This included the runaway slaves that were living in rural Georgia and South Carolina who had fled the harsh living conditions of plantations to gamble on living in the wild, swampy wetlands of Florida. Floridian Seminoles were a juxtaposition of runaway indians and slaves from multiple tribes and plantations who banded together under the humid Florida sun to maintain survival, which eventually led to the beginning of a completely new tribe. Black Seminoles were a great tool in interpretation and negotiation with U.S. forces trying to rid Florida of Indian tribes. They spoke Muscogee and participated in Seminole rituals and customs such as eating fry bread and engaging in the Green Corn Ceremony (Busk).
But once they were forced into Oklahoma, the Seminoles both black and full blooded realized that there was no use for afro-seminoles' characteristics such as swamp disease immunities or translation being as they were in the less-rugged prairies of the mid-west and many of them spoke english. Only to make matters worse, the United States put the ruling of the Oklahoma Seminoles in the hands of the Creeks, who favored slavery. In doing this, the tribe actually sided with the Confederacy during the civil war. After the war, the Seminoles signed a treaty in 1866 which included the full recognition of black tribal men and woman as Seminole Indians. The ties between the black and the full blooded seminoles began to fade, up until the early 1960's. Fast forward to the 2000's and things are right back to where they used to be: segregated.
After the U.S. Government awarded the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma $42 million in the mid-1990's for forcing them out of Florida, the Oklahoma Tribe is now divided on who is entitled to the retributions. The Tribe tried to change its constitution by doubling the amount of blood required to receive retribution money. The U.S. enables every Indian tribe to govern itself, but any treaties made between a tribe and the U.S. must be strictly enforced and can not be overridden by the tribe with out the United States' consent. Because of the treaty of 1866, black Seminoles are indeed Seminoles and are equally entitled to the hand out.
However, the Seminole Tribe of Oklahoma is suing the government for this ruling.
The black Seminole descendants are now living in extreme poverty (some not being able to afford school clothes for their children and some who can not maintain repairs to the houses that they have been living in all their life) and are mostly forbidden to sit on the Tribal Council to talk politics and speak the needs of those that fall on deaf ears. The descendants of the ex-slaves-turned-Seminoles say that it's not a matter of money but a matter of racism. The full blooded Seminoles say it's not a matter of money but a preservation of bloodlines; the afro-seminoles say that if it weren't for their ancestors, there wouldn't be a Seminole tribe in either Florida or Oklahoma and that they are equally responsible for creating the tribe. The full-blooded Seminoles say that they respect the ex slaves and their descendants but feel as though they were never accepted as part of the tribe but were taken under the wing of runaway indians who felt for their plight.
Either way, it is sad that both full-blooded indians and slaves found the common ground of being outcasts in a world run by white settlers and joined up with each other for survival, only to be fighting with each other a little more than one hundred years later over who gets money, a western European concept introduced to both slaves and indians alike by invading forces.
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