Newe Sogobia

Newe Sogobia Government

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These and future pages will explain the ways and means of the Nation, past, present and future, including those involved, yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

The government of the Western Shoshone Nation has been in continuous and unbroken existence from time immemorial to the present and is the entity that signed a treaty of peace and friendship, the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley, with the United States. Because of its oral history tradition, formal written records of meetings only began to be archived in 1983, when the Western Shoshone Government formalized its procedures and took the name, the Western Shoshone National Council.

In 1992, the Council began to take more active steps to demonstrate its sovereignty. In 1992 the Council approved a national seal for government documents, appointed its first Acting Envoy-at-Large in Europe, finalized and began to issue passports for foreign travel, and authorized an office of Western Shoshone Marshals to observe, record, and document U.S. actions within Western Shoshone Territory.

In 1995 the Council sent a Notice to the United States government informing them of the full sovereignty of the Western Shoshone government and that United States laws do not apply within Western Shoshone territory. They also passed a declaration declaring the interior of the Western Shoshone National boundaries as a nuclear-free zone, and adopted this declaration as Western Shoshone Law. At the 1996 Fall Gathering, the Western Shoshone National Council approved its National Flag.

The Council is made up of representatives of various Western Shoshone traditional communities, and presently includes:

Chief Raymond D. Yowell - Traditional Western Shoshone Cattlemen
Sub-Chief Allen Moss - Great Basin Descendents
Bennie Reilley - Ely Shoshone Tribe
Carrie Dann - Traditional Dann Family
Johnnie Bobb - Yomba Shoshone Traditional Community
Pauline Esteves - Timbisha Shoshone Tribe
John Wells - Southern Nevada Western Shoshone