The Advisory Council on California Indian Policy (ACCIP) was created by an act of the United States Congress and signed by President George H. W. Bush on October 14, 1992.
[1] It provided for the creation of a special advisory council made up of eighteen members with the purpose of studying the unique problems that California Native Americans face in receiving federal acknowledgment.
Additionally, they were given the task of studying the social and economic conditions of California natives, “characterized by, among other things, alcohol and substance abuse, critical health problems, family violence and child abuse, lack of educational and employment opportunities, and significant barriers to tribal economic development.”[1] Under the provisions for the act, the Advisory Council was to make recommendations regarding California Indian policy to the Congress and the Departments of the Interior and of Health and Human Services.
On September 9, 2002, the Bureau of Indian Affairs issued its Final Determination declining to acknowledge the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe on the grounds that it failed to meet three of the seven criteria laid out in the FAP regulations.
One of the criterion that the BIA determined the Muwekma Ohlone failed to meet was the requirement that,the petitioner to have maintained political authority or influence on a substantially continuous basis from historical times until the present.
The “Termination Era” lasted from the late 1940s to the early 1960s and ended during the Nixon administration, largely the result of Indian activism and widespread opposition to the policy.
[10] Federal acknowledgment of the tribes is of critical importance because it is directly related to the other problems that the ACCIP was tasked with addressing, namely the “continuing social and economic crisis” of California Indians.