A Resolution Supporting the Cherokee Nation’s Assertion of Its Treaty Right
to a Delegate in the United States House of Representatives
Resolution No. [NUMBER]
WHEREAS, [INSERT ORGANIZATION SPECIFIC LANGUAGE]
WHEREAS, the Constitution of the United States, through Treaty, Commerce,
Supremacy, and Apportionment Clauses and the 14th Amendment,
recognizes the inherent sovereignty of Indian Tribes and Nations
established prior to the United States; and
WHEREAS, through treaties, statutes, executive orders, and other legal
agreements and laws, the United States took on many legal and
moral obligations to Indian people in exchange for hundreds of
millions of acres of land; and
WHEREAS, since its founding, the [ORGANIZATION] has urged the United
States government to fulfill treaty obligations and uphold the federal
trust responsibility; and
WHEREAS, Article 7 of the Cherokee Nation’s 1835 Treaty of New Echota with
the United States states, “The Cherokee Nation having already made
great progress in civilization and deeming it important that every
proper and laudable inducement should be offered to their people to
improve their condition as well as to guard and secure in the most
effectual manner the rights guarantied to them in this treaty, and
with a view to illustrate the liberal and enlarged policy of the
Government of the United States towards the Indians in their
removal beyond the territorial limits of the States, it is stipulated that
they shall be entitled to a delegate in the House of Representatives
in the United States whenever Congress shall make provision for the
same”; and
WHEREAS, in addition to explicit language in Article 7 of the 1835 Treaty of
New Echota, the Cherokee Nation’s first treaty with the United
States, the 1785 Treaty of Hopewell, also includes the right to a
congressional deputy in Article 12 and the 1866 Treaty with the
Cherokee Nation, affirms the Cherokee Nation’s right to a delegate
in Article 31; and
WHEREAS, in 2017, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia
ruled that the rights and obligations established under the 1866
treaty remain in effect for the Cherokee Nation and the United
States; and
