page_title: Laura Cornelius Kellogg
section_title: Opposition to Kellogg
hierarchical_section_title: Laura Cornelius Kellogg / New York Land Claims / Opposition to Kellogg
caption_attribution_description: English: Six Nations Fight Decided in U.S. Court., August 9, 1929, p.4. Other information No. This work is in the public domain because it was published in the United States between 1923 and 1963 and although there may or may not have been a copyright notice, the copyright was not renewed. Unless its author has been dead for the required period, it is copyrighted in the countries or areas that do not apply the rule of the shorter term for US works, such as Canada (50 pma), Mainland China (50 pma, not Hong Kong or Macao), Germany (70 pma), Mexico (100 pma), Switzerland (70 pma), and other countries with individual treaties. See Commons:Hirtle chart for further explanation. Deutsch&#160;| English&#160;| español&#160;| français&#160;| italiano&#160;| 日本語&#160;| 한국어&#160;| македонски&#160;| português&#160;| português do Brasil&#160;| русский&#160;| українська&#160;| {{edit|Template:PD-U
context_page_description: Laura Cornelius Kellogg, was an Oneida leader, author, orator, activist and visionary. Kellogg, a descendant of distinguished Oneida leaders, was a founder of the Society of American Indians. Kellogg was an advocate for the renaissance and sovereignty of the Six Nations of the Iroquois, and fought for communal tribal lands, tribal autonomy and self-government. Popularly known as "Indian Princess Wynnogene," Kellogg was the voice of the Oneidas and Haudenosaunee people in national and international forums. During the 1920s and 1930s, Kellogg and her husband, Orrin J. Kellogg, pursued land claims in New York on behalf of the Six Nations people. Kellogg's "Lolomi Plan" was a Progressive Era alternative to Bureau of Indian Affairs control emphasizing self-sufficiency, cooperative labor and organization, and capitalization of labor. According to historian Laurence Hauptman, "Kellogg helped transform the modern Iroquois, not back into their ancient League, but into major actors, activists and litigants in the modern world of the 20th century Indian politics".
context_section_description: Kellogg's campaign in New York was fraught with problems, and there was
  strong resistance from local, state and federal government, and pressure on Six Nations leadership to halt Kellogg's initiative. As a result, there was publicized in-fighting among and within the tribes and efforts to discredit Kellogg's efforts and reputation. In 1925, Kellogg, her husband and Chief Wilson K. Cornelius of the Oneida Nation of the Thames, were arrested in Canada.
  There was also a succession of set-backs and defeats in the courts. In October 1927, a class action suit, James Deere v. St. Lawrence River Power, filed in 1925 in United States District Court for the Northern District of New York on behalf of the Six Nations to eject a subsidiary of Alcoa Aluminum and other occupants from a small parcel of land, was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. Kellog lost a suit for control of Onondaga Nation tribal funds in 1927. On December 23, 1928, Edward A. Everett, Kellogg's ally and chief legal counsel died.
  In 1929, Kellogg sought the intervention of the U.S. Congress, and with the help of John Collier of the American Indian Defense Association, managed to get a hearing for Haudenosaunee leaders before the Senate Subcommittee on Indian Affairs. Once again she spoke in proud terms of the Six Nations, of her plans for their economic, political and spiritual revival, of her hatred for the Bureau, whom she now accused of spreading pernicious and criminal propaganda against her and the Iroquois. On March 1, 1929, Kellogg testified, 
  Here are a group of Indians [Iroquois], 16,000 in all, occupying some 78,000 acres in reservations in New York or colonized in small groups in Western states and Canada. Their legal status is peculiar to Indian relations. They have the status of an independent protectorate of United States under this Treaty of 1784, confirmed and added too in the original treaty of 1789. They are a protected autonomy, with the title of original territory vested in them. In specific language, the U.S. ceded all right and title to them the territory they reserved to themselves out of their Iroquois domain in return for their ceding all right and title in the Ohio Valley to the United States government.
  However, Kellogg's testimony alienated most of the senators, and E. B. Merritt, Assistant Commissioner of Indian Affairs accused Kellogg of fraud and tried to launch a federal investigation.
  On August 29, 1929, Kellogg suffered another serious set back when Judge Frederick Howard Bryant of the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York ruled upon the leadership the dispute within the Six Nations and declared that Joshua Jones legal sachem of the Six Nations. Jones, an opponent of Kellogg, succeeded George Thomas a long-tine supporter of Kellogg.  By this time, subsequent court appeals were unsuccessful and many Iroquois supporters were angry that their financial support did not bring any results, and Kellogg's long campaign lost momentum. Nevertheless, Kellogg's rival council attempted to operate well into the late 1930s. On July 4, 1937, Kellogg speaking at a Six Nations council in Hogansville, New York, spoke of her continued pursuit, "The Iroquois are struggling for a renaissance. If we were permitted the return of self-rule, we could place before the world an example of perfect government."
caption: Six Nations Fight Decided in U.S. Court, 1929
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