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Muscogee Nation (Creek)
General Information
Capitol: 1000 State Highway 56, Okmulgee, OK
Tribal website
Language: Creek (Eastern Muskogean family).
GOVERNMENT
Executive Branch: Principal Chief David Hill
Legislative Branch: National Council
Chief prosecutor: Attorney General Roger Wiley
Judicial system: District Court and Supreme Court
District Court judges:
• Judge Gregory Bigler
• Judge Stacy Leeds
• Judge Shannon Prescott
Courthouse location:
• 1000 State Highway 56, Okmulgee, OK, Mound Building
• Phone: (918) 732-7970, (918) 758-1400
• No new courts opened since McGirt
Code of laws
Tribal constitution
Online court docket
Bar Association and Public Defenders list
Law Enforcement:
Lighthorse Tribal Police
• Chief of Police: Richard Phillips
• Phone: (918) 732-7800
• Number of officers: 76
• Number of cross-deputization agreements: 63
Sex offender registry
Crime Victim Support Services:
Family Violence Prevention Program
• Email: mjames@muscogeenation.com
• Phone: (918) 732-7979
REMOVAL
The Muscogee, sometimes referred to as the Creeks, lived in parts of Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee and Florida before the federal government forced them to move to Indian Territory.
The Muscogee ceded their remaining land east of the Mississippi River to the United States in the Treaty of Cusseta in 1832.
The tribe faced forced removal from their homelands to Indian Territory between 1834 and 1837. Muscogee who didn’t sell their property had to fight off land speculators and squatters. The remaining Muscogee launched acts of sporadic violence against some neighboring non-tribal settlements, leading to the Creek War of 1836. The uprising resulted in the U.S. Military forcing most of the remaining Muscogee citizens on a march to Indian Territory on the Trail of Tears.
Some Muscogee remained in the southeastern United States after removal. Citizens of the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, a federally recognized tribe based in Alabama, are descended from those who stayed behind.
The United States forced the tribe to sell about 3.2 million acres of Indian Territory land to the federal government after the Civil War as punishment for some tribal members' support for the Confederacy. The forced sale represented about half of the tribe’s domain.
Prior to removal to Indian Territory, the Muscogee Nation was a confederacy of indigenous tribes and 44 to 50 distinct tribal towns. A handful of federally-recognized tribes that were part of the Muscogee Confederacy remain and are still separate entities from the Muscogee Nation within the boundaries of the tribe’s reservation in eastern Oklahoma, including the Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town, Kialegee Tribal Town, and Thlopthlocco Tribal Town.
Among other major southeastern tribes, the Muscogees were closely aligned with the Seminoles, and their language and cultural practices share many ties.
MCGIRT APPLICATION
The Muscogee Nation was the first tribe to have its reservation boundaries affirmed through the U.S. Supreme Court’s McGirt decision in June 2020. The tribe filed briefs with the court arguing that its reservation had never been disestablished before Oklahoma became a state.
The tribe has not agreed to sign on to Congressional legislation that would allow it to enter into a compact with the state of Oklahoma to handle some criminal prosecutions.
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