• Booklist Reviews : Booklist Monthly Selections - #1 August 1997
  Readers skeptical about the long-term value of current "apology-for-slavery" moves may find reinforcement in this analysis of the 30-year work of the Indian Claims Commission, established after World War II to adjudicate the claims of Native Americans. Attorney Lieder and writer Page trace historical background and the legal concepts the commission developed (or failed to develop) to deal with unprecedented claims; they focus on the Chiricahua Apaches (Geronimo's subgroup), held as prisoners of war in Florida, Alabama, and Oklahoma from 1886 until 1913 (a full generation after the battles that perhaps justified incarcerating a few tribe members). The commission, the authors conclude, and the Court of Claims and Supreme Court in reviewing its decisions, relied on procedures and presumptions that prevented real evaluation of the harm Native Americans suffered through destruction of their cultures, expropriation of lands they couldn't imagine "selling," and misuse of funds appropriated for their use. The system was inflexible: novel legal theories were squelched to protect taxpayers' wallets and keep the claims process under control. ((Reviewed Aug. 1997)) Copyright 2000 Booklist Reviews

Michael Lieder has been a lawyer since graduating from Georgetown University Law Center in 1984. Now working in Washington, D.C., he has taught at the University of Toledo College of Law and published several articles in legal journals, including Analyses of American Indian Law.

Jake Page, a former editor of Smithsonian magazine, is a science writer and novelist whose fictional work includes The Stolen Gods, a Southwestern mystery concerning the theft of Indian religious artifacts. Called by The Denver Post "one of the Southwest's most distinguished authors," he has written numerous magazine articles on Indian affairs. With his wife, photographer Susanne Page, he wrote Hopi and Navajo, and is producing a forthcoming volume on American Indian mythology.