Most scholarship on American Indian politics focuses on tribal sovereignty and its relationship to U.S. Indian policy. As a consequence, there are few studies that examine the direct participation of American Indians in U.S. electoral politics. In their book, Daniel McCool, Susan Olson, and Jennifer Robinson take on this task by analyzing the effort to secure American Indian voting rights, especially following the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA). In so doing, the authors make a vital contribution to the emerging political science scholarship on modern American Indian politics. Those who work in the fields of U.S. race and ethnicity politics and U.S. public law will also find Native Vote an important addition to their reading lists.
The book focuses more on the abridgment than the denial of the right to vote, but the authors do address the latter in Chapter 1. The 1924 Indian Citizenship Act made U.S. citizens of all Indians in the country, although by that time almost two-thirds had already become citizens. Leading up to 1924, however, the effort to gain citizenship and suffrage was not aided by calling upon the Constitutional guarantees of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. In Elk v. Wilkins (1884), the Supreme Court declared that the Fourteenth Amendment did not apply to Indians. And the authors note that the Fifteenth Amendment “had virtually no impact on the right of Indians to vote” (p. 5). We see here a theme that persists throughout the book: the complexity of U.S. race and ethnicity politics, in which American Indian and African American political struggles are both distinct and deeply intertwined. For example, as with African Americans, it was at the state level that American Indians felt the direct brunt of the effort to deny them the right to vote. Also, measures first created to address African American political inequality and disenfranchisement, such as the post–Civil War constitutional amendments and the VRA, have been utilized by American Indians, to mixed but improved results over time. In this way, the authors show the value of placing American Indian politics into the wider context and history of race and ethnicity politics in the United States.
Chapters 2 and 3 trace the development of the VRA and the range of Indian voting rights cases brought forth since 1965. In looking at the cases, one sees that the most prevalent means of abridging American Indian voting rights are vote dilution, specifically via at-large electoral systems in multimember districts, and language barriers. The authors make it easy to track this abridgement by supplying a comprehensive table that chronologically lists and breaks down the legal issues, actors, case citations, and outcomes of all 74 Indian voting rights suits brought to this point in time (pp. 48–67). What becomes clear by this part of the book is the centrality of the courts to Indian voting rights politics. It is for this reason that I recommend the study to U.S. public law scholars, whether or not they have an immediate interest in American Indian or race and ethnicity politics, as they would likely have more disciplinary interest in the research and focus of the book than might those who study, say, social movements, political culture, or political behavior.
Chapters 4–6 are case studies of VRA litigations concerning, respectively, Navajos in Utah, the Assiniboine and Gros Ventre tribes of the Fort Belknap Reservation in Montana, and Lakota Sioux in South Dakota. Each chapter follows the same structure, providing historical background, the contemporary context, the details of the case, and finally the decision itself, which in each instance finds in favor of Indian voting rights. Read together, these cases demonstrate the variety of issues and resolutions that can be pursued through VRA litigation. What is also valuable here, especially for teaching, is that each chapter is a self-contained case, as all references to concepts and criteria mentioned in previous chapters are restated concisely and clearly. If I had one quibble, it is that while I appreciate the authors' aim of exploring the range of successful applications of the VRA, it would have been an interesting contrast to examine a case in which the decision went against Indian voting rights.
Although the book is not a study of the behavior of American Indian voters in U.S. elections, the final chapters argue that advances stemming from VRA litigation have been, in this regard, “profound for American Indians” (p. 173). Chapter 7 notes the rise in American Indian voter registration and turnout, the election of Indian representatives in newly created single-member districts, and the positive impact these representatives have had on public policy and Indian political efficacy. Finally, Chapter 8 traces the increasing bipartisan attention accorded “the Indian vote” in recent U.S. elections, noting that while American Indians tend to vote Democratic, they are not strongly identified with the party.
Taken as a whole, then, the authors' verdict is a positive one: American Indians are becoming more active and influential in U.S. elections, and thus “there are reasons for optimism” as it concerns their socioeconomic and political future (p. 194). The authors have done the research and work to make a case for this optimism and, while I highly recommend this book, I also recommend that teachers and scholars place it into direct conversation with studies that look at the politics of tribal sovereignty. I am sure the authors would agree, as they take note of the fact that some American Indian political actors see a tension between participating in U.S. elections and maintaining their political commitment to tribal sovereignty. I agree with the authors that this is likely a false choice. American Indians have strong claims to both full participation in U.S. politics and the right to tribal sovereignty, and the two can work hand in hand, provided sovereignty remains the political priority for tribes. To this end, McCool, Olson, and Robinson's important study widens our vision of the complicated terrain of American Indian politics, as well as that of U.S. race and ethnicity politics. As such, Native Vote is sure to become required reading in these fields, and will be a welcome addition to many syllabi; I know it will be on mine.
