A Milestone for Virginia's Native Tribes
For Virginia’s American Indian tribes, July 2 likely will go down in history as a red letter, to be remembered as the day the first Virginia tribe gained official recognition from the federal government.
Think about that for a second.
A tribe from Virginia, the site of the first permanent English settlement in the New World at Jamestown in 1607 — a settlement saved early on by the humanitarian intervention of nearby tribes, is only now, in 2015 gaining recognition by the federal government and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).
And ironically, it is the very tribe that saved the Jamestown settlers — and thereby sealed their own doom — that was recognized by the BIA on Thursday: the Pamunkey Tribe of Southeastern Virginia.
Virginia’s two U.S. senators — Democrats Mark Warner and Tim Kaine — made the announcement Thursday morning, marking a milestone in the long, arduous path toward federal recognition for Virginia’s native people. It was a moment that capped a push going back more than a dozen years for the two former governors, who had worked long and hard to gain federal recognition.
Federal recognition can take two paths: completion of an application process before the BIA or direct recognition by an act of Congress.
The Pamunkey chose to go the BIA route because more of their historical records the agency would rely on are intact. Six other tribes — the Chickahominy, the Eastern Chickahominy, the Upper Mattaponi, the Rappahannock, the Nansemond and the Monacan — have virtually no pre-Civil War records left, so they chose the congressional route.
Regardless of the path to recogntion the tribes have chosen, the process has been one filled with ups and downs for Virginia’s tribes and their supporters in Congress.
For the Pamunkey, the tribe of Pocahontas and Chief Powhatan, it’s been a decades-long quest. A decision was anticipated this past spring, but was delayed at the last minute when casino giant MGM, which is building a $1.2 billion gambling complex in Maryland, sought to block recognition out of fear the Pamunkey would open their own casino and drain money from them.
After intense, behind-the-scenes work by Virginia’s congressional delegation, that last-minute roadblock was overcome, giving the Pamunkey the chance to make history Thursday.
Now it’s time for the Monacan of Amherst County and the five other tribes seeking federal recognition through congressional action. Legislation, introduced by Sens. Warner and Kaine, has passed the Senate Indian Affairs Committee. It’s currently waiting to be called to the Senate floor action.
It is past time for that Senate vote. Time and again, the House of Representatives has OK’d past bills, only to have efforts fail in the Senate for one reason or another. This time around, the onus is on the Senate. We add our voice to those of the tribes’ many other supporters and call on Senate leaders to give these tribes what they richly deserve: recognition of their very existence. Now is the time.
