Who Is a Seminole, and Who Gets to Decide? Polly Gentry's skin is black. But she says she is an Indian. A black Indian. For generations, a little-known chapter of America's racial history shows, she and other descendants of escaped slaves have been members of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma. Even on the tribal council, descendants of slaves have sat alongside descendants of native people. Until last summer. Then, in the middle of a bitter legal battle over $56 million in federal funds, Seminoles with native blood voted to strip the people who call themselves black Seminoles of tribal membership. Suddenly, Ms. Gentry said, "My skin makes a difference." The battle over the place of the black Seminoles is now at the center of two federal lawsuits that challenge basic notions about race in America. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/01/29/national/29SEMI.html?pagewanted=all