Drawing on his work focused on Tribal co-management of federal public lands, Monte Mills will give a lecture at Case Western Reserve University Wednesday, March 22, at noon in the School of Law’s Moot Courtroom (Room A59).
Mills, the Charles I. Stone Professor of Law at the University of Washington, will present “Repairing our Legacy: Native Nations, Co-Management and the Future of Federal Public Lands.”
About the lecture
The history and management of our nation’s public lands have evolved largely at the expense and exclusion of the continent’s Indigenous peoples. The removal, dispossession and relocation of Native Nations enabled the United States to acquire and maintain these public lands, many of which have now come to define iconic American landscapes, ideals and values.
Despite that history, however, Native Nations and their citizens have maintained deep, lasting and meaningful connections with and knowledge of the territories that had been wrested from their control. Long ignored, excluded or erased from the story of public lands, these connections are now coming to redefine the way in which public lands are considered, managed, protected and used.
From the Bears Ears National Monument and Chaco Canyon National Historical Park in the southwest, to the Crown of the Continent in the Northern Rockies and the national forests of the Great Lakes, as well as many other places across the country, Native voices are now asserting an interest and shaping the way in which the federal government oversees our public lands. Those voices have led to a sea change in federal policies that now seek to honor, rather than silence, Native knowledge, insight and authority.
In this talk, Mills will discuss what has led to this critical moment, the changes that are currently underway and what they may mean for the future of our public lands.