A BIG RULING

The Cherokee Nation's Supreme Court decides to remove all references to `blood' from tribal laws

Further solidifying citizenship status for the descendants of Cherokeeowned slaves, the tribe's Supreme Court decided unanimously Monday to remove the words“by blood” from all tribal laws and even from the tribe's own constitution.

The tribal court's decision came in response to a 2017 case in federal court, Cherokee Nation v. Nash, which determined t hat Freedmen citizens had full rights as Cherokee citizens based on the Treaty of 1866 with the U.S. government.

The Cherokee Nation's attorney general, Sara Hill, had recently requested that the tribe's Supreme Court issue an order to clarify the issue.

“Provisions in Cherokee Nation's constitution and laws that deny descendants of Freedmen all the rights and obligations of Cherokee citizenship violate our 155-year-old treaty obligations and are void,” Hill said. “Cherokee citizens of Freed men descent are simply this:

Cherokee citizens.”

The Cherokee Nation has about 8,500 enrolled Cherokee Nation citizens of Freedmen descent.

The decision nullifies a 2007 amendment to the tribe's constitution “to limit citizenship in the nation to only those persons who were Cherokee, Shawnee or Delaware by blood.”

Monday' s tribal Supreme Court decision declared those words “never valid from inception, and must be removed wherever found throughout our tribal law.”