tribal law enforcement. These MOU's deal with non-Indians who commit crime on reservations. Complicating things, Federal law, State law and Tribal law sometimes apply to non-Tribal folks within reservation boundaries.

Reservations can make their own gun laws, and often do. Most times, though, if persons remain on State or Federal Highways, the law that governs the rest of the highway off reservation is what one should follow.

Finally, Reservation land IS NOT public property! You can get into big time trouble for trespassing on Reservation property!
 
Finally, Reservation land IS NOT public property! You can get into big time trouble for trespassing on Reservation property!
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Definition of PUBLIC LAND
: land owned by a government; specifically : that part of the United States public domain subject to sale or disposal under the homestead laws
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Military bases, court houses, government offices, The White House, etc., are ALL public lands and you can get in trouble for trespassing on the property. "Public" doesn't mean open to the public. It means OWNED by the public. Is the tribe the "public" in the same way my local municipality is? Maybe not.

property of the Tribe, but the BIA manages it for the Tribe
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I could write a page on that bit.
 
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BLM, USFS, NPS are all agencies that manage land "owned" by every single person in the U.S., and therefor referred to as "Public Land".

Tribal Land, managed by the BIA, belongs to all enrolled Tribal members, but not the general U.S. population. So In that sense, Tribal land is public to those enrolled in the Tribe, but not you or I!
 
Agreed with the caveat that owning something that is managed by another party without your informed consent given freely is not really owning. I won't argue that informed consent was not given freely by the tribes. Such an argument would take mountains of research of the situations surrounding the treaties which is in many cases probably not available or not reliable.
I will only argue if the tribes didn't give informed consent freely, the tribes don't really own the land anymore than a child owns "their" playhouse in their parents back yard. If they gave free consent I guess they are the parent who fooled their ten year old son into thinking mowing the grass was great fun or the neighbor who convinced another to mow their grass because their zero-turn riding mower is so nice and big it will only take a few minutes to mow a second city yard.
 
Yes, general Tribal land is "held in trust", just like a minor child that has inherited a plot of land when their parent died. But there are a lot of "allotments" too, which are actually the private property of their native owners, and private fee land, like I own, and pay county property tax on.
 
There was a purpose in the BIA trust relationship. The fact of the matter was that Indians who needed money were selling their lands to whites, and it got to the point in some areas where the reservations were disappearing. To protect the tribes and the tribal lands, restrictions were placed on the alienability of Indian land. But it is still land owned by the tribe and not by the federal government.
 
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