Modoc Nation Opens Tribal Roll for Citizenship Applications
Citizenship Code Enacted
On Saturday, January 29, 2011, the Legislative Council unanimously passed the Modoc Nation Citizenship Code of 2011. The Nation's Chief Executive signed it into law on the same day. The 27-page Citizenship Code sets up four different categories of citizenship (all have the same rights and privileges); defines what is required in each application; sets forth the application process; sets up and governs the conduct of the Citizenship Committee that will receive, evaluate and determine applications; and sets forth the appeals rights and procedure to be followed by a person whose application has been denied. It also provides a method for petitioning for the involuntary revocation of a person’s citizenship, and hearings and appeals both to the Legislative Council and the Nation’s court system. The Citizenship Code was written with the view of protecting both the Modoc Nation and the due process rights of persons denied enrollment or whose enrollment is involuntarily revoked.
Tribal Roll Now Open For Enrollment: Download Your Application Packet
We have opened the Nation’s Tribal Roll to all persons of Modoc descent so that you can apply for enrollment and become an official citizen of the Modoc Nation. The official “Modoc Nation Citizen Enrollment Packet” contains an application form, family tree chart, and an instruction and information sheet. We have worked hard to make the process and paperwork as simple and easy as possible. Just print out the document and follow the instructions. The most important thing you can do to help your Nation, yourself and your children and grandchildren is to fill out and return your application and supporting documents so that you are granted citizenship in the Modoc Nation as soon as possible. It is very important that we enroll as many citizens as quickly as possible because the Klamath Tribal government is doing everything it can to stop us. The more citizens we have, the stronger we are as a Nation, and the easier it will be to get the BIA to agree to deal with us separately from the Klamath Tribes.
Facts to Remember
- If you are a Modoc who is enrolled in the Klamath Tribes, don’t fill out an application unless you are ready to give up your enrollment in the Klamath Tribes. Neither their constitution nor ours allows for dual tribal enrollment. We will notify you when the BIA has officially accepted the Modoc Nation as a tribal government separate and distinct from the Klamath Tribes, and you can then enroll without any interruption in benefits. You can and should, however, apply on behalf of your minor children and grandchildren, if they are not enrolled in the Klamath Tribes.
- If you want to enroll an adopted son or daughter, please email or call one of us at the contact information shown below.
- The current “Modoc Nation Citizen Enrollment Packet” is for persons who claim descent from a person who is, or if deceased, was Modoc. There is no minimum blood quantum requirement.
- You do not have to fill out all the blanks and information on the Modoc Ancestor Lineage Form (family tree chart). Just do the best you can, remembering that our Special Master for Citizenship is a skilled researcher with specialized knowledge of the genealogy of the Modoc people.
- If you have friends or relatives who do not have email, please print out copies of this Special News Bulletin and the attached “Modoc Nation Citizen Enrollment Packet” and give it to them. Alternatively, ask for their permission for you to email us their names, addresses and telephone numbers. We will call them, and, if they wish, mail them a paper version of the Enrollment Packet. Check back with them frequently to make sure they get the application put together and sent in.
- All information you submit in and with your application is by Modoc law confidential and will never get back to the Klamath Tribal government.
Why You Should Act Now
The federal government began its genocide against the Modoc Tribe and People in 1864, when it seized approximately 5,000 square miles of our homelands, denied us a reservation, and told us we had to live with the Klamath Tribe on a reservation that was their ancestral homeland. Today this is called “ethnic cleansing,” and is illegal under international law. If it is wrong now, it was wrong then. Our great warrior chief Keint-poos fought heroically to protect our Creator given rights to have a homeland and to just be left alone to live in peace with the invading white settlers. But that was not to be. Like Chief Crazy Horse, Black Kettle and other great Indian leaders, Keint-poos was murdered by the U.S. Army. Unlike the others, he wasn’t stabbed or shot. He and three of his followers were hanged after a “show trial” in which they were falsely accused of “war crimes.” Hanging is the worst possible death for a native person because the rope prevents the soul from leaving the body with the last breath.
Since then, we Modoc of southern Oregon and northern California have lived in exile: a tiny few in the Modoc Tribe of Oklahoma, quite a few chained as virtual slaves to the Klamaths in Oregon, but perhaps just as many or more of us scattered to the winds because the Klamath Tribal government, acting in concert with the federal government, is carrying out a determined program to extinguish us as a separate tribe and people. They are denying us and our children enrollment in the Klamath Tribes. The few they choose to enroll are listed as “Klamath.” The Klamath government’s own enrollment guidelines no longer lists the Modoc or Yahooskin peoples – only Klamath.
Lawyers representing the Klamath Tribal government recently stated that the Modoc Tribe no longer exists. Gary Frost, the current Chairman of the Klamath Tribal government stated in an interview with the Herald & News on October 22, 2010: “I’d like to see the Klamath Tribes as one. We’re all one. We’re one tribe.” In one more generation the words of Gary Frost will become true – there will no longer be a Modoc Tribe or people. Is that what you want for you and your descendants – to choose between assimilation by the Klamaths, or have no recognition by anyone of your unique tribal identity and culture? That’s what this fight is all about. We can choose to do nothing – and the Klamaths are betting on that – or we can choose to fight. All you have to do right now to be a proud Modoc warrior is to apply for enrollment in the Modoc Nation. The time to act is now.
We invite you personally to listen to the voices of your Modoc ancestors who live on in your heart, and to join with the ever growing number of Modoc brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles, cousins and friends in working to make Keint-poos’ vision of political freedom and control of our ancestral homelands a reality. He died to protect his people and their descendants, that is, he died for us. Is it therefore not our responsibility to justify the deaths of those who have already given their lives for our freedom, and also to our children unto the seventh generation, to seize our future with our own two hands? We can’t wait for someone to just give it to us because the world doesn’t work that way. Those who have stolen something that is yours just don’t give it back because you ask them to. If we want our independence from the corrupt and despotic rule of the Klamath Tribe, we will have to take it from them. It’s as simple as that.
Fill out and send in your application for enrollment in the Modoc Nation now. Get your Modoc friends and neighbors to do the same.
May the blessings of the Creator be upon you, your family, the Modoc Nation and all our relations!
Two Eagles (Perry Chesnut) |
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Kokiwas Band |
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Acting Chief Executive, Modoc Nation |
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P.O. Box 2590
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Woodinville, WA 98072-2590
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425-770-7345 |
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| citizenship@modoc-nation.org |
Contact Information for General Inquiries
Perry H. Chesnut, Acting Chief Executive, Modoc Nation, P.O. Box 2590, Woodinville, WA 98072-2590
425-770-7345 pchesnut@modoc-nation.org