A Sliver of a Full Moon, but Not the Full Moon Yet | Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University

A Sliver of a Full Moon, but Not the Full Moon Yet | Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University: "Mary Kathryn Nagle wrote the play Sliver of a Full Moon—which will be read today at the Radcliffe Institute—because Native leaders asked her to. Nagle, an attorney and citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, was approached by tribal leaders in early 2013 who asked her to interview Native women survivors and share their stories.
They were trying to explain to people—including Congressional lawmakers—why tribal governments needed their jurisdiction restored on Indian lands. A 1978 Supreme Court ruling, in Oliphant v. Suquamish Indian Tribe, had stripped tribes of criminal jurisdiction over non-Indians on tribal land. One result of this ruling was that when non-Indian men sexually assaulted Native women on Indian land, tribes did not have the authority to prosecute the assailant, and these incidents were occurring more and more frequently."