Descendant of slaveowners expel descendant of slaves from ethnic group:

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

http://news.yahoo.com/second-largest-u-indian-tribe-expels-slave-descendants-011650136.html

This is one in a series of controversies between Indian tribes which adopted slavery as part of becoming the Five Civilized Tribes and the descendants of those slaves.


The excerpt here:



The controversy stems from a footnote in the brutal history of U.S.
treatment of Native Americans. When many Indians were forced to move to
what later became Oklahoma from the eastern U.S. in 1838, some who had
owned plantations in the South brought along their slaves.


Some 4,000 Indians died during the forced march, which became known as the "Trail of Tears."


"And our ancestors carried the baggage," said Marilyn Vann, the Freedman leader who is a plaintiff in the legal battle.


Officially, there are about 2,800 Freedmen, but another 3,500 have
tribal membership applications pending, and there could be as many as
25,000 eligible to enter the tribe, according to Vann.


The tribal court decision was announced one day before absentee
ballots were to be mailed in the election of the Cherokee Principal
Chief.


"This is racism and apartheid in the 21st Century," said Vann, an engineer who lives in Oklahoma City.


Overlooks that in these Indian tribes the slaveowners themselves were part-white in descent and considered themselves more white than Cherokee, at least at the time. This is why some Indians fought for the Confederacy and one became a Brigadier General. Unfortunately humanity as a whole has a tendency to be bigoted, and thus this kind of thing happens. This in my view is a reprehenesible and disgusting thing to do. What do you guys think?