This section provides information resources for and about Tribes and Native Villages in the United States. The next section provides more detailed information for the tribes in Arizona.
There are 574 federally recognized Indian tribes and Alaska Native Villages in the United States.
The U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) within the US Department of Interior currently provides services (directly or through contracts, grants, or compacts) to approximately 1.9 million American Indians and Alaska Natives. A list of federally recognized tribes and Alaska native villages is published annually (usually in January) in the Federal Register.
The BIA Tribal Leaders Directory provides a listing of all these tribes and their contact information. This is an electronic, map based, interactive directory which also provides information about each BIA region and agency that provides services to a specific tribe. Additionally, the directory provides contact information for Bureau of Indian Affairs leadership.
Of the 574 tribes, approximately 250 have established tribal court and justice administration systems. When researching a tribe's legal system, you may want to start with information about the tribe and the types of primary resources you will need for your research.
The National Indian Law Library's Tribal Law Gateway contains an index by tribe, listing sources for tribal constitutions, codes, and court opinions. The National Indian Law Library (NILL) also provides these helpful "How To Find" tips for locating the types of sources you may need including research guides for:
Another useful resource is the Native Nations Institute Indigenous Governance Database. The database provides free access to 1500 video, audio, and text resources. The database is searchable by native nation, format, and search terms. An account is required to access the content.
The UA Law Library's IPLP LibGuide also has useful resource information.
The following additional resources provide information about and for tribal justice systems.
The Tribal Court Clearinghouse is a project of the Tribal Law and Policy Institute, and is a comprehensive website to serve as a resource for American Indian and Alaska Native Nations, American Indian and Alaska Native people, tribal justice systems, victims services providers, tribal service providers, and others involved in the improvement of justice in Indian country. It includes a wealth of tribal, state, and federal resources. The Clearinghouse contains extensive resources on tribal, state, and federal law along with extensive Indian country subject-matter resources, a training events calendar, and resources from all Tribal Law and Policy Institute webinars.
Indigenous Law Portal from the Library of Congress provides access to materials as well as links to tribal websites and primary source materials found on the web. Tribal information includes constitutions and codes and can be browsed by region, state, and alphabetically.
Harvard's Caselaw Access Project (CAP) also includes some tribal court decisions - those published in West's American Tribal Law Reporter (1997-2017). Unfortunately, CAP does not include cases as they are published, cases not designated as officially published, nor, non-published trial documents.
Native American Constitution and Law Digitization Project is a cooperative effort among the University of Oklahoma Law Center, the National Indian Law Library, and Native American tribes, which provides access to tribal constitutions, tribal codes, and other tribal legal documents. (While this is an old resource and has not been updated in a number of years, it still is a good resource starting out - think historical information.)
Indigenous Digital Archive is a project of the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture in collaboration with the New Mexico State Library Tribal Libraries Program and the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center. The Indigenous Digital Archive will help you explore the history of US government Indian boarding schools in the 19th and 20th centuries. Explore, annotate and learn from over 500,000 archival documents about Santa Fe Indian School and others, all kinds of boarding school records, yearbooks, and letters.
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Tonto Apache Tribe - the Tonto Apache Tribe does not have a webpage of its own.
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San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe of Arizona
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Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community
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In these tabs are links for and to the 22 tribes in Arizona and their resources. Some Tribes make more information available online than others.
The best source and resource for Tribal materials is always going to be the Tribe itself.
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Fort Mojave Indian Tribe of Arizona
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