[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George H. W. Bush (1992-1993, Book II)]
[October 21, 1992]
[Pages 1911-1912]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Memorandum of Disapproval for the Jena Band of Choctaws of Louisiana 
Restoration Act
October 21, 1992

    I am withholding my approval of S. 3095, entitled the ``Jena Band of 
Choctaws of Louisiana Restoration Act.''
    S. 3095 would establish the Jena Band of Choctaw Indians in 
Louisiana as a distinct, federally recognized Indian tribe.
    It is important that all groups seeking Federal recognition as an 
Indian tribe should go through the established Federal acknowledgment 
process. The process was established with the encouragement and support 
of the Indian tribes and the Congress to deal uniformly and consistently 
with requests for acknowledgment. The acknowledgment process is 
objective, applies fair criteria, and provides each petitioning group 
the opportunity for an unbiased, detailed evaluation of its documented 
petition.
    S. 3095 would circumvent the standard Federal acknowledgment 
process, establish a precedent that would weaken the Department of the 
Interior's acknowledgment process, and encourage other groups to seek 
statutory recognition outside this well-established process. Further, it 
would be inequitable to other groups seeking Federal acknowledgment. 
Finally, it is inconsistent with the standard practice of ``restoring'' 
Federal recognition to only those tribes that have been previously 
recognized and legislatively terminated.
    S. 3095, in using the term ``restore,'' automatically assumes the 
Band was formerly recognized as the Band claims. This claim is based on 
the fact that, for a few years in the 1930's, the United States funded a 
school for Indians at Jena, Louisiana, and, in 1938, considered 
relocating Jena families to Mississippi, but did not do so. The limited 
provision of funds for education and the consideration to relocate Jena 
families were actions based on the identification of members of the 
group as Indians, not on identification of the group as a tribe. There 
is a distinction between identifying individuals as Indians versus 
Federal recognition of a tribe, which establishes a perpetual 
government-to-government relationship.
    Enactment of S. 3095 would circumvent and weaken the Federal 
acknowledgment

[[Page 1912]]

process and be unfair to other groups similarly situated. For these 
reasons, I am withholding my approval of S. 3095.

                                                             George Bush

The White House,
October 21, 1992.