Named after | Lipan Apache people, State of Texas |
---|---|
Formation | 2007 [1] |
Type | Nonprofit organization [1] |
US Texas TIN 13311748407 [1] EIN 33-1174840 [2] | |
Legal status | active |
Purpose | Cultural awareness; Agriculture, fishing and forestry; History museums [2] |
Location | |
Official language | English |
Website | lipanapache |
The Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas is a cultural heritage organization of individuals who identify as descendants of Lipan Apache people, based in McAllen, Texas. [2]
The Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas is an unrecognized organization. They are neither a federally recognized tribe [3] nor a state-recognized tribe. [4]
They should not be confused with other unrecognized organizations who also identify as Lipan Apache descendants, including the Apache Council of Texas (Alice), Cuelgahen Nde Lipan Apache of Texas (Three Rivers), Lipan Apache Band of Texas (Brackettville), and Lipan Apache Nation (San Antonio).
The Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas, Inc., became a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in 2007. [5] [1] It is based in McAllen, Texas. [1]
Their subject areas are cultural awareness; agriculture, fishing, and forestry; and history museums. [2] In 2013, the organization held $10,013 in assets. [2]
Bernard F. Barcena Jr. is the registered agent. [1]
Officers of the organization include:
The Lipan Apache Tribe Cemetery Association, another 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, was registered in 2023. [6] [ better source needed ] Bernard F. Barcena of San Antonio is also the registered agent of this organization. [6]
In 2009, the Texas state senate passed Senate Resolution 438, a congratulatory resolution authored by State Senator Juan Hinojosa. [7]
On March 18, 2009, SR 438 titled "Recognizing the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas" was adopted in the Texas Senate, legislative session 81(R). Jointly, on the same day, HR 812 titled "Recognizing the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas" was adopted in the Texas House of Representatives. Although not signed by the Governor or law, these resolutions expressed the views of the Senate and the House in recognizing the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas as "the present-day incarnation of the clans, bands, and divisions historically known as the Lipan Apaches, who have lived in Texas and northern Mexico for 300 years" [8] and commending the people of this Tribe for their contributions to the state. [9]
Congratulatory resolutions such as SR No. 438 are not the same as state-recognition. [10] [lower-alpha 1] Texas has "no legal mechanism to recognize tribes." [13] This organization has neither filed a petition for federal recognition as a Native American tribe, nor sent a letter of intent to file a petition for federal recognition. [14]
State senator Hinojosa introduced Texas Senate Bill 27, introduced in January 2021, to formally recognize this group. The bill died in committee. [15]
In August 2014, after nine years of litigation by Robert Soto (Vice-chairman of the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas) and other plaintiffs against the U.S. Department of Interior (DOI), the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals found that the seizure of 50 eagle feathers during a 2006 Lipan Apache pow wow violated Robert Soto's rights as a "sincere adherent to an American Indian religion" under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) of 1993. [16] They concluded that Congress did not specifically aim to safeguard the religious rights solely of federally recognized tribe members. [17] The Court accepted that he was "without dispute an [American] Indian" and a member of the Lipan Apache Tribe acknowledged to have "long historical roots" in Texas and who had a history of "government-to-government" relationships with the Republic of Texas, State of Texas, and the United States. [17] The opinion was limited only to "Soto's RFRA claim based on his and his tribe's status". [18] They remanded to the lower district court for proceedings consistent with their opinion, and the case was cabined to "Native American co-religionists" (referring to the "religious practices of real Native Americans") [18] The DOI and the plaintiffs settled the case on June 3, 2016. Through the settlement, the DOI granted lifetime permits to over 400 Native Americans plaintiffs who were not members of federally recognized tribes to "possess, carry, use, wear, give, loan, or exchange among other Indians, without compensation, all federally protected birds, as well as their parts or feathers" for their "Indian religious use", in accordance to "the terms set forth in the DOI's February 5, 1975 'Morton Policy'". The case was officially closed on February 17, 2017. [19]
In 2021, officials in Presidio and Presidio County, Texas, donated a late 18th- and 19th-century cemetery, Cementerio del Barrio de los Lipanes, to the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas. [20] The Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas partnered with the Big Bend Conservation Alliance to protect and study the site in the Lipan Apache Cemetery project, funded in part by the Mellon Foundation. [21]
The Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas hosts an annual October powwow in Alton, Texas. [22]
A member of the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas, Gonzo Flores, served as Southern Plains Vice-President of the National Congress of American Indians in 2022. [23] He was succeeded by Reggie Wassana (Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes). [24]
The Apache are several Southern Athabaskan language–speaking peoples of the Southwest and the Southern Plains. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan homelands in the north into the Southwest between 1000 and 1500 CE.
Lipan Apache are a band of Apache, a Southern Athabaskan Indigenous people, who have lived in the Southwest and Southern Plains for centuries. At the time of European and African contact, they lived in New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Texas, and northern Mexico. Historically, they were the easternmost band of Apache.
The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, Pub. L. No. 103-141, 107 Stat. 1488, codified at 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb through 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-4, is a 1993 United States federal law that "ensures that interests in religious freedom are protected." The bill was introduced by Congressman Chuck Schumer (D–NY) on March 11, 1993. A companion bill was introduced in the Senate by Ted Kennedy (D-MA) the same day. A unanimous U.S. House and a nearly unanimous U.S. Senate—three senators voted against passage—passed the bill, and President Bill Clinton signed it into law.
Mescalero or Mescalero Apache is an Apache tribe of Southern Athabaskan–speaking Native Americans. The tribe is federally recognized as the Mescalero Apache Tribe of the Mescalero Apache Reservation, located in south-central New Mexico.
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The San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation, in southeastern Arizona, United States, was established in 1872 as a reservation for the Chiricahua Apache tribe as well as surrounding Yavapai and Apache bands removed from their original homelands under a strategy devised by General George Crook of setting the various Apache tribes against one another. Once nicknamed "Hell's Forty Acres" during the late 19th century due to poor health and environmental conditions, today's San Carlos Apaches successfully operate a Chamber of Commerce, the Apache Gold and Apache Sky Casinos, a Language Preservation program, a Culture Center, and a Tribal College.
In the United States, the eagle feather law provides many exceptions to federal wildlife laws regarding eagles and other migratory birds to enable Native Americans to continue their traditional, spiritual and cultural practices.
The American Indian Religious Freedom Act, Public Law No. 95–341, 92 Stat. 469, codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1996, is a United States federal law, enacted by joint resolution of the Congress in 1978. Prior to the act, many aspects of Native American religions and sacred ceremonies had been prohibited by law.
Thomasina Elizabeth Jordan (Red Hawk Woman) (? – 1999) was an American Indian activist who became the first American Indian to serve in the United States Electoral College in 1988.
Native American religions are the spiritual practices of the Native Americans in the United States. Ceremonial ways can vary widely and are based on the differing histories and beliefs of individual nations, tribes and bands. Early European explorers describe individual Native American tribes and even small bands as each having their own religious practices. Theology may be monotheistic, polytheistic, henotheistic, animistic, shamanistic, pantheistic or any combination thereof, among others. Traditional beliefs are usually passed down in the forms of oral histories, stories, allegories, and principles.
The Choctaw-Apache Community of Ebarb, also known as the Choctaw-Apache Tribe of Ebarb, is a state-recognized tribe and nonprofit organization in Louisiana. The community describes themselves as the descendants of Choctaw and Lipan Apache people and is primarily based in the town of Zwolle, Louisiana, with powwow grounds in Ebarb, Louisiana, both of which are in Sabine Parish, Louisiana, where the group say they have lived since the early 18th century.
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Robert Soto is a pastor, religious leader, Tribal Council vice chairman, feather dancer, and activist who is a member of the Lipan Apache Tribe of Texas and serves as their council's vice chairman. He is best known for a series of successful legal challenges to oppose laws that have both restricted and criminalized eagle feather possession by Native Americans. The basis for his position is that possession of eagle feathers is an expression of Native American religious freedom.
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The Lipan Apache Band of Texas is a cultural heritage organization of individuals who identify as descendants of Lipan Apache people The organization LABT is based in Edinburg, Texas; however, members live in Texas, Louisiana, California, and Mexico.
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