Sovereignty and Nation-States
By Chief Jimmie W. Kersh. Chief Kersh holds an honorary Doctorate in Divinity (2022), MA in Teaching (2011) and an MA in Religious Education (1993). Jimmie is a retired Southern Baptist Minister (Licensed and Ordained) who graduated from the largest seminary in the world, Southwestern Theological Seminary, in 1993. He worked in churches in Arkansas, Florida, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Texas as an Education and Student Minister as well as a supply pastor. He held a teaching license in Secondary Social Studies for 10 years before retiring from the teaching profession. He became Chief of the West Region of The Chickamauga Nation in the spring of 2019 where he continues to serve.
Introduction
The Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation are direct blood line descendants of the Mississippian Mound Builders and the Southeast Ceremonial Complex Religious Cult who original descended from the Archaic and Woodland period on this continent between 2000 BCE and 1500 BCE. The Chickamauga are descendants of a vast and mighty, Meso-American Sovereign Nation-State Empire who retains the traditional religion and culture of their ancestors. As Southeast Woodlands Natives, we are blood cousins with the Creek, Choctaw, Natchez, Chickasaw, and many other lesser-known tribes and bands.
Our blood commingles with the sovereign Nation-States of the Choctaw, Creek, Natchez, Chickasaw, Shawnee, Powhatan, Catawba, Spain, England, France, and Mexico. As our Chief Bloody-Fellow proclaimed, “even should the habits and customs of the Chickamauga give place to the habits and customs of the whites, or even should they themselves become whites by intermarriage not a drop of Indian blood would be lost it would be spread more widely, but not lost.” Therefore, all citizens of The Chickamauga Nation are Full-Blood Chickamauga without exception.
Our Southeast Woodland sovereign Nation-States shared hunting, fishing, and gathering grounds which extended north of the Ohio River into central Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. Our eastern boundaries extended along the Appalachian Mountains, as far north as current West Virginia and as far south as Central Georgia. Our southern boundaries extended to the Gulf of Mexico inclusive of the Florida panhandle, Alabama, and Mississippi. Our western borders were the Arkansas River valley and its tributaries.
The Chickamauga Nation along with our Mississippian, Muscogean, and Mobilian era cousins spoke derivatives of a pigeon language called the Mobilian Trade Language until sometime in the late 1600s when the Chickamauga began using the southern dialect of an Iroquoian trade language of Cherokee. The Chickamauga began speaking the Cherokee trade language because the Cherokee invaded the Southeast Woodlands from their homelands in Canada between Lake Huron and Lake Erie. The Cherokee linguistic influence led England, France, and Spain to refer to the Chickamauga as Cherokee and often the Cherokee Nation in treaties by Spain, England, and United States. No matter the linguistic influence, the Chickamauga were Mound Builders as were their blood cousins while at the same time the Cherokee were not. Since the Chickamauga no longer have need of the Iroquoian based Cherokee trade language, we have begun the process of reverting back to the earlier Mobillian Trade Language in honor of our ancestors.
While many of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation still practice the traditional religion, many others practice other religions as well. As a modern Nation, we allow for diversity of religion, while at the same time respect each other’s beliefs. This does not take away from our being able to go to sacred sites to worship, pray, or participate in ceremonies together as one Nation.
Sovereign Nation-State
“Indian Nations had always been considered as distinct, independent political communities, retaining their original natural rights, as the undisputed possessors of the soil… The very term “nation” so generally applied to them means ‘a people distinct from others.’”
- Chief Justice Marshall, United States Supreme Court
The western philosophical Nation-State concept became fully developed in ancient Greece, almost 2500 years ago, therefore it would be preposterous to think that the philosopher kings who created the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution of the United States had no understanding of the sovereign Nation-State status all nations possess inclusive of Indian Nation-States. It would be a complete display of legal malfeasance to assert that these “founders and framers” had no concept of sovereign nation status and the power and authority ascribed to other Nation-States considering their philosophical and political literacy from Socrates to Moses, to Locke.
Does the colonizalzation of the possessions of one sovereign Nation-State by another Nation-State promote legitimate status to the colonizer? Can the colonizer claim legitimate status on the world stage as a sovereign Nation-State through the genocidal practices of conquest? No legitimate government uses the genocidal practice of conquest to annihilate the original possessors of a said territorial possession. Does the illegitimate ever become legitimate in the eyes of the God of Nature? Can the dispossession of the rightful possessors ever be legitimized by the legitimate Nation-States of the world? It is not within the acceptable behavior of any Nation-State to usurp the sovereign Nation-State status of another sovereign Nation-State thus creating illegitimacy for the later and legitimizes the former.
The Sovereign Nation Status of all indigenous peoples on the North American continent predate any and all illegitimate European invaders by a minimum of three millennia with all of the rights and privileges granted under their status as sovereign Nation-States irregardless of the dogma of the Doctrine of Discovery, as promulgated by the Catholic Church, white supremists, and the United States Supreme Court, or any other philosophical or political construct against the rights of all men to possess within their government the rights of sovereign status devoid of the machinations of the empirical conquest designs one Nation-State may have or make toward another.
At no time has The Chickamauga Nation ever surrendered its Sovereign Tribal or Nation-State rights to its hunting, fishing, and gathering rights in its traditional homelands it shared with the Creek, Choctaw, Natchez, and Chickasaw. At no time had The Chickamauga Nation ever surrendered its sovereign Indigenous rights on any of its trust lands. The Chickamauga Nation proved its sovereign nation status in declaring war against the United States in 1792 completely altering George Washington’s fourth annual address to Congress. The Chickamauga Nation has never been terminated by the Congress of the United States. Only a sovereign nation retains the rights and privileges to declare war on another sovereign nation. Proving the sovereign nation status of The Chickamauga Nation, the Congress of the United States debated war and peace during the 1792 – 1793 session.
In 1776, the United States began a campaign of Genocide against The Chickamauga Nation beginning just days prior to the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The Hopewell Treaty of 1785 does not stipulate that the Chickamauga signed over its sovereignty, only that the Chickamauga allow the United States to protect the sovereign Nation-State from all other sovereigns. The Treaty does not surrender lands to the United States, only that the Chickamauga would hunt in lands stipulated within the treaty. At no time prior to 1785, or since, has The Chickamauga Nation surrendered its Tribal Sovereignty to any other sovereign or become its dependent under tutelage. The Chickamauga Nation fiercely defended its sovereignty against all other tribes and sovereigns. In 1785, the Chickamauga co-signed a treaty of stipulations all resting upon the phrase, “on the following conditions:”. The Chickamauga Nation did not trust the United States nor did it intend to honor a treaty where the United States immediately broke that treaty by allying with the Cherokee and Chickasaw to attack the Chickamauga over and over. These conditions were all built upon one another and if one condition was broken, then the Chickamauga concluded all were broken.
A question again becomes quite obvious to the casual non-European observer, “Under what authority did the United States have to declare, “The Congress shall have the power to…regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.” As for The Chickamauga Nation, it has never surrendered their sovereign state status to the United States nor anyone else. Again, under what sovereign state authority did the Nation-State of the United States of America have to state in Article 1, Section 8 of their brand-new constitution that, “The Congress shall have the power to…regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.” Until that time, all sovereign Nation-State tribes that signed treaties with the United States signed treaties under the Articles of Confederation which did not allow for a strong federal government and allowed the individual states to run rough-shod over the sovereign Nation-State Indian Tribes. This new constitution began a brand new government, not the same government which signed treaties with the sovereign Nation-State Indian tribes before 1788.
While at no time has The Chickamauga Nation ever surrendered its Sovereignty Nation-State tribal status to the United States, the United States has violated The Chickamauga Nations’ sovereign Nation-State status by violating and failing to honor treaties i.e. land rights, stolen lands through land fraud, murder, rape, pillage, and committed genocide specifically against the Chickamauga because they honored their 1730 treaty with Great British and refused to surrender their sovereign Nation-State status. For the United States it was incumbent upon them to put these savage, godless, lesser than humans under conservatorship of tutelage since the Indians obviously were not intellectually capable of caring for themselves in a civilized manner.
In honoring its obligations under transnational law, The Chickamauga Nation further demonstrates it sovereign Nation-State status overcoming the illegitimate actions of genocide and conquest originating and continuing by the actions and behavior of the United States. The Chickamauga Nation calls upon the sovereign Nation-States of England, Spain, France, and Mexico to honor their obligations under transnational law to protect The Chickamauga Nation both physically and fiscally. The sovereign Nation-State of The Chickamauga Nation calls upon the United States to honor its treaties obligations to England and France to protect the Indians, honor the treaties made with the Indians and return their lands to them, Treaty of Land Cession 1803 and Treaty of Ghent 1814. The French and the English knew the genocidal and illegitimate behavior of the United States toward the Indians and tried to correct the behavior through treaties.
As a sovereign Nation-State, The Chickamauga Nation is obligated under transnational law to honor and uphold its 18 Treaties with the United States and its 13 International Treaties with other sovereign Nation-States which have never been abrogated and are thus still in force.
• England – Whitehall Treaty, 1730
• United States - Treaty at Hopewell, November 28, 1785 - 7 Statute 18
• United States – Treaty of Holston, July 2, 1791 Treaty, 7 Statute 39
• Spain – Treaty of Nogales (Walnut Hills), April 10, 1792
• Spain – Treaty of Pensacola, 1792
• Spain – Treaty of Nogales, October 28, 1793
• United States – Treaty of Philadelphia, June 26, 1794 - 7 Statute 43
• United States - Treaty of Tellico Blockhouse, Nov. 8, 1794
• United States - Treaty of Tellico, October 2, 1798 – 7 Statute 62
• France – Land Cession Treaty, April 30, 1803
• United States - Treaty of Tellico, October 24, 1804 - 7 Statute 288
• United States - Treaty at Tellico, October 25, 1805 - 7 Statute 93
• United States - Treaty at Tellico, October 27, 1805 - 7 Statute 95
• United States - Treaty in Washington, January 7, 1806 - 7 Statute 101
• Great Britain and United States – Treaty of Ghent, December 24, 1814
• United States - Treaty in Washington, March 22, 1816 - 7 Statute 138
• United States - Treaty with the Cherokee, March 22, 1816 - 7 Statute 139
• United States - Treaty at Turkey Town, September 14, 1816 - 1 Statute 148
• United States - Treaty of the Cherokee Agency, July 8, 1817 - 7 Statute 156
• United States - Treaty in Washington, February 27, 1819 - 7 Statute 195
• Mexico – Articles of Agreement, November 8, 1822
• Mexico – Treaty of San Antonio de Bexar, with the Spanish Empire 1822
• United States - Treaty in Washington, May 6, 1828 - 7 Stat. 311
• United States - Treaty at Fort Gibson, February 14, 1833 - 7 Statute 413
• United States - Treaty of Camp Holmes, August 24, 1835 - 7 Stat. 474
• Last General Consultation - Treaty Between Texas Commissioners and the Cherokee Indians, November 13, 1835
• United States - Treaty at New Echota, December 29, 1835 - 7 Statute 478
• Republic of Texas – Treaty of Bowles Village with the Republic of Texas 1836
• Republic of Texas – Treaty of Birds Fort, September 29, 1843
• Republic of Texas – Treaty of Tehuacana Creek, October 9, 1844
• Mexico - Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, February 2, 1848
White Privilege, The Constitution, Land Theft, Duplicity, Murder, and Genocide
While the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are two of the greatest documents ever created by mankind, they are flawed documents in that they allowed for the subjugation of Natives and Negros. As the focus is on sovereign Nation-State status, individual rights for the non-Lily-white has been horrifying at best which is a direct result of white, European, Christian superiority manifesting itself in the Doctrine of Discovery which was the forerunner to American Indian Policy and ultimately to Adolf Hitler’s “Final Solution.” This is demonstrated in the paranoia of anti-intellectualism when coupled with the inability for abstract thought which is symptomatic of the rampant ignorance induced by public education, it is of little doubt the shallowness induced by concrete thinking forbids comprehension of menial human thought and rationale. Make no mistake, racism is racism is racism, no matter how it is sugar coated. Subjugation and genocide in the name of the European, Lily-White, Christian god whether in the sale and trade of non-Lily-white human beings or stealing and murdering non-Lily-white human beings for their lands and possessions is an abomination to the God who Created all things in color.
The European, Lily-White, Christian god is not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The God of Moses said the moving of ancient boundary markers was an abomination. The European, Lily-White, Christian god is not the God of who gave the Ten Commandments; inclusive of honoring your father and mother, not lying, not murdering, not stealing, not committing adultery, and not coveting your neighbor’s wife, lands or property. The European, Lily-White, Christian god approves of dishonoring your ancestors, lying, murdering, stealing, committing adultery, and coveting your neighbor’s wife, lands, and property because that is the god of the United States.
The European, Lily-White, Christian god of the United States applauds and praises the story of David raping Bathsheba, killing her husband, and taking all of their property. The European, Lily-White, Christian god of the United States applauds committing genocide and ethnic cleansing against an innocent people for the purpose of lining their own pockets with the “spoils of war.” The European, Lily-White, Christian god of the United States continues to enslave Indians on reservations and damning them when they try to better themselves. The European, Lily-White, Christian god of the United States refuses to honor its treaties with other sovereign Nation-State tribes because these tribes under tutelage “do not know their place” and may become “uppity.”
No wonder the religion of the European, Lily-White, Christian god is collapsing in the United States. That god is a god of slavery, rebellion, murder, lying, stealing, adulty, covetous, moving boundary markers, hatred, and racism. The European, Lily-White, Christian god is not the god who created the universe in color, that god is a monochrome failure. That god came to the Americas as white men in black robes with their god on a cross hung around their necks. That god came promoting stealing, killings, and enslavement for all of those who were not white. That god came to conquer and commit genocide against the non-Lily-White. That god was not colorblind, that god was nothing more than a racist, authoritarian, dictator destroying everything that was good or in its path.
Illegal and Illegitimate
The Civil Rights Violations of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation by the Executive and Legislative Branches Congress has not gone unnoticed. The denial of religious rights of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation to practice their religion and do ceremonies at their sacred sites while allowing other tribes access to our sacred sites has not gone unnoticed. The Executive Branch Departments and Agencies denial of access to grants and loans eligible to “Federally Recognized Indians List” in violation of the Civil Rights of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation has not gone unnoticed. The Legislative Branch passes laws violating the religious and civil rights of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation and refuses to honor treaties with the government of The Chickamauga Nation denying the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation of their Civil Rights.
The various Executive Branch Departments and Agency employees, from Secretaries of the department to the secretaries who write the memos, know that the laws they are required to use in denying rights and privileges are in violation of the Civil and Religious Rights of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation and other Indigenous Treaty Tribes. The various Legislative Branch employees from the elected officials to the secretaries who write the memos know that their actions are in violation of the Civil and Religious Rights of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation and other Indigenous Treaty Tribes.
It is therefore the right of the sovereign Nation-State of The Chickamauga Nation to do everything within its power to bring these violations into the light for the protection of its Citizens. It is the responsibility of the sovereign Nation-State of The Chickamauga Nation to seek out allies to help defend itself against such injustices. While calling upon the God of Nature, the Chickamauga calls upon the Nation-States of the world to come to our defense, to assist us in our struggle to secure physical and fiscal protection from the government of the United States.
While we first call upon our transnational treaty partners of England, Spain, France, and Mexico for protection, we call upon all nations of the world to come to our side and help the legitimate government of the Citizens of The Chickamauga Nation secure the rights and privileges entitled to our Nation.