Intertribal People

Inter-Tribal American Indians of NJ (ITNJ) is an organization, created circa 1980, to meet the needs of American Indians from across North and South America who are now living in New Jersey. Members have represented Nations such as Mohawk, Cayuga, Seneca, Cherokee, Delaware, Apache, Lakota, and Hopi. Programs have included language (Mohawk and Lakota) speakers from different reserves/reservations, on current issues affecting American Indians, and American Indians representing different professions and agencies discussing their purposes, or possible opportunities. Note that tribe refers to a group of people of any size who have no specific rights, while Nation refers to people who, over centuries, occupy an area, have and speak the same Native language, and have had their government in place since time immemorial.

The Mohawk Nation is a sovereign nation, one of the Five Nations of the Iroquois Confederacy. The Iroquois Confederacy existed centuries before Columbus arrived in the Americas. Mohawks have had and continue to have a federal as well as provincial/state government to government recognition of national sovereignty, and relationships in the form of treaties and agreements, with the occupying forces of the current governments of the United States and Canada. Mohawk people have a fierce pride in their language, heritage and identity.