Posted on 03/14/2012 8:05:37 AM PDT by opentalk
CHEYENNE, Wyo. – The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has taken the unusual step of issuing a permit allowing an American Indian tribe in Wyoming to kill two bald eagles for religious purposes.
The agency's decision comes after the Northern Arapaho Tribe filed a federal lawsuit last year contending the refusal to issue such permits violates tribal members' religious freedom. Although thousands of American Indians apply for eagle feathers and carcasses from a federal repository, permits allowing the killing of bald eagles are exceedingly rare, according to both tribal and legal experts on the matter.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Well, if one goes deeper into that, it gets more complex - the various tribes recognized by the US government, are actually “nations within a nation”, a result of the rather strange methods by which the tribes were annexed into the US as pseudo-independent protectorates. This is why reservation police are mentioned as separate entities on legal documents regarding laws and jurisdiction. So yes, their family backgrounds do grant them certain rights, as a result of treaties that go back decades. For example, under an 1868 treaty, the Shoshone tribe can hunt on national land without interruption. The Fort Bridger treaty states that “The Indians.... shall have the right to hunt on the unoccupied lands of the United States so long as game may be found there on, and so long as peace subsists among the whites and Indians, on the borders of the hunting districts.”
ML/NJ
Perhaps in Canada and Alaska the bald eagles are as numerous as crows but not so much in the lower 48 -
In the James River area of VIrginia, they were just about extinct, and now up to around 240-250 breeding pairs. Each pair can lay from 1-3 (3 and occasionally 4 have been seen but are somewhat unusual) eggs, from these hatchlings there is only a 50% survivial rate for those making it to 5 years, which is the earliest that a bald eagle is able to breed.
Given those numbers, it does make me sick that someone can claim the right to kill them. That’s just my opinion. We have several converging rivers in the Dayton area, but no eagles have been seen in many years. Around Lake Erie, I understand there are some. Where we used to summer in Northern Michigan, a pair would come each year (in the 60s) but none have been seen in that area in years.
I guess that even our national symbol has to bend over (and die) for vocal minorities.
I love my country, but eagles are glorified buzzards.
And they are lazy and they drink too much and they can’t be trusted. Come on, can’t you come up with something but ancient biased cliches? Crap like this comes from uninformed , lazy people that don’t know and don’t want to know. If I were like you, I would say that you are a white cracker, redneck, who’s people killed the tribes and stole their land outright or by eminent domain. (their greatest tool for theft). Doesn’t come across as intelligent does it?
So, where does the fault lay and if you had the power to change it, what would you do. I’m not putting you down here, I just wonder what people think about how it should be. Remember you would be expected to keep the promises you made (as a government) and still improve their lives. What is done is done and has been going on so long, any change seems almost dead on arrival.
Recently a young friend, a member of the Nortern Arapahoe tribe, signed up to learn to participate in the Sun Dance. He said they required himto make a commitment of four years participation in the annual Sun Dance. Last year we were watching the Sun Dance and they accidently dropped a feather on the ground and the dancing was immediately halted and the crowd was silent as an elder of the tribe picked up the feather and reverently performed ceremony with the feather facing in the four directions then returned the feather to the dancer who had dropped and the dancing then resumed. All the little children were dressed in traditional costumes that their mothers had obviously worked worked very had making. The mood of the crowd was
quite festive and happy.
If those Asian carp get into the Great Lakes, there will be plenty of eagle chow for all.
Savages, eh?
I’m on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming and we sometimes see eagles soaring very high overhead.
Equality means equality. No free school, you can pay like everyone else. I don’t care what your parents did, where they came from, what church they go to - on AMERICAN soil, you can be treated like everyone else.
Right now, we don’t have equality, we have ‘superiority’, at the taxpayer’s expense. Free college tuition, free trade school, free food, free clothing, free medical - and zero personal responsibility.
If the reservations want to be treated like foreign soil, fine. They can be their own isolated countries, they can build their own roads, generate their own power, pay for their own education; just like every other foreign country.
As-is; the Tribal Consul gets to cherry-pick what they want, to their advantage exclusively. If they want to be annexed by the State, then they can have taxpayer paid roads, utilities, fire, police and schools. If they want to remain seperate, then they can establish borders around their reservation - just like any other country would do.
Assimilate, or Separate - your choice. But I submit we remove the “Parasite” from the US taxpayer roles. Just because it’s been going on for years; does not make it right. Slavery, denying women the right to vote and other issues were going on for a long time - it doesn’t make it right.
BINGO!!!
And if I could provide a document that said my Great-great grandfather owned your great-great grandfather, and any offspring he fathered, was to be passed down through my family; would I now own you? At some point in time, both documents would be equally legally valid. Times have changed. What was reasonable then, is no longer reasonable now. We are either 'equal' or we are not.
We have hundreds of eagles here in OK...during the winter. Even have a few pairs that live here year round.
Wasn't like that...30-40 yrs ago.
FWIW-
Ohhh noes!!!! Two bald eagles!!
They are very abundant around us, here in southeast Wyoming. We live along the North Platte. We see pairs of them all the time.
So they are issued a couple of permits, why is that a problem? Good for the Indians/Native Americans, keeping traditions alive and passing them on to the their children.
“Bald eagles aren’t endangered any more”
No kidding! I live in the heart of Minneapolis 1/4 mile from the Mississippi I see them every day. Dozens of them.
If the natives want to do their thing, ok. No harm to me.
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