court ruled that according to Article 9 of the Cherokee Treaty of 1866, the Cherokee Freedmen descendants have present rights to citizenship that is coextensive with the rights of native Cherokees. Senior U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan stated that while the Cherokee Nation has the right to determine citizenship, it must do so with respect to both native Cherokees and the descendants of Cherokee Freedmen. In a statement on August 31, Cherokee Nation Attorney General Todd Hembree stated that no appeal will be filed against the ruling. Further, citizenship applications from Freedmen descendants have been accepted and processed since the ruling. In a public statement, Cherokee Freedmen lead counsel Jon Velie stated that the ruling was not only a victory for the Freedmen in regaining their citizenship, but also a victory for Native Americans as the federal courts have enforced treaty rights of citizenship while maintaining tribes and elected officials' rights to determine citizenship and self-determination. Reactions to the controversy A number of Cherokee Freedmen descendants feel that they have been gradually pushed out of the Cherokee Nation, and that the process has left each generation less aware of its rights and its history. As Freedman activist Reverend Roger H. Nero said in 1984, "Over the years they [Cherokee Nation officials] have been eliminating us [Freedmen] gradually. When the older ones die out, and the young ones come on, they won't know their rights. If we can't get this suit, they will not be able to get anything". Freedmen descendant and journalist Kenneth Cooper said, "By rejecting a people whose history is so bound up with their own, the Cherokees are engaging in a massive case of denial. The history of every family descended from Freedmen reflects close relations with Cherokees, down to some last names still in use today." Some Cherokee who oppose membership for Freedmen descendants support Chief Smith's position: that the Freedmen are not Cherokee citizens because their ancestors were listed on the Freedmen Roll of the Dawes Rolls and not on the "Cherokee By-Blood" Roll (although some were in fact of Cherokee blood). Smith and supporters claim that the Freedmen and their descendants have not been active in the tribe for 100 years, the Freedmen were compensated for slavery by their Dawes land allotments and not tribal membership, and they were forced on the tribe by the US under the Treaty of 1866. Some Cherokee