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on account of race, color or creed or previous condition of servitude. Now that was set out as set out as his opinion. And then he said under the Federal Constitution the acts of Congress and the constitution and laws of this state, therefore I am of the opinion that the Indians themselves residing upon the Uintah Reservation who are of the age of 21 years and who are otherwise eligible under Utah law are eligible to vote within the precinct within which they are residing though such precinct may be within the territorial boundaries of the Uintah Reservation. In other words, he said, the Indians out there have a right to vote. And so that was taken for granted and if no Indians did not vote during that sixyeen yeras up to now it was there own fault, they had a right to and many of the Indians did take advantage of that right. Now the difficulty comes because the present Attorney General has asked a question early this year asking whether the Indians of this state had a right yo vote. Only be impltation was this question asked. A direct question was asked, Is it necessary for us to set up facilities to allow these Indians to vote. That was asked by the Secretary of State, the Attorney General and so the [[crossed-out]] Attor[[/crossed-out]] present Attorney General on March 23, 1956,said as follows: Indians who are born in the United States are citizens of the United States. As such they are invitedto the same voting privileges as other citizens. The Constitution of Utah, ARticle 4, Section 2, but like other citizens they must establish a voting residence in Utah in accordance with terms of the section 2214. Now thats the one I have read to you. And then the statute there is set out again and let me read to you just once morebecause I have it correctly written in this one, Any person living upon an Indian or military reservation shall not be deemed a resident of the state of Utah within the means of this chapter unless such person has acquired a residence in someother county in Utah prior to taking up his residence upon said Indian or military reservation." Now that might have had some merit when people were moving in but the Ute Indians now are people who were born here largely and the only residence that a lot of them have is on the reservation. That's the only residence that a lot of them have is on the reservation. That's the only residence they acquired. They [[crossed-out]] registered in[[/crossed-out]] were residents of this state and if they are citizens of the United States we don't think they are going

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---------- Reopened for Editing 2023-11-27 15:27:19