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24 B. C. Envtl. Aff. L. Rev. 651 (1996-1997)
Sovereignty, Self-Determination, and Environmental Justice in the Mescalero Apache's Decision to Store Nuclear Waste

handle is hein.journals/bcenv24 and id is 661 raw text is: SOVEREIGNTY, SELF-DETERMINATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE IN THE MESCALERO APACHE'S DECISION TO STORE NUCLEAR WASTE Louis G. Leonard, III* Throughout history, Americans have had an insatiable appetite for land. The desire for each individual to own a piece of the American dream has brought the dominant capitalist society of the United States into repeated conflict with the communal cultures of North America's indigenous peoples. Despite predating this capitalist cul- ture in North America by over 20,000 years, the land-based heritage of most tribes suffered greatly from these conflicts. The battles were most dramatic in the previous two centuries where exploitation and crimes against Native Americans' and tribal land were obvious and frequent.2 Today the confrontation is more subtle but continues to raise serious problems.3 One stage on which today's cultural conflict unfolds is nuclear waste siting, as tribes look to store low or high-level radioactive waste on reservation lands. Few problems are more politically charged, legally complex, or socio-economically controversial. Which governments have legal jurisdiction over such siting? Even if they have the legal power, will those governments take on this politically volatile issue? Is this an example of large corporations practicing environmental racism or * Executive Editor, 1996-1997, BOSTON COLLEGE THIRD WORLD LAW JOURNAL. 1This Comment will use the terms Native Americans, Native people, and occasionally Indians interchangeably to refer to members of the over 500 federally recognized and unrec- ognized tribes. This generalization is done for practical purposes and is not meant to diminish the individual cultural heritage of any tribe or member. 2 See Charles K. Johnson, A Sovereignty of Convenience: Native American Sovereignty and the United States Government's Plan for Radioactive Waste on Indian Land, 9 ST. Jom's J. LEGAL COMMNT. 589, 591 (1994). 3 See Mary Christina Wood, Indian Land and the Promise of Native Sovereignty: The Trust Doctrine Revisited, 1994 UTAH L. REV. 1471, 1483 (1994).

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