Guardian: US Tribe battles to reclaim land (Shinnecock Hills)

[maddezmom]

Give us back our land, poor US tribe tells super rich owners

Native Americans make $1.7bn claim over former home that is now exclusive holiday playground and top golf course

Jamie Wilson in Washington
Friday June 17, 2005
The Guardian

It is the playground of the super rich. The grandiose mansions that line the white sand beach are where New York's high rollers escape for the summer, from international financier George Soros to the heirs to the Hilton hotel chain and the descendants of the Ford car family. Fashion designer Calvin Klein's $27m summer pad even comes with its own shark pool over which a previous owner dangled his daughter as a party trick. A mile or so inland, the world's best golfers can regularly be seen wandering the fairways of Shinnecock Hills, viewed as America's premier golf course and the venue for last year's US Open championship.

But now the residents of Southampton find themselves at the centre of a multibillion dollar law suit filed by some of America's poorest citizens as the Shinnecock Native Americans fired an opening salvo in their battle to reclaim 3,600 acres of ancestral lands around the exclusive Long Island town.
To the beat of animal skin drums, the shake of rattles and the chant of an "honour song", their leader, Randy King, entered a federal court to file - financially at least - the largest Native American land claim in history over the oldest English settlement in New York State.

In the 19th century the area attracted the original "robber baron" industrialists, including the Rockefeller family, spawning the modern-day Hampton vacationing mania.

"This day has been decades in the making. We only seek what is ours," Mr King, chairman of the tribe's board of trustees, said later in a statement.

~snip~
more:http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1508546,00.html

[azndndude]

1. Not in America! where lies and deception to the Indigenous people

are the norm, As an Indigenous person I support the Shinnecock's fight to reclaim their land, but also realize that it is going to be an uphill battle. America was founded on graves and of the shedding of our people's blood.

[Broken_Hero]

2. Nothing is going to happen...

Speaking as an Nativer American, this tribe is fighting a losing battle, and nothing will happen about it, its much like the fight indians have about native mascots, it won't go much of anywhere. There are always loopholes and what nots. If you don't believe me go to osu.edu and look up the treaties, the hundreds of treaties that the USA has renigged on, and you might believe this post...:) osu as in Oklahoma State University, they have a great website on Indian issues/Law.