Cherokee Nation: AG agrees to order temporarily restoring citizenship rights to Freedmen
The Muskogee Phoenix reports: The attorney general of the Cherokee Nation agreed to a temporary injunction in tribal court Monday that allows descendants of the tribe’s slaves to maintain their citizenship while they appeal the constitutionality of an election that rescinded their tribal membership.
The order applies only to appeals made by the descendants, commonly known as freedmen, in tribal court, and not to ongoing appeals being made in federal court in Washington, D.C. ...
But Jon Velie, the attorney for the freedmen in the federal case, called the tribal court’s action “a temporary fix” and said the tribe was reacting to recent filings by the freedmen in the federal case. In that case on Monday, U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. denied a motion by the tribe to dismiss the case or move jurisdiction of it to an Oklahoma federal court.
Young said the order by Cherokee District Court Judge John Cripps means the freedmen will be able to vote in the tribe’s June 23 election, in which current Chief Chad Smith is running for another term. The Tahlequah-based Cherokee Nation is the largest American Indian tribe in the United States, with about 250,000 members. -- Tribe to restore freedmen