PRESS RELEASE
For immediate release
Contact: Jane Whitmire (928-300-5306)
Dr. Maurice Crandall Returns to the Phillip England Center
After his very popular presentation, "After the Whirlwind: Yavapai-Apache Scouts and the Worlds They Made" in February of 2023, Dr. Maurice Crandall, Associate Professor of History at Arizona State University and an enrolled member of the Yavapai-Apache Nation, is returning to the Phillip England Center for the Performing Arts. On Sunday, May 5, at 3:00 pm, he will present a free program titled, “The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 at 100: Its Significance for Native Americans in Arizona and Beyond.”
When President Calvin Coolidge signed the Indian Citizenship Act into law on June 2, 1924, it granted birthright citizenship to all Native peoples in the United States. While there had been avenues to citizenship for Native Americans before 1924, the Act gave blanket citizenship to any Native American born within the territory of the United States.
The Act was a long time in coming. But unfortunately, it did not specify how individual states could decide qualifications for Native American voters. As a result, both Arizona and New Mexico—two states with large Native populations—denied the franchise to Native Americans, including veterans of the Armed Forces, until 1948.
Dr. Crandall will review and analyze the history of American Indian citizenship, and how it relates to Native Americans in Arizona, including right here in the Verde Valley. He will also tie this history to the present, showing how Native Americans in Arizona and elsewhere continue to be disenfranchised, essentially making them non-voting citizens.
The Phillip England Center for the Performing Arts is located at 210 Camp Lincoln Road in Camp Verde. Doors for the 3:00 pm program will open at 2:20.
[See pages 2-3 for Photos].
President Coolidge and Native American Leaders in 1925 after the Signing of the
Indian Citizenship Act
Dr. Crandall with baskets made by his great grandmother, Daisy Russell
