What happens when careless or discriminatory misinformation establishes the law of the land?
In The Worst Trickster Story Ever Told: Native America, the Supreme Court, and the U.S. Constitution, Keith Richotte, Jr., begins his playful, unconventional look at Native American and Supreme Court history with a question: When did plenary power-the federal government's self-appointed, essentially limitless authority over Native America-become constitutional?
Richotte shows that when the Supreme Court first embraced this massive federal authority in the 1880s, it did not bother to seek any legal justification for the decision--it was simply rooted in racist ideas about tribal nations. By the 21st century, however, the Supreme Court began telling a different story, with opinions crediting the U.S. Constitution as the explicit source of federal plenary power over Native America, despite the lack of any textual evidence in support.
How did the Court achieve this sleight of hand? Just as importantly, why did it change its story? And what does this change mean for Native America, the Supreme Court, and the rule of law? For Richotte, a citizen of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians, tribal Court of Appeals Judge, and Professor of Law at the University of Arizona, such sinuous transformations recollect the trickster stories of Native myth - in this case, with devastating real-world manifestations..
More than corrective constitutional history, The Worst Trickster Story Ever Told provides an irreverent synthesis of Native American legal history across more than 100 years, reflecting on race, power, and sovereignty along the way. Engaging with the story of plenary power from an Indigenous perspective, Richotte's examination opens possibilities that are otherwise foreclosed. Embracing the full power of trickster stories we are able to better understand the past, and imagine a future that is more just and equitable, and that better fulfills the text and the spirit of the Constitution.
