The Fire and The Spirits: Cherokee Law from Clan to Court
By: Rennard Strickland
The Laws of the Cherokee Nation (LCN) in Dark Horse v Cherokee Nation are specific in that the Chickamauga who moved to Arkansas are not Citizens of the Cherokee Nation, they have no rights as a Cherokee, and that they are their own people and own Nation with their own laws. It is evident that the LCN in Dark Horse forbid any rights whatsoever to the Chickamauga.
This is understood in that Little Turkey declared that the Chickamauga are not of the Nation, they are a separate people and that the Cherokee must extract vengeance on the Lower Town Chickamauga. This is further understood in that the Lower Town Chickamauga are identified by George Washington as Chickamauga living on the lower town s of the Tennessee River. Even the beloved courtesan (want a list of the many people she slept with? We have that too!), and her coven witches as described by Dragging Canoe, issued death warrants (today we call them "hits") against the Chickamauga who sold or traded their lands and moved into the Arkansas Territory and Indian Territory.
Rennard Strickland, a pioneer in the movement for Native rights and a legal historian who received two law degrees from the University of Virginia School of Law, died Jan. 5 at the age of 80.
Born in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Strickland was of Osage and Cherokee heritage. In a career that spanned teaching and leading numerous law schools, he served as dean of four: the University of Tulsa, Southern Illinois University, Oklahoma City University and the University of Oregon. He was most recently senior scholar in residence at the University of Oklahoma Law Center, where he helped introduce Indian Law into the University’s legal curriculum. The author, editor or co-editor of 47 books and 208 essays, book chapters and articles, he was frequently cited by courts and scholars for his work as revision editor-in-chief of “Cohen’s Handbook of Federal Indian Law,” considered the authoritative text on the subject.
As a student at UVA Law, he earned his LL.B. in 1965 and S.J.D. in 1971.
“Rennard — a legal historian, institutional leader, teacher and arts patron — was himself a historic figure in the movement for the recognition of Native rights, a movement that informed virtually his entire professional life,” said Professor Lindsay G. Robertson ’86, the Chickasaw Nation Endowed Chair in Native American Law at the University of Oklahoma College of Law. Robertson succeeded Strickland in his founding role as faculty director of the Center for the Study of American Indian Law and Policy at the school.
According to his obituary, Strickland made his mark with many firsts. He was the only person to have been a tenured professor of law at all three of Oklahoma’s ABA-approved law schools. He was the first and only person to have served as both the president of the Association of American Law Schools and as the chair of the Law School Admissions Council. He was also the only person to have been honored by both the Society of American Law Teachers with their annual teaching award and the American Bar Association’s “Spirit of Excellence” Award.
In 1997, he was elected to the American Law Institute. In 2012, he received the Robert Kutakes’ Award, presented by the American Bar Association in recognition of his substantial contributions to legal education and the active practice of law. In 1992, he was appointed chair of the Osage Constitutional Commission by U.S. Judge James O. Ellison of the Northern District of Oklahoma.
Strickland had been involved in the resolution of a number of significant Indian cases, including testifying on behalf of the Muskogee Nation and against the State of Oklahoma in the case that established the rights of American Indian tribes to engage in gaming.
What Does This Mean to Us Today?
"You called down the Thunder, now the Chickamauga are coming and JUSTICE is coming with us"
(C) This document was produced at the request of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs on July 18, 2019, to document the History, Anthropology, Culture, Religion, and Archaeology of The Chickamauga Nation.