Indian Rights, Indian Law

Duration: 60

Year Published: 1978

Creator: Consentino Films Production

Format: 16mm

Color: Color

Sound: sound

Description: From Maine to the State of Washington, American Indians are reasserting their rights in the courts, basing their claims on "Indian Law," what Justice Felix Frankfurter called "The vast hodgepodge of treaties, statutes, judicial and administrative rulings, and unrecorded practices in which the intricacies and perplexities, confusions and injustices of the law governing Indians lay concealed." The Native American Rights Fund (NARF) is the only national Indian law firm devoted to the protection of Indian rights. Focuses on the work of NARF's lawyers, most of whom are Indians, in such cases as the fight between 14 tribes and Washington State officials over treaty fishing rights along the Pullayup River; the struggle of the Paiute Tribe against the diversion of water from Pyramid Lake in Nevada; the religious rights of Indian prisoners; more equitable treatment for Indian school children; and the land-claims suit of the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot Tribes in Maine., The Native American Rights Fund, founded in 1970, is a national Indian law firm dedicated to the preservation of tribal sovereignty and resources. This film focuses on court cases throughout the U.S. in which NARF lawyers have utilized Federal Indian Law to argue the claims of native peoples. These include: reassertion of fishing rights for members of the Quinault Reservation in Washington, fighting to reverse the federal policy of termination which threatened the sovereignty of the Menominee tribe in Wisconsin, securing equitable educational opportunities for Navajo children in Utah and protecting the religious freedoms of Native American prisoners in Nebraska. Working with the Native American Natural Resource Federation, NARF lawyers re-established water rights for the Paiutes, fought to protect the oil-rich lands of the Crow people in Montana and represented the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes of Maine in the return of territory guaranteed by a 1790 treaty.

Complete Record: From Maine to the State of Washington, American Indians are reasserting their rights in the courts, basing their claims on "Indian Law," what Justice Felix Frankfurter called "The vast hodgepodge of treaties, statutes, judicial and administrative rulings, and unrecorded practices in which the intricacies and perplexities, confusions and injustices of the law governing Indians lay concealed." The Native American Rights Fund (NARF) is the only national Indian law firm devoted to the protection of Indian rights. Focuses on the work of NARF's lawyers, most of whom are Indians, in such cases as the fight between 14 tribes and Washington State officials over treaty fishing rights along the Pullayup River; the struggle of the Paiute Tribe against the diversion of water from Pyramid Lake in Nevada; the religious rights of Indian prisoners; more equitable treatment for Indian school children; and the land-claims suit of the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot Tribes in Maine., The Native American Rights Fund, founded in 1970, is a national Indian law firm dedicated to the preservation of tribal sovereignty and resources. This film focuses on court cases throughout the U.S. in which NARF lawyers have utilized Federal Indian Law to argue the claims of native peoples. These include: reassertion of fishing rights for members of the Quinault Reservation in Washington, fighting to reverse the federal policy of termination which threatened the sovereignty of the Menominee tribe in Wisconsin, securing equitable educational opportunities for Navajo children in Utah and protecting the religious freedoms of Native American prisoners in Nebraska. Working with the Native American Natural Resource Federation, NARF lawyers re-established water rights for the Paiutes, fought to protect the oil-rich lands of the Crow people in Montana and represented the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes of Maine in the return of territory guaranteed by a 1790 treaty. NOTE: Two (or more) records have been merged together to create this data.