An invisible people of the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation want to give form to their plight.
That's why the Timpanogos Tribe filed a lawsuit Monday in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City in a sovereignty dispute with the Northern Ute Tribe.It is an issue so culturally and legally tangled the Utes say they're unaware there is a Timpanogos Tribe.
That's at least partly the perception that prompted the filing.
"The Utes have usurped the authority over the reservation, and it's not theirs," said Mary Meyer, Timpanogos chief executive officer. "They're depriving us of our rightful historical place on our land."
"In my opinion the Utes are a rogue government," said Ken Hackford, Meyer's husband. "We have exclusive lawful occupancy which is not being recognized."
The lawsuit, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief, named as defendants the state of Utah and the Northern Ute Tribe.
Michael L. Humiston, plaintiffs' attorney, said the declaratory action advocates the Timpanogos Tribe never "rescinded or ceded any of their rights" obtained from the federal government.
He said the injunction asks the state and Utes to "stop entering into negotiations without the Timpanogos being a necessary and indispensable party."
"There's been a lot of dirty politics with two tribes inhabiting the reservation," Humiston said. "What's remarkable is the incredible legal basis the Timpanogos have in establishing their sovereignty. All this has been out there waiting for somebody to assert it."
What was remarkable to the Utes Monday was a lawsuit being filed by a Timpanogos Tribe.
"We hadn't heard of it. And we didn't know there was a Timpanogos Tribe," said Mary Navanik, secretary for the Ute Tribal Council, the reservation's prevailing governing body. "I don't mean to be critical, but I don't believe they are among the 520 federally recognized tribes."
Navanik said tribal council members coincidentally were in federal court in Salt Lake City Monday on an entirely different matter -- to hear the result of a long-debated Ute jurisdictional dispute with Utah.
"Once the leaders see this other suit, I imagine they'll respond," Navanik said.
The Timpanogos said they've gotten used to two kinds of responses from the Utes -- ignoring or confronting them.
Hackford cited run-ins with Ute game officers.
"They've told us we can't fish or hunt here or there," Hackford said. "No physical confrontations. A lot of verbal ones."
Hackford said a still-touchy point was the Utes selling elk herds to ranchers a couple of years ago.
"It was very disturbing to have them take our elk off our land," he said.
Humiston said another part of the dispute is oil, believed to be plentiful under the reservation.
"It's been a pretty sweet deal for the petroleum companies, dealing exclusively with the Utes and keeping the two tribes at odds," Humiston said. "The tribes are weaker that way. They'd be much stronger united."
Meyer also said two years ago when she went to license her car at the Department of Motor Vehicles in Roosevelt, she was told she no longer had tax-exempt status.
"I was treated very rudely. They told me the Utes said I wasn't eligible anymore. Only Utes were," Meyer said.
The Ute judicial system affords little satisfaction for Timpanogos Tribe members, Hackford said.
"They've told us they don't even want us in their courts," Hackford said. "Everything we do -- nobody will answer. It's like we don't exist."
The Timpanogos assuredly do, Meyer said. The tribe is composed of the Cucumbrah, Pahvant, Sanpitch and Weber bands, she said. They were groups Abraham Lincoln referred to in 1861 -- and Congress agreed in 1864 -- when he declared "Indians of the territory" should be undisturbed, Meyer said.
The Utes weren't in Utah then, Hackford said. They were Colorado people who came later.
"Our people were the 'Indians of the territory.' We are what early trappers called the Snake people," Hackford said, drawing a hand across his throat. "They meant what they'd do to a snake."
Meyer said the Timpanogos' aim is to "settle the confusion and co-exist peacefully" with the Utes.
"But it's like the Serbs and Bosnians, if you want a term of reference," Meyer said. "It's like telling them to sit in a room and work out their differences."