Title
ACT RELATING TO APPEAL A FEDERAL DISTRICT COURT DECISION IMPACTING THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE CHEROKEE NATION AND THE 566 OTHER TRIBES ACROSS THE UNITED STATES AND DECLARING AN EMERGENCY
Body
BE IT ENACTED BY THE CHEROKEE NATION:
Section 1. Title and Codification
This act shall be known as the 2017 Sovereignty Protection Act and codified as _____________ (Title) ___________ (Section) ______________ of the Cherokee Nation Code Annotated.
Section 2. Purpose
The purpose of this enactment is to require the Attorney General to appeal Cherokee Nation v. Nash, NDDC, Civil Action No. 13-0313 and any other case impacting the sovereignty of the Cherokee Nation to determine its own citizenship.
Section 3. Legislative History
A. In Cherokee Nation v. Nash, NDDC, Civil Action No. 13-0313, the federal District Court for the Washington DC District issued a Memorandum Opinion August 30, 2017 which diminished the right of the Cherokee people to determine citizenship in the Cherokee Nation.
B. The most fundamental and sacred aspect of sovereignty of any nation is that its people have the right to decide who is entitled to enrollment for citizenship. “The Act of Union of 1839.” provides in part:
Whereas our Fathers have existed, as a separate and distinct Nation, in the possession and exercise of the essential and appropriate attributes of sovereignty, from a period extending into antiquity, beyond the records and memory of man. . . “
C. In its Memorandum Opinion dated August 30, 2017, the federal district court in Nash held that a post American Civil War 1866 Treaty between the United States and the Cherokee Nation provided a federal treaty right to descendants of Freedmen to currently enroll as Cherokee Nation citizens, although they are not eligible under the Cherokee Nation Constitution.
D. In 2011, the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court held Cherokee Nation Registrar v. Nash, SC-2011-02 the 2007 Constitutional Amendment was the expression of the Cherokee ...
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