How one band stayed: the mechanism, read in the statute

L. 103-323 (1994)

The Pokagon Band stayed by a negotiated article, a Catholic identity the treaty itself recited, a land purchase, and — once — a judge: the mechanism stands in four documented parts. The article: the United States' own findings, codified at 25 U.S.C. §1300j in the Pokagon Band recognition act (Pub. L. 103-323, 21 September 1994), state it in so many words: "In the Treaty of Chicago 1833, the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians was the only band that negotiated a right to remain in Michigan." The creed clause: the treaty's supplemental article of 27 September 1833 let part of the band settled on Michigan reservations, "on account of their religious creed," remove instead to L'Arbre Croche and receive their proportional annuities there — the Clarke Historical Library's reading covering the four Catholic Potawatomi communities afterwards known collectively as the Pokagon Band. The creed was earned before it was recited: Leopold Pokagon, the band's leader, was the Catholic convert-chief who had brought Father Badin to the valley in August 1830 (the religion file), and who abstained from alcohol at the Chicago council of 1833 — the sobriety the tradition credits with the band's negotiating clarity. The purchase: Pokagon bought land in fee — 874 acres jointly with his wife on Silver Creek, south of Niles, near Dowagiac (Clifton, The Pokagans) — a homeland held by deed where treaty title failed others. The judge: in 1841, a military removal attempt against the band was halted with the help of Michigan Justice Epaphroditus Ransom. The mechanism's modern state closes the article: federally recognised since 1994, headquartered at Dowagiac, some 3,400 citizens, a ten-county service area that includes St. Joseph County, Indiana (the tribes file) — the band that stayed is this township's statutory neighbour still.

Principal sources: 25 U.S.C. §1300j (Pub. L. 103-323), findings read first-hand; the Treaty of Chicago supplemental article of 27 September 1833 as read in the Clarke Historical Library's treaty record; Clifton, The Pokagans, 1683–1983; the banked Native Nations lk-modern-nations and lk-removal.