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He never shied away from his Cherokee heritage at a time when many did not talk about it out of fear of persecution, Hoskin said.

The scholars association abruptly rescinded the award after allegations surfaced last spring that Blackwell’s claims of Cherokee heritage, based on family stories, were phony.

Georgia, which concerned whether the state of Georgia had the authority to regulate the affairs of its citizens and the Cherokee Nation, President Andrew Jackson is often said to have defied the Supreme Court.

When the justices decided a dispute between the state of Georgia and Cherokee Indian governments in 1832, Jackson did not seem interested in following its direction.

But some matrilocal communities exist today or in the recent past, including the Akans in Ghana, West Africa and Cherokee in North America.