The tribes say honor the treaties. Do you know what clause in what treaty is not being honored? If you look for a clause saying they don't have to remit sales and excise tax, good luck. Not only doesn't it exist, but the implication of it giving all weight to the tribal arguments and favoring the tribe as if they did not understand the meaning of treaties they made still resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court ruling five times that states have the authority to collect taxes on tribal sales to people that are not members of that tribe.

To argue that enforcing the law would cause a loss of jobs or closure of businesses is a bit narrow-minded. The tribes making those arguments closed down competitors and took jobs from legitimate tax paying businesses by intimidating the state to selectively enforce the law against everyone else. What about those people's rights?

It boils down to simple mob mentality. The state fears violence if they enforce the law. That was the state's argument in court for refusing to enforce the law even though the state won that right in 1995 by a unanimous vote of the U.S. Supreme Court.

To those that believe equality under the law should be enforced, I urge you to send that message to Governor Patterson by joining in the motorcade Oct. 4 at 9 a.m., starting about two miles south of Seneca Falls on Route 414 for a 30-mile drive.

Richard Tallcot

Union Springs

Tallcot writes as chairman Cayuga-Seneca UCE