Chronology of American Indian History

2003

January 22

The Oneida endow a chair at Harvard Law

School.

Harvard Law school announces the creation of

the Oneida Indian Nation Professorship of Law.

The Oneida donate $3 million to fund the chair

in American Indian law. Ray Halbritter, tribe mem-

ber and Harvard Law School graduate, explains,

“We are confident that the kind of scholarship for

which the law school is known worldwide will help

create a better understanding of the complex legal

issues faced by all American Indians today and

in the future.” Harvard representatives claim the

professorship will help bring Indian law into the

mainstream of American legal scholarship.

January 28

The Mohegan announce the purchase of a

WNBA team.

The Mohegan tribe buys the Orlando Miracles, a

team in the Women’s National Basketball Associa-

tion. With the purchase, the Mohegan become the

first tribe to own a professional basketball team. The

Mohegan relocate the Miracles to the Mohegan Sun

Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut, which the tribe

constructed in hopes of acquiring a team. The Mo-

hegan rename the franchise the Connecticut Sun.

March 23

Hopi soldier Lori Piestewa is killed in the

Iraq War.

During the U.S. invasion of Iraq, an American

army convoy is ambushed in the city of Nasiriyah

after taking a wrong turn. Private Lori Piestewa,

a 23-year-old Hopi Indian raised on the Navajo

(Dineh) reservation, is driving a Humvee bringing

up the rear when a rocket-propelled grenade hits

the vehicle. The Humvee crashes into a truck, and

Piestewa is severely injured. Taken as a prisoner of

war, Piestewa later dies of her injuries, one of nine

soldiers killed in the attack. Piestewa is the first U.S.

woman killed during the war. She is also the first

female American Indian soldier to die in combat.

(See also entry for SEPTEMBER 21, 2004.)

April 29

A Montana court confirms the Little Shell

Chippewa’s tribal sovereignty.

In deciding Koke v. Little Shell Chippewa, the Su-

preme Court of Montana declines to intervene in a

tribal election dispute. The court maintains it does

not have the authority to do so, because the Little

Shell Chippewa are a sovereign tribe according to

the criteria set out by the 1901 U.S. Supreme Court

decision in Montoya v. United States (see entry for

1962). The judicial decision is a boost to the tribe’s

battle for federal recognition, which has lasted for

more than one hundred years.

John Herrington, a member of the Chickasaw tribe,
was the first American Indian astronaut to travel into
space. (National Aeronautics and Space Administration)