Suit seeks to force US govt to account for all royalties due individual Native Americans since 1887 on seized lands; they've been forced to accept far less than market value of drilling rights on their lands for 120 years. Government protecting business interests by paying low royalties, robbing poor people. I hope they appeal - this isn't near enough.

See Time to Pay Up

I'm waiting for someone to say "We owe them nothing! We conquered the land fair and square!"

Good for them....

And my point is proven.

The Indians signed a deal with the federal government, if they don't make them live up to it, then its on the Indians. That is what I consider fair.

How in the world is it "on the Indians"? Are you somehow implying that Native Americans had some sort of leverage with the federal government? Get real!

Did they not have a written contract? Did they not have access to the courts?

Did they speak the language that the contract was written in? No.

Were they considered US citizens who had equal protection under the law? No.

How did US soldiers and the Indians speak on a daily basis? Translators.

You still have not addressed the fact that Native Americans had ZERO political or military power in the face of the US federal government.

They did have power in the face of the federal government. Its called the court room. The federal court is the great equalizer between plaintive and defendant.

Are you serious? Are you joking? Indians were not granted US citizenship until 1924. They DID NOT have equal protection under the law.

And if you don't know that the US courts have been historically heavily biased against non-whites you're reading all the wrong history books.

It's called fighting the system until you get your way. Women did it; Blacks did it; why couldn't Indians do it?

Gee, I don't know. Could be that by the time they were granted citizenship, they had been slaughtered and terrorized for over 300 years and stuck on reservations in poverty, disease, and despair.

And after the Civil Rights movement, and after the women's rights movement, there was indeed an American Indian movement. And they were imprisoned and terrorized.

But, according to the Supreme Court, whether you are a citizen or not, by being on U.S. land, and human, you are entitled to certain rights.

James, are you actually trying to say that Native Americans are to blame themselves for centuries of murder, dislocation, broken treaties, and lies? They just didn't "try hard enough" to defend their rights and lives? Why do you so casually dismiss the effects of centuries of oppression on a people?

James - I think they're doing exactly what you suggest they do.

Did they not have a written contract? Did they not have access to the courts?

No, and no.

Likely their ancestors were forced to sign a contract that they were never given. The understanding would have been that Uncle Sam would give them whatever he thought best, and that theoretically it would be based on land leases. But as I understand it, they've never been allowed to see how it was computed.
This may be the very first moment in history that such a suit had any breath of a chance of success.

Why didn't they insist on looking at the contract? You don't sign anything without looking at it. You don't trust anyone you don't know.

Because, friend, they had no choice. They were conquered nations, this is what the US government set up, and whether or not they agreed to it was utterly immaterial. They were like Japan after the atomic bombs. They had been millions, they were reduced to sickly thousands, in utter poverty.