THE TELEGRAPH: The Barack Obama administration has offered to spend $3 billion (£1.8bn) to settle a long-running lawsuit with native American tribes that claim they were swindled out of billions of dollars in royalties for oil, gas, grazing and other leases dating back more than a century.
If cleared by Congress and the courts, the settlement would be the largest Indian claim ever approved against the US government – exceeding the combined total of all previous settlements of Indian claims.
President Obama said an agreement on the case, known as Cobell v. Salazar, was an important step to reconcile decades of acrimony between Indian tribes and the federal government.
"As a candidate, I heard from many in Indian Country that the Cobell suit remained a stain on the nation-to-nation relationship I value so much," the president said in a written statement. "I pledged my commitment to resolving this issue, and I am proud that my administration has taken this step today."
Under an agreement reached with tribes, the Interior Department would distribute $1.4 billion to more than 300,000 native American tribe members to compensate them for historical accounting claims, and to resolve future claims.
The government also would spend $2 billion to buy back and consolidate tribal land broken up in previous generations. The scheme would allow individual tribe members to obtain cash payments for land interests divided among numerous family members and return the land to tribal control.
The settlement would give every tribe member with an Interior Department account an immediate check for $1,000, with additional payments to be determined later under a complicated formula that takes into account a variety of factors.
Many tribe members also would receive payments for parcels of land that are held in some cases by up to 100 family members, in an effort to consolidate tribal land and make it more useful and easier to manage. >>> Alex Spillius in Washington | Tuesday, December 08, 2009
Major Indian Tribes in the United States >>>
