Oh My God, what am I doing???? Weighing in on this controversy again - but I shall try and hopefully I won't put anyone's nose out of joint. A couple of things about the treaty that is posted here. This is the Treaty of Point No Point. If you follow the link, you will see that there are the following tribes represented as signatores to the Treaty.

Clallam
Skokomish
Chimacum

So, this particular treaty is but one of many and not even the one that the Boldt decision was based on. That was the Treaty of Medicine Creek which was signed by a whole nother bunch of Indian tribes. That treaty happened before this one (I think 1854, but my memory is foggy on that point). It doesn't much matter, the infamous language that the Boldt decision is based on is Article 4.

I guess the only thing I can add to the discussion is that the English language has evolved over time and what was meant by the framers of these treaties may in fact be interpreted differently now. But, that is the key point, in our current society, we have chosen to let Judges interpret the treaty language and tell us what it means under the current set of circumstances. Thus, Article 4, according to George Boldt, means 50%. And before you call Boldt some kind of liberal hippie pinko.... you should know that he was some kind of mean old redneck. I was in his court once, he was a real piece of work!!!

But, here is my real issue - and Grandpa spelled it out well. We can take our energies and try to figure out how to get the Indian to bend to our will when it comes to fishing allocations. I'm uncertain what the motivation for this post is but I have a notion that is part of what is occuring with this post. I have decided that (for me) this is not a productive approach. I have chosen to work with the Indians. Under the law of the Land, they do hold trump. I would rather work with them than take my chances in court. Remember the Boldt decision and what led up to it. Indians getting cracked over the head, thrown in jail, losing their property over exercising what they said were their Treaty rights. Hell, I even remember Marlon Brando was on the Nisqually and Dick Gregory went on a hunger strike in Olympia or Seattle. That was confrontational, I see the same kinds of confrantational approach with this post and others that we have recently thrashed to death. It didn't work before and I'm fearful of what we will get when it doesn't work this time. My 2 cents. Flame away if you must. Just because I take this approach does not mean I like the current situation - it does mean that I believe certain tactics will lead to success, others to failure.