The Onondaga Nation has protested for centuries that illegal land grabs shrank its territory from what was once thousands of square miles in upstate New York to a relatively paltry patch of land south of Syracuse.All failed.So now the nation is presenting its case to an international panel.
“We had to adapt to the coming of our white brother to our lands,” said Sid Hill, the Tadodaho, or chief, of the Onondaga Nation. “And we just feel that with the talk about justice and equality and all these issues, then why isn’t it there for us?”Today, the federally recognized territory consists of 7,500 gently rolling acres south of Syracuse. About 2,000 people live there, many in single-family homes on wooded lots. A tax-free smoke shop sits just off the interstate.
The Onondaga’s case centers on a roughly 40-mile-wide strip of land running down the center of upstate New York from Canada to Pennsylvania. They claim ancestral land was appropriated over decades by New York, starting in 1788, through deceitful maneuvers that violated treaties and federal law. The Onondagas have effectively spent more than 200 years seeking recognition their land was unlawfully taken. They’re not seeking money as reparations, but land. Though Syracuse and crowded suburbs sit on much of the ancestral territory, nation attorney Joe Heath said there’s land that could be made available, such as state parcels.The nation filed a federal lawsuit in 2005 claiming the illegally acquired land was still theirs.
Notably, the U.S. took no action after the commission in 2002 found it failed to ensure the rights of two Western Shoshone Nation sisters in Nevada who argued they were denied use of their ancestral lands, according to attorneys. In the end, the nation’s biggest gain in pursuing the case is likely to be attracting more attention to Onondaga’s 240-year-old argument. Carozza said a ruling in favor of the nation also would add “moral weight” to their cause.
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