Imperfect Victories: The Legal Tenacity of the Omaha Tribe, 1945-1995 (Law in the American West) - Hardcover

Scherer, Mark R.

9780803242517: Imperfect Victories: The Legal Tenacity of the Omaha Tribe, 1945-1995 (Law in the American West)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0803242514 ISBN 13: 9780803242517

Publisher: University of Nebraska Press, 1999

The Omaha Tribe of Nebraska has borne more than its fair share of the burden created by the federal government’s wildly vacillating Indian policy. Mark R. Scherer’s Imperfect Victories provides a detailed examination of the Omahas’ tenacious efforts to overcome the damaging effects of shifting directions in federal policy during the last fifty years. The Omahas’ struggles are particularly significant because the tribe often bore the initial impact of experimental legislation that would later be implemented nationally. Scherer details the disastrous consequences of postwar federal legislation that transferred control over Indian affairs to state authorities as a precursor to the wholesale termination of Indian tribalism. The legislation brought jurisdictional turmoil to the Omaha reservation and placed the Omahas in chronic conflict with local law enforcement agencies. As the tribe fought to become the first Indian group in the nation to escape the effects of that law through retrocession, they waged equally notable struggles for the redress of past wrongs with the Indian Claims Commission and in the federal courts. Scherer demonstrates that the Omahas’ successes in those campaigns have been at best imperfect victories, coming only after years of hardship and failing to eliminate many underlying tensions and problems.

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About the Author:

Mark R. Scherer is an adjunct instructor of history at the University of Nebraska, an instructor of law at the College of Saint Mary, and a practicing attorney.

Review:

“An important book. . . . Imperfect Victories is a welcome contribution to Native American history. Scherer has written a compelling account of how the Omahas escaped Public law 280, redressed historical wrongs through the Indian Claims Commission, and participated in the Red Power movement to regain control over valuable tribal property. This book will be of special interest to scholars, policymakers, attorneys, and Indians interested in the origins of the self-determination movement.”—Kenneth R. Philp, Law and History Review (Law and History Review Law and History Review 2009-06-05)

“The book is a revelation of the cultural and legal complexities of modern tribal existence. . . . This book offers both an outsider’s view and an insider’s view of the factionalism and turmoil within the Omaha tribe. The author has presented a complex story in an understandable manner. For those keeping abreast of modern federal-Indian relations, his book is an important contribution.”—Donald L. Fixico, American Historical Review
(American Historical Review American Historical Review 2009-06-05)

“[Imperfect Victories] masterfully demonstrates how the experiences of Nebraska’s Omahas are indicative of national patterns. . . . . In a concise volume, Mark R. Scherer offers a well-crafted piece of legal history. He intricately weaves personal interviews with Omaha participants throughout his consideration of United States Indian policy as offered in the works of leading scholars from Vine Deloria, Jr., to Donald Fixico.”—W. Ben Secunda, Chronicles of Oklahoma
(Chronicles of Oklahoma Chronicles of Oklahoma 2009-06-05)

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