Document Type
Brief
Case Name
Perez v. City of San Antonio
Publication Date
11-15-2023
Abstract
No. 23-50746
Perez v. City of San Antonio
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas Honorable Fred Biery (5:23-cv-00977-FB)
From the Summary of the Argument
For centuries, generations of the Lipan-Apache people have gathered for prayer, mediation, and worship along a bend in the Yanaguana—known as the San Antonio River in English—which mirrors the constellation Eridanus in the skies above. It is a place where the lower, middle, and upper worlds come together; a place that reflects the Yanaguana creation story, which teaches that life began in the area when droplets of water fell to the earth from the feathers of a cormorant. And, because of the confluence of these spiritual elements, it is the only place in the world where certain religious ceremonies involving the river, the cormorants, and the stars above may be performed.
Recommended Citation
Barclay, Stephanie Hall and Meiser, John A., "Amicus Curiae Brief of the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers and Carol Logan in Support of Appellants" (2023). Court Briefs. 53.
https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/sct_briefs/53
Comments
Amici curiae are the International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers and Carol Logan, an elder from the Confederated Tribes of Grande Ronde. Amici submit this brief to highlight the troubling history of governmental destruction of Indigenous sacred sites and to reject the erroneously cramped interpretation of TRFRA’s broad protections suggested by the City in this case.
Table of Authorities includes:
Stephanie Hall Barclay & Michalyn Steele, Rethinking Protections for Indigenous Sacred Sites, 134 Harv. L. Rev. 1294 (2021)