The Cayuga Nation of New York is a federally recognized tribe of
Cayuga people
The Cayuga (Cayuga: Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫʼ, "People of the Great Swamp") are one of the five original constituents of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), a confederacy of Native Americans in New York. The Cayuga homeland lies in the Finger Lakes regio ...
, based in
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* ...
, United States. Other organized tribes with Cayuga members are the federally recognized
Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma and the Canadian-recognized
Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation
Six Nations (or Six Nations of the Grand River, french: Réserve des Six Nations, see, Ye:i’ Níónöëdzage:h) is demographically the largest First Nations reserve in Canada. As of the end of 2017, it has a total of 27,276 members, 12,848 of w ...
in
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
, Canada.
History
The name
Cayuga (Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫʼ ') means "People of the wet lands."
They belong to the
Iroquoian
The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.
As of 2020, all surviving Iroquoian ...
language family, and were one of the original Five Nations of the
League of the Iroquois, who traditionally lived in New York.
[Pritzker 412] The Five Nations were the
Mohawk,
Oneida,
Onondaga,
Seneca and Cayuga. When the
Tuscarora joined the Iroquois Confederation in 1722, the confederacy was known as the Six Nations.
In early times, the Cayuga lived primarily between
Owasco and
Cayuga lakes, which lay between the territory of the Onondaga and Seneca.
Jesuit
, image = Ihs-logo.svg
, image_size = 175px
, caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits
, abbreviation = SJ
, nickname = Jesuits
, formation =
, founders = ...
s founded missions among the Cayuga in the mid-17th century. In 1660, there were approximately 1,500 Cayuga.
[
In the beginning of the 18th century, the Cayuga primarily lived in three villages, composed of at least 30 ]longhouse
A longhouse or long house is a type of long, proportionately narrow, single-room building for communal dwelling. It has been built in various parts of the world including Asia, Europe, and North America.
Many were built from timber and often rep ...
s. About 500 people lived in each of these villages.[ The Cayuga became trading partner with the French from Canada and were active in the beaver ]fur trade
The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals have been the mo ...
. They also traded with the Huron for birch bark goods.[
All the main Iroquois nations except the Oneida had allied with the British in the ]American Revolution
The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...
. They were defeated in the war. The British gave up both their and Indian claims to lands in treaty negotiations, and the Iroquois were forced to cede their lands to the United States. Most relocated to Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world ...
after the Treaty of Canandaigua in 1794, although some bands were allowed small reservations in New York. New York made separate purchases and leases of land from the Indians, which were not ratified by the US Congress.
Government
The Cayuga Nation is headquartered in Seneca Falls, New York
Seneca Falls is a town in Seneca County, New York, United States. The population was 8,942 at the 2020 census.
The Town of Seneca Falls contains the former village also called Seneca Falls. The town is east of Geneva, New York, in the north ...
. They are governed by a council of chiefs, chosen by clanmothers. The Cayuga Nation is part of the Haudenosaunee
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Indigenous confederations in North America, confederacy of First Nations in Canada, First Natio ...
confederacy.
Location
Under the 1794 Treaty of Canandaigua, 64,000 acres at the north end of Cayuga Lake
Cayuga Lake (,,) is the longest of central New York's glacial Finger Lakes, and is the second largest in surface area (marginally smaller than Seneca Lake) and second largest in volume. It is just under long. Its average width is , and it is a ...
were reserved. In 2005 the Cayuga Nation began to purchase land within its claimed territory at the north end of Cayuga Lake.
Tribal enrollment
Children of tribal members can be enrolled at birth. As the tribe has a matrilineal
Matrilineality is the tracing of kinship through the female line. It may also correlate with a social system in which each person is identified with their matriline – their mother's lineage – and which can involve the inheritance ...
kinship
In anthropology, kinship is the web of social relationships that form an important part of the lives of all humans in all societies, although its exact meanings even within this discipline are often debated. Anthropologist Robin Fox says tha ...
system, children are considered to be born into the mother's clan
A clan is a group of people united by actual or perceived kinship
and descent. Even if lineage details are unknown, clans may claim descent from founding member or apical ancestor. Clans, in indigenous societies, tend to be endogamous, meani ...
. Descent and inheritance are passed through the maternal lines. The tribe requires members to have a mother who is Cayuga.
Economic development
The nation controls several businesses, including Lakeside Trading convenience stores; Pullens Towing and Recovery service; Harford Glen Water, a pure water bottler; Gakwiyo Garden, which grows 35 types of fruits and vegetables and provides food for over one hundred member households; Cayuga Corner, which sells fresh produce and flowers; and Cayuga Sugar Shack, an ice cream stand and miniature golf
Miniature golf, also known as minigolf, mini-putt, crazy golf, or putt-putt, is an offshoot of the sport of golf focusing solely on the putting aspect of its parent game. The aim of the game is to score the lowest number of points. It is played ...
course in Seneca Falls. They own Lakeside Entertainment, which includes two Class II Gaming facilities; however, both are temporarily closed due to ongoing legal battles with the State of New York.
Lakeside Trading Post
The Cayuga Indian Nation owns two pieces of property from which it operates its Lakeside Trading Post: a convenience store and gas station operation. One store is located in the Town of Seneca Falls (Demolished on February 2020) and the other in the Village of Union Springs.
On November 25, 2008, the Seneca and Cayuga County Sheriffs' Departments seized all the cigarettes at two locations of the Lakeside Trading Post because of the Cayuga refusal to remit state excise taxes on sales. The Cayuga have said that as a sovereign nation, they do not owe taxes to the state. This was part of a long-standing issue with the counties and state. The Seneca County District Attorney said the counties were in the right because the Cayugas did not own any sovereign
''Sovereign'' is a title which can be applied to the highest leader in various categories. The word is borrowed from Old French , which is ultimately derived from the Latin , meaning 'above'.
The roles of a sovereign vary from monarch, ruler or ...
land in either county. The state contends that only by operating on sovereign land (a reservation) would the tribe be exempt from the taxes.
A 2005 US Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...
decision ruled that Indian tribes could not claim sovereignty on land they purchased; they had to apply to the Bureau of Indian Affairs
The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), also known as Indian Affairs (IA), is a United States federal agency within the Department of the Interior. It is responsible for implementing federal laws and policies related to American Indians and ...
and have the land put in trust for their use. The Cayuga Indian Nation sought to enjoin the authorities from initiating any prosecution and to compel them to return the seized cigarettes.''Cayuga Indian Nation v. Gould, Stenberg, et al.''
, Upstate Citizens, accessed 10 Apr 2009 New York Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Fisher denied the Cayugas' motion for a preliminary injunction and dismissed the action.
On February 22 2020 around 2am Cayuga Nation Police raided the Seneca Falls gas station and demolished it along with other buildings on the property including a school house for indigenous ceremonies, a daycare center, and some tiny homes that were being lived in at that time.
Land claims
The Cayuga Nation of New York began a land claim action on November 19, 1980, in the to pursue legislative and monetary restitution for land taken from it by the State of New York during the 18th and 19th centuries. New York entered into land sales and leases with the Cayuga Nation after the signing of the Treaty of Canandaigua after the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
. Its failure to get approval of the United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washi ...
meant the transactions were illegal as it did not have the constitutional authority to deal with the tribes. A series of federal laws in the 1790s known as the "Nonintercourse Acts" required all land purchases involving native tribes to be approved by the federal government.
In 1981, the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma was added as a plaintiff in the claim. A jury trial on damages was held from January 18 – February 17, 2000. The jury returned a verdict in favor of the Cayuga Indian Nation of New York and the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, finding current fair market value damages of $35 million and total fair rental value damages of $3.5 million. The jury gave the state a credit for the payments it had made to the Cayugas of about $1.6 million, leaving the total damages at approximately $36.9 million. On October 2, 2001, the court issued a decision and order which awarded a prejudgment interest award of $211 million and a total award of $247.9 million.
Both the plaintiffs and the defendants appealed this award. On June 28, 2005, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (in case citations, 2d Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. Its territory comprises the states of Connecticut, New York and Vermont. The court has appellate juri ...
rendered a decision that reversed the judgment of the trial court. It rule
in favor of the defendants
based on the doctrine of '' laches''. Essentially the court ruled that the plaintiffs had taken too long to present their case, when it might have been equitably settled earlier.
The Cayuga Indian Nation of New York sought review of this decision by the Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
, which was denied on May 15, 2006 The time in which the Cayuga Indian Nation could ask the U.S. Supreme Court to rehear the case has passed.
See also
*Green Corn Ceremony
The Green Corn Ceremony (Busk) is an annual ceremony practiced among various Native American peoples associated with the beginning of the yearly corn harvest. Busk is a term given to the ceremony by white traders, the word being a corruption of t ...
*Three Sisters (agriculture)
The Three Sisters are the three main agricultural crops of various Indigenous peoples of North America: squash, maize ("corn"), and climbing beans (typically tepary beans or common beans).
In a technique known as companion planting, the maize ...
*Wampum
Wampum is a traditional shell bead of the Eastern Woodlands tribes of Native Americans. It includes white shell beads hand-fashioned from the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell and white and purple beads made from the quahog or Western N ...
Notes
References
* Pritzker, Barry M. ''A Native American Encyclopedia: History, Culture, and Peoples,'' Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. .
External links
Cayuga Nation of New York
official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cayuga Nation of New York
Native American tribes in New York (state)
Federally recognized tribes in the United States