Native American issues

For Women in the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, A Chance for Justice

When I think of Indian reservations, and the laws that govern them, the first things I think about are always casinos. Driving down I-95 from Jacksonville to Miami each year to visit my relatives, we would always pass huge billboards advertising a casino with a strange name to me—Miccosukee—that implored us to stop in on our way down. I’ve been fascinated by geography from the time I was young, so on one of these trips, maybe when I was 9 or 10 years old, I asked my parents why anyone would place a casino so far outside of the city. They explained to me that, while the State of Florida had outlawed gambling (though some might say it still exists today), those laws did not apply to Indian tribes, and so many Indian tribes used the casinos to make money.