By the Fire We Carry by Rebecca Nagle

By the Fire We Carry by Rebecca Nagle tells the story of the Muscogee people through narratives of the American court system, democratic processes, and historical accounts of displacement of Muscogee people from the eastern US to Oklahoma. After relocation to Oklahoma, Oklahoma asserted that Muscogee nation no longer existed as a sovereign entity. This book uses a criminal case in which the crime occurred on Muscogee Nation's land to affirm for Muscogee people that their nation is indeed sovereign. 

To set the stage, Muscogee's land cession was "one of the largest indigenous land cessions in US history...23 million acres, including the southern portion of present day Georgia and much of Alabama," (Loc 481). On the scale of today's US population, [relocating the Indigenous nations living east of the Mississippi] would be like forcibly relocating the city of Houston," (Loc 1406).  

Through the allotment process, tribes in the US lost nearly two-thirds of their land base..."carried out not through war, but bureaucracy," (Loc 1905). As I have seen in other books time and time again, the allowance of railroads to run through tribal lands was devastating (Loc 1933). "Prior to July 9, 2020, American Indian reservations made up only 2% of all land in the US- or about 56 million acres. For perspective, nearly 200 million acres is reserved for national forests...our government set aside more land for trees than for Indigenous people," (Loc 2680). 

Miscellaneous:

- White and Native American rates of alcoholism are the same. (Loc 127)

- The landmark case took place, at one point, at the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals in downtown Denver (Loc 1202). 

- There were over 50 all-Black towns in Oklahoma. Vernon, OK, is one 13 towns there that still exist. Today it is only churches (Loc 161). 

- An interesting reminder of how administrations make a difference: the Trump admin asked the solicitor general of the US asked the Supreme Court to overrule the Tenth Circuit decision.  

I really enjoyed this book, which had a variety of other insights in addition to those listed above. Highly recommend. Shoutout Axios for putting this book in an email! I am so glad I read it.