Thank you all for some good, well prepared postings and thoughtful discussion. Well done.
One point of further comment is to recommend the book by Ian Frazier "On the Rez." - a really interesting, humorous and sometimes painful account of current American Indians. Well worth reading.
It also happens to mention the story of the Wampanoag tribe that Juliet posted - the tribe that befriended the whites and participated in the first Thanksgiving. The tribe does , in fact, have its reservation lands; the tribe is thought to have become extinct in the 1800s, but in recent times they revived (how?) their tribal identity, went before a federal court to re-establish their rights to "stolen" land in 1989, and, eventually, after negotiation with Jackie Kennedy Onassis (!), won the right to reservation areas close to Cape Cod.
This is a much simplified account of the whole saga (see pages 78 to 80 in 'On the Rez') but it confirms the complexity of issues surrounding "Who is an Indian" and the use of lawyers to fight the present-day battles...
Good wishes,
John
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