Car tag issue
Sac and Fox Principal Chief Randle Carter said the recent situation surrounding a member of another tribe being ticketed for tribal tags is about “authority and control.”
“The governor thinks he has authority over tribal matters between the tribe and its members,” he said. “But on the Sac and Fox, I can tell you since inception, we’ve administered it according to what guidelines have been sent out by the Supreme Court.”
He said to his knowledge, the Sac and Fox Nation has not received any word of any of their motorists with tribal tags being ticketed. He wants to reassure his tribal members that the Nation is monitoring the situation and asks that they inform tribal leadership if they do receive any tickets or encounter other problems with the state related to their tribal motor vehicle tag.
He said that the one thing he wants to know is what the attorney general of the state will do about the situation.
“What’s he going to do to prosecute it or the DAs? How are they going to handle this?” he said, adding that tribal leaders haven’t been consulted on the enforcement of these matters. “It’s kind of taken us by surprise.”
He also said that according to the court, it is illegal for law enforcement to pull over anybody merely for displaying a tribal tag.
Carter is just one of many tribal leaders in the state who are voicing concern over the recent ticketing of a Native American tribe member for having tribal plates.
Last week, a member of the Otoe-Missouria tribe was pulled over by the Oklahoma Highway Patrol near Enid. The woman had a tribal license plate and was ticketed for speeding and failure to pay state motor vehicle taxes because she did not live on tribal land, according to reports.
The legal right to Oklahoma tribes to issue motor vehicle license tags was confirmed in 1993 with the landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case Oklahoma Tax Commission v. Sac and Fox Nation.
According to the ruling, the state does not have the authority to tax tribal citizens who live within tribal jurisdiction. The Oklahoma Department of Public Safety said in a statement that the ruling states Native Americans can only use a tribal tag if they reside and “principally garage” their vehicle in the tribe’s territory.
Principal Chief Carter is one of the last remaining Sac and Foxes who was at that case. His father, Truman Carter, issued the very first tribal license plate in Oklahoma and was one of the main three who filed the case.
Only three tribes - the Cherokee, Chickasaw and Choctaw nations - have compacts with the state that allow them to issue tribal tags regardless of where their citizens reside.
According to Carter, the Sac and Fox Nation’s jurisdiction runs as far north as the Cimarron River, as far south as the north fork of the Canadian, east to the Creek County-Lincoln Count line, and all the way to the west side of Kickapoo Street in Shawnee. This is 750 square miles that fall under the Nation’s jurisdiction. Just about half of the tribe’s membership - 4,000 people - live within these boundaries.
“That case isn’t just about car tags, it’s also about income tax,” he said. “The question really is, if you’re not legally required to pay a tax, would you? The answer is always no. That was the heart of the issue back then and still the heart of the issue now.”