Excerpt page 24 : In addition to lineage and blood quantum, some Tribes add other criteria to the mix. Some have requirements around culture and tradition - my own Tribe, the Lumbee, for example, now requires completion of that Lumbee history class before someone can enroll. A handful of Tribes take into consideration which side of your family your Native ancestry is on. Some Tribes require applicants to enroll within a certain period after their birth. Some maintain a residency requirement: the applicant must have been born or currently reside on the Tribe's lands.
... In recent years, and with the advent of consumer ancestry tests, a misconception has emerged that DNA spit tests can be used to gain Tribal enrollment. That's not quite true. No federally recognized Tribe in the United States allows someone to apply for enrollment using just their 23andMe report. Tribes that use DNA tests in their enrollment processes generally do so for maternity or paternity purposes - that is, to determine a person's biological parentage.
(For people were not born in or residing in their Tribal Community. (I note, in common language, "on the reservation" do an enrollment application.) ... Usually an extensive family tree must be filled out usually, historical birth certificates of ancestors must be submitted. Often the process must be completed in person. ...
Excerpt page 25 : ... One of the biggest obstacles people face with Tribal enrollment is verifying their ancestry. It is generally the case that Tribes don't release their historical rolls to the public. Certainly, from a sovereignty perspective, this makes sense. After all, the U.S. government doesn't maintain a public-facing list of all its current citizens. I can think of a hundred reasons this sort of public cataloguing would be problematic. The same goes for Tribes.
Lesson: For Native American Tribes, citizenship is never geographical. It's always relational.
PUBLIC NATIVE AMERICAN ROLES (Commonly called THE FIVE CIVILIZED TRIBES)
Cherokee Nation
Chickasaw Nation
Seminole of Oklahoma
Choctow of Oklahoma
Muscokee (Creek) Nation
According to an expert of the Chickasaw Nation, the further from these roles (called The Dawes Rolls) they get, the harder it is to prove Native Tribal affiliation.... And some people with common names erroneously "prove" they are not
Notes: Author Carrie Lowry Schuettpelz also discusses the founding of the United States census and the evolution of questions asked. Until the 1850 census race was not asked. She explores the question of dismissiveness and also racism. She brings up the Nazi's and extermination of a people, her visit to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, dealing with National Archives and Record Administration. She explores treaties and agreements between tribes and government and also individuals.
Again, I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in the history or the genealogy!
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