PAMUNKEY Tribe of VA: SOVEREIGNTY GIVES US THE RIGHT TO BE RACIST

 

Should we ignore the racism of the Pamunkey Tribe of Virginia because of tribal sovereignty?  Should we accept it because of "tribal sovereignty"  This is a story not told and I'm sorry I'm just learning more of it.  The Richmond Free Press did the deep dive. My own tribe, Pechanga took my black cousins out of the tribal school, but I don't believe it was racism, just greed.

The exposure of the tribe’s racist past is largely the work of 30-year-old Essex County resident Jasmine N. Anderson, who has spent more than five years quietly working to gain recognition for herself and her relatives. They are members of the Dungee family that was banished from the tribe between 1865 and 1871 after a member opened a free school for newly freed slaves near the reservation.

“I have undisputed, direct ancestral ties to four Pamunkey Indian lines,” Ms. Anderson said.

That includes her six-times great-grandfather, Joseph Dungee Jr., and his brother, Jesse Dungee (also spelled Dungey and Dungy), a farmer and minister who represented King William County in the General Assembly from 1871 to 1873, and gained recognition as both a Pamunkey and as an African-American legislator.