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MUSCOGEE NATION OF FLORIDA EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Muscogee Nation ofFlorida, also known as the Florida Tribe ofEastem Creek Indians, is listed as Petitioner Number 32 in the Branch of Acknowledgment of the Bureau oflndian Affairs. We are a tribe of Creek Indian people from towns that existed as part of the Creek Confederacy in the Southeastern United States before the 1814 Treaty ofFt. Jackson. Our government is organized into 5 townships - a central governing township known as Choctawhatchee and 4 satellite townships known as Escambia, Red Ground, Apalachicola and Withalacoochee. Our tribal government consists of a National Council with representatives from each township, an Executive Branch of a Chief and Vice-Chief, and a Judicial Branch. Our townships are located across the interior of Northwest Florida and we are over 1100 members strong in a viable tribal entity. At one time, Creek domain extended through most of Alabama, Georgia and parts of Mississippi southward to the Gulf of Mexico. Those who formed our modem nation followed the rivers south into the State ofFlorida to escape the removal policies of the federal government. We came from the old towns of Eufaula, Hickory Ground, and Tuskegee. This migration into the new lands of Florida forced the reestablishment of our traditional grounds, communities, lifestyles, and governance. On August 1, 1814, General Andrew Jackson called for a meeting ofthe Chiefs ofthe Lower Creeks - friendly Creeks- to a meeting at Ft. Jackson. A small percentage of the Chiefs were in attendance for this signing away of our homeland. Shortly afterwards, Northwest Florida became a veritable highway for oppressed and struggling Creeks - the first stage of an Eastern Trail of Tears. The Adams-Onis Treaty with Spain, ratified in 1821, had confined white settlements in Florida to St. Augustine and Pensacola with the remainder occupied by Creek Indians. But, by 1823, Commissioner Gadsden urged the removal of Indians from Florida altogether. This policy was achieved through the Treaty ofCamp Moultrie signed on September 18, 1823. It was this treaty that began a division between the modem Creeks and the modem Seminoles. Ultimately, the Treaty of Payne's Landing, signed on May 9, 1832, required the removal of any remaining Creek Indians to Mississippi. After the Seminole's Treaty at Payne's Landing, the 'Apalachicola' Creeks located in Northwest Florida continued to be treated separately. Government agencies kept some records of those Creeks who emigrated or agreed to emigrate. In 1839, the reserve lands of the Aplachicolas were finally "laid off" in conformity with the provisions of the Treaty of Apalachicola that had been concluded on June 18, 1833. Historians failed to note the continuing and unbroken presence of Creek Indians in these eastern Lands. In fact, most people are unaware that there is a Creek people still cohesively living in North Florida who are attached to the Treaty Town ofChief John Blount and the towns of historic Creek Nation. Byl850, our people began the process of forced adaptation to survive. Even so, we continued to honor the basic traditions and governance methods carried from our original homelands in Alabama and Georgia down connecting rivers into Northwest Florida. We have faced and survived many forms of oppression in loss ofland, identity, ownership of traditional rights and practices, and the right to remain as Creek people to conduct our own governance and to serve our people in the common way that was brought from Alabama and Georgia. While new 1 MNF-PFD-V007-D0003 Page 1of5 adaptations were made, the Tribe suffered in its Florida homeland with the passage of state legislation that affected the Indian peoples ofNorth Florida. The Act of 185 3 passed by the General Assembly removed any possibility ofCreek people openly living their traditional lifestyles and worse, identifying themselves as a tribe. This was the first Act of Extermination by the State of Florida through the attempt to extinguish of any form of self governance, traditional ceremonies, practices and lifestyles as Indian people by threat of removal or death: "It shall be unlawful for any Indian or Indians to remain within the limits of this State, and any Indian or Indians that may remain, or may be found within the limits of this State, shall be captured and sent west of the Mississippi; provided, that Indians and half-breeds residing among the whites shall not be included in this section." However, this Act of Extermination did not prevent members of the tribe from living and residing and interacting with each other as Indian people. While the tribe was forced to acknowledge the new policies of the State of Florida and try to survive them, it remained a tribe and continued to function as a tribe with limited interference from the surrounding non-Indian communities. It continued to function with its leadership, subsistence type ofliving, traditions such as medicine and ceremonies, and in the existence ofits townships infrastructure. Second cousin exchange marriage became a way of protection of the Indian bloodline in the more remote areas of our townships. This Act of 1853 legislated the Creeks' adjustment to even the most basic element ofthe domestic lifestyle which was a forced racial change. There was no allowance made for "Indians" to remain in the rapidly changing areas ofNorthwest Florida. The Seminoles were afforded a reservation area in the Everglades, but this was not an option we, the Creeks in North Florida, were given. Consequently, we were left without any rights or provisions by the passage of this Act and in the eyes of the government of the State of Florida, there was no longer an Indian population in Northwest Florida to be required to respond to. In other words, the Creek of North Florida, now considered by historians to be its 'pioneer families', were legislated to disappear into the fabric of an emerging white or black population. This law remained a part of the statutes of the state until the federal Civil Rights Act superceded it. In order to protect and retain culture and heritage, the Creek people went "underground" - but still continued the expression of traditional customs, as well as, governance. Townships maintained a leadership vested in a central male, that was either elected by the members, passed down to another tribal member, or was self-appointed. Leadership was based on the man's ability to serve as a liaison between the tribal people and the non-Indian communities because of his bilingual abilities and literacy. These qualities were vital to the survival of the township for the protection from further erosion of the Creek identity and culture. The leader maintained a precarious balance serving as a representative, a mediator, a negotiator, and an advocate for the rights and protection of his community. On the local basis, he was the provider of goods and services for his people. Politically, he was also the liaison between other tribal leaders in other townships when meetings were called to discuss tribal affairs, for ceremonies such as at the grounds of Boggs Pond in Blountstown, for economic cooperation, or for civil and criminal legal issues. Even though legislation and local governments had to become a part of the Creek people's lives, the tribal government continued to 2 MNF-PFD-V007-D0003 Page 2 of 5 exist through its tribal township leaders, its elders, and its ceremonial events. Since 1862, the Bruce Community in Walton County Florida has served as a center for education, social interaction, and other types of traditional events that were and are still a part of Muscogee Nation. For the past 150 years, our people have maintained ceremonial events and traditional practices. One of the major events that took place in the lives of Creek people was the move to incorporate some sort of organized religion into the community through the work of outside missionaries and circuit riders in the late 1800s. The Bruce Church, established in 1912, is recognized as a Native American Church by the Methodist Conference. The community also had a separate Creek Indian School from 1890 until 1948 which had a cooperative arrangement between tribal leaders and the School Board of Walton County. Entering the new century of the 1900s, the communities and people of the Muscogee Nation continued to practice traditional form of government within the townships with traditional customs, medicine, language, hunting and fishing, and cooperative labor. During this period, the tribe saw an increase in its membership, and families had large groups of children. The men often maintained multiple households and the townships supported each other from a communal type living. In the late 1930s, however, the economics shifted and that affected the aboriginal area. Turpentine industries declined, as did logging. The tribal townships were faced with developing new methods to ensure the economic survival of their people. Liquor production filled this desperately needed void of revenue utilizing farming abilities and enabled the communities to locally produce crops for its creation such as com, rice, and sugar cane. This was a tribally sanctioned enterprise with many members across the townships actively involved. By 1940, the war effort of World War II brought in a new threat of extinction to the tribe. Eminent domain included lands owned and settled by Creek fishing families who were displaced into other areas and received little to no compensation. Again, these Indian families had to start over. One of the losses to the people was a ceremonial grounds located in the Mary Esther area, along with known burial areas that suddenly fell under federal jurisdiction through the establishment of Eglin and Hurlburt Air Force Bases. Under new management of the federal government, the tribe no longer had access to its aboriginal homelands for hunting and fishing.

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