The 7,112 acres - or 11 square miles - of Crow Creek Sioux ancestral land in central South Dakota was auctioned off on Thursday by the US Internal Revenue Service to help pay off more than $3.1 million (£1.9 million) in unpaid taxes, penalties and interest.
The land, part of the tribe's original reservation established in an 1868 treaty, was originally held by the federal government in a trust for the tribe.
However, it was later divided up between individual tribal members, some of whom sold it to non-Indians, putting it outside the tribe's legal jurisdiction.
The tribe bought it back in 1998 but claims the US Bureau of Indian Affairs failed to put the land back into trust, which would have protected it.
The bleak, flat reservation land is particularly valuable to the tribe, one of the poorest communities in the US, because it has been designated as suitable for the development of wind power.
Buffalo County, which encompasses the Crow Creek reservation, is consistently listed by the US Census Bureau as one of the poorest counties in America.
While the tribe's lawyers have launched a legal appeal, some Indians said they would be erecting teepees on the disputed land in protest.
Lawyers and academics believe it is the first instance of the IRS seizing tribal lands in this way.
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This feels like a punch in the gut to everyone with any sense of morality and responsibility (or it should). If any group deserves restitution it's the Native Americans, and I can't believe they are being jerked around once again. The government "failed" (deliberately probably) in their duties and the Native Americans have to pay for it.
ReplyDeleteJust another sign o the times.
ReplyDeleteThe wonderful 'godly' act of poisoning the Native Americas during the feasts celebrated by ignorant Americans on 'Thanksgiving.'
ReplyDeleteThe King told the colonists that poisoning the Native Americans was the right thing to do because God told him so.
Sounds like the same logic our mis-leaders use today.
Thieves, liars, murderers...
ReplyDeleteThat's how we'll be remembered long after the crash when the Indians take back over the land because the white man couldn't live without his giant screen LCD and water sprinkler system.
Like Chris Rock said, no one has been treated as bad as the Native Americans. When was the last time you saw a family of NAs chillin' out at Denny's? Never!
ReplyDeleteOur Euro trash great great great+ relatives were scumbags to the ninth degree. Literally unwashed POS treacherous filth.
And then there is the pathetic bigot on the outside who, out of touch with reality, absolutely has no clue.
ReplyDelete