Mashpee Wampanoag's historic ties chided by some
January 31, 2013
By GEORGE BRENNAN
Reaction to the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe's claims of significant historic ties to Taunton was swift and in some cases predictable.
"Put your full waders on. It's starting to get deep," Middleboro Selectman Allin Frawley, a casino opponent, posted on his Facebook wall linking to a Sunday Cape Cod Times story reporting the claims.
The Times obtained copies of two widely anticipated reports contained within the tribe's application to have 146 acres in Taunton and 170 acres in Mashpee taken into trust by the Department of the Interior.
One report claims historic and modern ties to Cohannut, which encompasses modern-day Taunton, as part of the larger Pokanoket tribe. The other, prepared by tribe lawyers, attempts to demonstrate the Mashpee tribe was always under federal jurisdiction so a 2009 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, known as the Carcieri decision, would not prevent the tribe from getting land.
Documentation included in the reports has never been used previously either in the tribe's pursuit of federal recognition or in its aborted attempt to get land into trust for the casino it proposed for Middleboro, she said.
"I don't know anyone in the United States named King George," she said, a reference to the tribe's report that it had an agreement — equivalent to a treaty — with the British crown in 1763 protecting Mashpee land from English settlers. The report argues the deal should have been enforced by the United States, which is responsible for any treaties for sovereign land it takes over.
James Lynch, a Connecticut-based historian working on behalf of a state-recognized tribe known as the Pocasset, said the Mashpee tribe isn't connected to the Pokanoket, as it asserts. He says the Mashpee tribe was isolated to Cape Cod. He said there was no treaty and that the tribe's documented history shows that it was under state, not federal, control.
Lynch said he's not being paid by the Pocasset tribe, but does work on their behalf pro bono because he feels they are "getting screwed" by the Mashpee tribe and Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah) invading their turf.
It's the Pocasset, not the Mashpee or Aquinnah tribes, which is tied to the land in Southeastern Massachusetts from Cape Cod to Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island, he said.
The Pocasset tribe filed a petition to become federally recognized two years ago, Lynch said.
The process took the Mashpee tribe 30 years to complete.
Last week, Lynch filed official opposition to the Mashpee application with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, even though he's yet to see the actual report.
In the report he concludes Mashpee and the Aquinnah were compelled "to invent and embellish a past" to achieve "an economic agenda."
In its report claiming ties to Taunton, the Mashpee tribe attempts to deflect expected criticism by pointing out that the Pocasset have come alive only after the 1988 Indian Gaming Regulatory Act gave tribes the right to build casinos on tribal land. Mashpee's application to be recognized predated the casino law by 11 years.
"A newly-formed tribe (that is post-IGRA), calling themselves Pocasset, also claimed ownership of the Watuppa Wampanoag Indian Reservation," the tribe report states. "However, this group was and is not recognized by any existing historic Wampanoag tribes nor have they demonstrated any sustained control over the Watuppa Reserve."
It was Mashpee Wampanoag member Amelia Bingham and other "traditionally-minded Wampanoag" who opened the 277 acres known as the Watuppa Wampanoag Reservation within the Freetown-Fall River State Forest for ceremonial uses, the report asserts.
In an interview Tuesday, Lynch disagreed, saying a reservation was created in the early 1700s for the Pocasset.
"There was never a cessation of the reservation use," he said.
The state Department of Conservation and Recreation website makes no mention of a specific Wampanoag tribe. In 1976, Gov. Michael Dukakis signed an executive order strengthening control over the land by tribe members.
Lynch has written letters to the editor to the Times and other newspapers in Southeastern Massachusetts opposing the tribe. In 2009, he was hired for $5,000 by Halifax selectmen to disprove the Mashpee tribe's ties to Middleboro, where it planned to build a $1 billion casino.
Lynch has been described by tribes as a "hired gun," employed to poke holes in research done by tribes seeking federal recognition. In a lawsuit brought by New York against the Shinnecock tribe, his credentials were called into question because he lists himself as a "Ph.D (abd)" on his curriculum vitae, which means "all but dissertation." His work was called "slipshod" and "replete with errors," according to court documents filed in that Shinnecock case.
Lynch said it's "par for the course" for defense attorneys to pick apart expert witnesses. He said he did not complete his doctorate because of family issues, but doesn't think it's misleading to include the reference on his resume.
In a 2009 case involving the Unkechaug Nation in New York, a federal judge questioned Lynch's motivation.
"Mr. Lynch found adversely to the tribe's federal recognition in nine matters in which he was retained by clients opposing tribal recognition," the court document states. "In the one matter in which Mr. Lynch found in favor of federal tribal recognition, he was retained by a client that supported tribal recognition."
Lynch defended his work. "I don't invent the facts. The facts are there. My job is to find them and present them," he said.
It's unclear how much weight the Bureau of Indian Affairs will give to Lynch or any other comments opposed to the Mashpee tribe's claims. Nedra Darling, a spokeswoman for the bureau, had no immediate comment.
The Mashpee Wampanoag produced a letter earlier this month from the bureau that indicates a decision on whether to consider the tribe's application under the "initial reservation" designation is imminent. The bureau has also stated that it will act early this year on whether Carcieri affects the application, according to the letter.
In March, the state gaming commission will re-evaluate the tribe's progress clearing its federal hurdles. At that point, the commission could open up the Southeastern Massachusetts region — for which the Mashpee Wampanoag were given a first chance to build a casino — to commercial bidders.
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