10 Things You Need to Know about Indian Reservation Gambling

Have you ever visited a casino on a Native American reservation? David Israel hasn't yet, but he likes to go prepared, so he found out as much as he could about the history and laws of Native American casinos. Here's a sampling:
7. Revenues from gaming are required to be used for tribal governmental and charitable ventures only. The revenues are exempt from federal, state, and local taxes, however there are exceptions. In the cases where the revenues are divided evenly and then distributed directly to tribal members, the federal government gets a nice cut. State taxes are often part of the agreements for large scale casinos.

8. There are 562 recognized tribes in the United States, only about 200 operate full scale casinos. There are approximately 150 additional tribes seeking recognition. Many complain that these tribes have no real membership and are only seeking to cash in on the casino business. Supporters of Native American rights point to centuries old treaties put in place to protect these unrecognized tribes. The Pequot tribe, which operates Foxwoods, received recognition in the early 1980s, after the last surviving member living on the reservation died and her grandchildren came together to recreate the tribe.

Read the rest in this post at mental_floss. Link

In my clouded biased opinion - "Indian gaming" should be banned and reservations should be closed. My family did not come here rape, murder and steal land.

And what about 'black' reparations? That was only a few years ago in the whole scheme of things.

Pretty sick really and thats coming from a middle class white male. If the "native americans" get free money, why dont the Irish or the Africans?

I believe the government maintains these reservations to demoralize the 'indian' people. But then again, I have a lot of 'indian' friends who think the same thing, but they also would never close the casinos as they EACH get a RIDICULOUS amount of money PER MONTH.
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I have to admit that I have always been fascinated with the rights extended to Native Americans. As a people group they were certainly treated harshly by settlers, but the continuous tax shelter/reparations extended to this group are pretty elaborate compared to what has been extended to descendants of slavery for example. I would think the special tax status could be phased out over time given that the worst offenses against the group occurred generations in the past.
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Hehe! "Tribes". Some of these recognized tribes and many of the unrecognized ones didn't even exist after the 1600s/1800s and were only recently "rediscovered". Their members can be whiter and blonder than yours truly- "Mr. WASP" -and some tribes are indistinguishable from any Harlem street corner crowd.

These "rediscovered" and "reconstituted" tribes, though, always seem to have millions of dollars immediately upon recognition to build casinos. Meanwhile, many actual Indian tribes languish in poverty and alcoholism too far away from anywhere to make a casino worthwhile for anyone to invest in.
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@ felixthecat

I was about to quote one of the posters above when I saw it was you. =D I think you answered your own question.

How is giving one tribe millions and stiffing there neighbor out of money & land NOT demoralizing?

And how do those that GET the extra money feel? I am sure they are happy with the extra cash, but I know for a fact some of them are quite disgusted by the whole thing and donate a fair portion of their "winnings"(pun intended) to local charities and neighboring 'tribes'. Which is very commendable. I can only assume those that do not express such feelings and progressive motivation are disgusted with themselves(and mostly drive lifted 4x4's and drink nonstop). I live on reservation land and know first hand that giving people who have not earned that much money is a very bad thing.

Mo' money mo' problems!

Peace

Teeko Benz
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