NY Times reports - Sioux Split on Suit Seeking Money for Black Hills

It's an interesting legal problem.....and there is almost certainly no way to "win."

Over a century ago, the Sioux were driven out of the Black Hills and onto reservations.  Eventually, the US Government offered compensation.  The compensation hasn't been accepted or paid......the tribes insisting, instead, that the government should return the property.

Now, it's pretty obvious that's never going to happen, with due respect to the tribes' position.

So now there is a federal lawsuit filed as a class action suit which seeks to have a federal court release as much as $900 million in compensation and interest.

But as the NY Times reports, "The dispute has split the tribes. Some 5,000 tribal members have signed up for the class-action lawsuit, but just 19 plaintiffs are listed because many others live on reservations and fear retribution, said lawyer Wanda L. Howey-Fox of Yankton.

She said tribal members are wrong if they believe taking the money amounts to selling the Black Hills.

''There is no selling to be done because the court determined it was an improper taking and all the court can give as far as a remedy is money,'' Howey-Fox said. ''They can sit and hope and pine away that the government is going to give the Black Hills back, but that is never going to happen.''

But Charlotte Black Elk, who has been active in traditional native issues including the Black Hills, said she would never consider taking money for the Black Hills, which the Sioux hold sacred.

''To take the money would bless the theft,'' said Black Elk, who lives on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation."

To say that is issue is dividing the tribes would be a bit of an understatement.

Read the full story HERE.

twp