People are going to do what they feel is right anyway. They can't post a Mountie at every band office or an F.B.I. agent at every council chamber. There are many instances when people do not report an event to outsiders. S o, let's stop the nonsense about the mysteries and vagueness of Indian customary law. It is a special form of law, just as there are schools of common law or socialist law.
Indian people know it, and that is sufficient.
The proper doctrine is that national governments must recognize what aboriginal qpeoples do in their own communities. That means that what the people are doing already is legitimate, and any native community can have the form of law it desires today. This site was posted March 5, 1998.