Collections >> Oral Histories of the American South >> Document Menu
Oral History Interview with Barry Nakell, October 1, 2003. Interview U-0012. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007).
Audio Options
Transcript Only (28 p.)
Abstract
This interview offers a look at the economically and politically disenfranchised Lumbee Indians' efforts to assert themselves in Robeson County and to some extent, white North Carolinians' efforts to sabotage that effort. Barry Nakell, a professor of law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, remembers traveling to Robeson County in the mid-1970s to help the Lumbee Indians—and a splinter group, the Tuscarora—save a historic building and strike down so-called double voting. Double voting allowed city residents in Robeson County to vote for both city and county school board, giving city elites unusual control over county schools, where most Native American children studied. Nakell succeeded in defeating the system before a U.S. Circuit Court. He believes that once Native Americans took more control over their education system, their most prominent citizens were freed to agitate for more rights and protections. Nakell's intervention sparked an interest in legal solutions to civil rights issues, and a steady stream of Lumbee Indians began earning degrees at UNC law school so they could return home and advocate for other Native Americans.
Learn More
This interview is part of the Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007), a collection of over
4,000 interviews housed at the Southern Historical Collection.
Subjects
Funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this title.
Return to Oral Histories of the American South Home Page
Return to Documenting the American South Home Page
© Copyright 2004 by the University Library, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, all rights reserved
Copyright / Usage Statement
URL: http://docsouth.unc.edu/sohp/U-0012/menu.html
Last updated May 12, 2008