1953 session laws – Ch.874 Sec.1

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CHAPTER 874 AN ACT RELATING TO THE LUMBEE INDIANS OF NORTH CARO- LINA. WHEREAS, many Indians now living in Robeson and adjoining coun- ties are descendants of that once large and prosperous tribe which occupied the lands along the Lumbee River at the time of the earliest white settle- ments in that section; and WHEREAS, at the time of their first contacts with the colonists, these Indians were a well established and distinctive people living in European- type houses in settled towns and communities, owning slaves and livestock, tilling the soil, and practicing many of the arts and crafts of European civilization; and WHEREAS, by reason of tribal legend, coupled with a distinctive ap- pearance and manner of speech and the frequent recurrence among them of family names such as Oxendine, Locklear, Chavis, Drinkwater, Bullard, Lowery, Sampson and others, also found on the roster of the earliest English settlement, these Indians may, with considerable show of reason, trace their origin to an admixture of colonial blood with certain coastal tribes of Indians; WHEREAS, these people are naturally and understandably proud of their heritage, and desirous of establishing their social status and pre- serving their racial history: Now, therefore, The General Assembly of North Carolina do enact: