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[repkowil at msu.edu]

Hola, 

This message may help folks understand how we selected the list that we chose.
I am not suggesting the list is perfect ? I would love to hear suggestions 
for new groups to add. But, this should shed some light. 

In particular, I wanted to respond to Travis?s post, as well as a backchannel 
that I received as to why the MSU paper did not include :

	a) A Tribe from the Great Plains
	b) More of the Shoshone splinter groups.

Let me say that we considered geography in the process of selecting tribes. 
For instance, we wanted very badly to include one of the many, many 
unrecognized tribes in California (I get that this is not the Great Plains ? 
please bear with me)? We almost placed the Muwekma Ohlone (San Fran area) and 
the Juanenos (Santa Ana area) on the list -- but chose not to b/c the lit 
base for one was tiny, and the other had formed a series of splintered 
organizations (This is fairly common. As tribes ?splinter? occurs, so too 
does the specific literature base as it relates to each half of the 
splintered petition)? In general, we found geographic diversity secondary to 
the depth of literature and the prospective side bias? 

A note on ?Geographic Fairness?

A few have asked ? can I research the MSU topic as well as, let?s say, the 
Vermont debate team ? who is just a car ride away from the Abenaki?s ??

For one, I am not afraid to expand our literature base to creative areas. I 
would hope several teams contact the tribes on our list. I do not think this 
will happen as frequently with other wording proposals. Accordingly, I think 
we will miss out on something.

For another, when we thought about how every team in a nation-wide debate 
community would have to research this topic ? it was re-assuring to us that 
we were gathering a lot of information on each tribe from a computer in 
Michigan. Oddly, I think the elimination of our list, the Mancuso topic, and 
the Rayburn topic all have a far greater chance of creating ADVANTAGE areas 
for particular tribes that negative would never think to be prepared for 
(Corey ? don?t start ? your "overhaul" does not preclude the Aff from running 
a Apache advantage). Bottom line ? at least the Neg knows to look for Abenaki 
evidence under our topic.     

As it relates to the Shoshones (here is the reasoning):

1. Timbisha Shoshone Tribe seem to have the most literature about them ? in 
part b/c of their involvement in a high profile case revolving around winning 
access to a reservation that stood within the Death Valley National Park. 
They are federally recognized ? however ? which is a big reason why their 
lawsuit had a chance to succeed.  

2. Timpanogos Tribe, a.k.a. The Snake Band of the  Shoshone  Indians, seem to 
be an unrecognized group of Shoshones that could be included on the list. My 
fear here is the size of the literature and the fact that they do not 
presently have a petition before the BAR/Congress (the have threatened to but 
have not done so as of 2/06/01. They are looking to the court system) ? which 
seems to be a good standard for negative ground/literature base? But, I am 
certainly open to having the list expand ? especially in reaction to 
community feedback? 

3. We also strongly considered the Lemhi Shoshone ? a tribe in Idaho? The 
squad had a good long discussion about including this group? In fact, several 
of the cards from the Kritik section are cut from a law review devoted solely 
to an analysis of Foucault and Said?s work as it relates to recognition of 
the Lemhi? We ultimately opted against including the Lemhis b/c there was an 
aff law review article which on-point answered the article I referenced 
above?. It would have been a storng kritik Aff ? with a small literature 
base, that DID ACTUALLY have carded answers in the literature to the 
prominent criticisms of recognition? We just felt it was the definition of a 
what we were trying to avoid ? tiny cases with a large side bias?   

4. Western  Shoshones

Including this group could be very interesting ? as it stands to court the 
Yucca Mountain debate . The problem is that many Western Shoshone splinter 
groups are recognized ? it is just their tribal council that is not:

		INDIAN COUNTRY TODAY January 4, 1999

	The  Western Shoshone  National Council is the traditional government 
of the Western Shoshone  Nation whose jurisdiction spans the territory 
outlined in the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley.

   The National Council, however, is not a  federally recognized  tribal 
council created by the Indian Reorganization Act. 


And, I am unclear which of the Western Shoshone splinter organizations we 
should include. The following are recognized: 

	(http://www.wildapache.net/NativeAmericanSite/pages/TribeswFedRec.html
 -- a useful webcite for those exploring recognition questions)

Native American Tribes with Federal Recognition
Listed Alphabetically

Te-Moak Tribes of Western Shoshone Indians of Nevada (Four constituent bands: 
Battle Mountain Band; Elko Band; South Fork Band and Wells Band)


In the end, including Great Plain Indians in the topic is tough because such 
a high percentage are recognized, and those that are not lack a huge lit base.

Travis also spoke to the desire of intentionally including a splintered group 
in the topic? The United Houma Nation ? a Louisiana tribe in the topic ? is 
confronting this dilemma? The literature about how such splintering effects 
their petition and relations should stand to fulfill such objectives?
  
      --Will
        repkowil at msu.edu