LOCAL
Joe Tomlinson, The Oklahoma Eagle
From left to right: Sen. Regina Goodwin (D-Tulsa), attorney Jana Knott, plaintiff Jeffery Kennedy, lead counsel and freedmen Damario Solomon-Simmons, freedmen Ron Graham and Rep. Ronald Stewart (D-Tulsa). Photo: Joe Tomlinson/The Oklahoma Eagle
Muscogee (Creek) Nation freedmen leaders want to meet with the tribe’s leadership next week following Wednesday’s landmark ruling that freedmen are MCN citizens.
“We believe it is time to stop all the fighting, the litigating, and it is time to be one Creek Nation,” lead counsel and freedmen Damario Solomon-Simmons told the media Thursday. “We’ve already sent communications to the Creek Nation, and specifically Chief [David] Hill, asking that we can sit down with him and his leadership… and we can start the healing process.”
Asked if he anticipates the Muscogee Nation to contest the ruling, Solomon-Simmons said “we’re laying down our weapons, we’re going to the table and saying it’s over.”
Plaintiff Jeffery Kennedy teared up as he read aloud a letter he wrote to the MCN years ago in which he listed his ancestors within the tribe.
“When I heard the ruling, I felt generations of my family’s exile at once. They just exhaled,” Kennedy said. “My knees buckled. I just dropped and gave all glory to God.”
Asked why she fought so hard to reenter a nation that forced her out, plaintiff Rhonda Grayson likened her experience to the descendants of American slaves.
“It’s no different for us who were enslaved by the tribes,” Grayson said. “These people intermarried together, fought together. They prayed together, they laughed together. We are Muscogee people. It is our birthright.”
Solomon-Simmons said freedmen leaders “would love” for Hill to come with them to collect their citizenship cards.
“We think it’s best if we could show a united front,” he said.
What citizenship grants
With a Sept. 9 voter registration deadline and the Muscogee Nation’s general election on Sept. 20, freedmen have a short window to submit their citizenship applications if they wish to be eligible to participate in their first election in 46 years.
Tribal citizenship also allows MCN citizens to run for office and benefit from numerous services, including health care, education and housing.
Solomon-Simmons said they estimate there are roughly 100,000 Muscogee freedmen descendants.
The Justice For Black Creeks Coalition is hosting a seminar on Aug. 16 to help people gather documentation and apply for citizenship.
A win for all
Ron Graham, a freedmen who has sought since 1983 to have his citizenship recognized, said the ruling is a win for the entire tribe.
“I’ve been getting a lot of calls. They say the freedmen won,” Graham said. “I want to assure you something: The Creek Nation won, because the Creek Nation represents the Treaty of 1866. Without that, we have no foundation, none whatsoever.”
State Rep. Ronald Stewart (D-Tulsa), a Choctaw citizen and Creek freedmen descendant, echoed Graham’s words.
“This was a victory for the nation,” Stewart said. He said he hopes “the Chief invites our group to the table, (…) so that we can move forward as a unified nation and forge a new path — one of reconciliation and one of unity.”
