Tribes'
long battle over Bennett Freeze Area
Nov.
3, 2006
The issue stems from a 1934 federal law that extended
the borders of the Navajo Reservation and said the area
was for use by the Navajos "and other Indian tribes."
The Hopis sued the Navajos for access to the land in
1974, hoping to keep people from becoming entrenched
amid various ongoing legal matters.
The freeze,
instituted in 1966 by former Bureau of Indian Affairs
Commissioner Robert Bennett, banned Navajos living on
contested land from making repairs to their homes or
building new ones on about 1.5 million acres on the
western edge of the Navajo Reservation. It also applied
to water and power lines, indoor plumbing and roads.
In 1997,
U.S. District Judge Earl Carroll lifted the ban on about
half of the disputed area, allowing building.
The construction
ban remained on 700,000 acres to which the Hopis still
laid claim because of a long-standing historical and
religious presence.
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