Oneidas' divisions have deep roots
Feb. 24, 2002

By R PATRICK CORBETT
Observer-Dispatch

The tensions among the different branches of the Oneida Indian Nation are rooted in distant historical events yet remain as current as any family squabble.

For three decades, leaders of the Oneidas’ New York, Wisconsin and Ontario, Canada, branches have fought to get compensation for the loss of their traditional homelands in Oneida and Madison counties.

Today, they can’t agree on who should get how much if the land-claim case is settled. The disagreement has extended to the point that the Wisconsin Oneidas last week sued 20 Central New York property owners even as the New York Oneidas were touting a proposed land-claim deal made with the state and local counties.

The New York Oneidas brand the Oneida Tribe of Wisconsin as “greedy outsiders.” The Wisconsins, however, say they simply are trying to protect their ancient heritage.

Daniel Usner, professor of history and director of the American Indian Program at Cornell, said the federal government helped create today’s strained tribal relations.

“It’s a complicated story experienced by several tribes across the northern woodlands, caused by government policy,” Usner said, citing events in the late 1700s and early 1800s.

“The duplicity is that the federal government let the states violate federal law (to purchase Oneida land in violation of treaties),” Usner said. “They hoped the Indians would die off or disappear.”

He said now that the tribes are reasserting their land rights, government is stuck with dealing with the patchwork mess it created.

As the Oneidas lost their land in New York state, members of the tribe headed to Wisconsin and to Canada. Today, the Wisconsin and New York branches are recognized by federal law. The Thames Band is recognized in Canada.

Other tribes, including the Cherokee and Choctaw, are struggling with similar geographical splits, Usner said.

The complexity in the Oneida case is illustrated by New York Assemblyman David Townsend’s reaction to the latest Wisconsin demand for land.

“They weren’t Wisconsins before they moved there,” the Lee Center Republican said. “If the Oneidas of New York establish a homeland, (the Wisconsin Oneidas) can come back here if ... a presence in their homeland is what they really want.”

Not really, Wisconsin Oneida Tribal General Manager William Gollnick said. The tribal membership rolls are separate and distinct, so Wisconsin Oneidas cannot transfer to New York Oneida rolls or vice versa, he said.

“Our vision for the land claim was not that we were going to all live in the same neighborhood, but that Oneida people would all recognize their collective roots,” he said.

For 11,000 years Oneidas “traveled throughout the Northeast, but we were based in New York,” Gollnick said.

The Wisconsin Oneidas say they won’t settle their claim without some land in their traditional homeland, something not provided in the deal the New York Oneidas worked out with the state.

The Wisconsin and Canadian Oneidas had talked about a “footprint” of land in the territory during the failed land claim negotiations two years ago.

It would give them a physical tie to their emotional roots, Gollnick said.

Those roots were torn out in the late 1700s and early 1800s, he said.

“Through a series of illegal treaties we found our land base being eroded and found ourselves homeless,” he said.

In a few decades, Oneida landholdings went from millions of acres to thousands, he said.

The Oneidas, unschooled in European law and with little concept of land ownership, were easy targets for land speculators. Many readily agreed to schemes to move them out of the path of the new United States’ westward expansionism to new homelands in Wisconsin and Canada.

Some Oneidas stayed behind, in and around the homeland.

Most settled on Mohawk and Onondaga tribal territory. Others lived on in small enclaves on the old territory, a distinction claimed by the Marble Hill band.

Next month, the Marble Hill Oneidas will try to convince a federal judge to add them to the land-claim lawsuit.

Today, the Wisconsin Oneidas claim about 15,000 members, the Canadians 5,000 and the New York branch 1,100.

Any pretense at modern Oneida unity crumbled Feb. 16 when the Oneida Indian Nation of New York announced it had cut its own deal with the state to settle the land claim.

It was not the first split among the land-claim plaintiffs.

The Oneida Nation of New York tried private negotiations with the state briefly in 1993 but soon rejoined the tribal flock in court.

That move followed an unsuccessful effort by the Wisconsin Oneidas to block the opening of the New Yorkers’ Turning Stone Casino in 1993.

Canadian Indians were part of an Oneida faction that seized the old bingo hall on the Oneida Territory along Route 46 in Oneida, held it by force and then burned it to the ground in 1988.

Those who remained in New York don’t always agree among themselves on tribal issues.

New York Oneida Nation representative Ray Halbritter readily admits that there are differences among the Oneida people, much as there are among non-Indian nations.

In an August 2000 response to an article questioning his leadership, Halbritter wrote to the managing editor of News From Indian Country, “We have severe differences with some of our families.”

Those differences led the Bureau of Indian Affairs to withdraw its recognition of the New York tribe in 1975, because the people couldn’t agree on their leaders.

The leadership vacuum lasted more than a decade, and a disputed 1986 tribal referendum ended with about 300 favoring Halbritter’s “traditional” backers and 200 supporting the “constitutional” Oneidas.

Canadian Oneidas further confused the leadership issue by withdrawing their recognition of Halbritter in 1987, but it turned out to be a futile gesture.

Halbritter acknowledged that splits exist, but he criticized the Indian newspaper in 2000 for ignoring what he called “a wider and deeper reality about our nation.”

He said that in spite of internal critics the Nation has put into place educational, health and housing initiatives that benefit Oneida people.