Announcement of changes concerning LLMC Digital’s Native American Collection.

Over the course of the next few weeks, LLMC will be reorganizing its Native American Collection.  This decision has been made for several reasons.  First of all, the offerings that will be coming online over the next year necessitated a re-evaluation of the approach taken nearly 20 years ago when LLMC Digital first went live.  The Early State Records project has brought to light hundreds of historic titles dealing with relations between the colonies and the resident native populations.  Secondly, at present it is not possible to view all the resources for a particular tribe in one location; titles are organized by what they are (i.e., constitutions, laws, etc.) rather than by the enacting jurisdiction (e.g., Cherokee Nation). Finally, with LLMC’s assumption of the responsibility for the Library of Congress’ Indigenous Law Portal last July, it was thought that adopting a structure parallel to that of the Portal’s would make it possible to provide links between current resources available on the web and more historic materials available on LLMC Digital.

What will you see?

First of all, the Native American Collection will be relocated from the Special Focus Collections page to the first page just after the entry for Other Countries.  Its name will also change to Indigenous Law since, over time, we hope to add materials that go beyond those populations which reside in the United States.  The next level of organization will be by regions within the U.S., Canada, Mexico and so forth as found on the Portal.  Within those regions, First Nations, tribes, Alaskan villages, etc. will appear in alphabetical order.  Each entity will have an internal organizational structure similar to that of other national jurisdictions. 

Please be assured that during this transition, all materials will remain available.  If they are not where you have found them in the past under the Native American Collection, search under the new Indigenous Law tab on the opening screen.  If you do not find what you are looking for, feel free to contact LLMC.  Phone numbers and email addresses are available from the site’s homepage.