Copyright © 2000 NLThomas
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The problem isn't in your claim that you had ancestors that were Tsalagi, but in the claims to status as a Nation.

Indigenous Tribes are Nations and hold legitimate claims to sovereign status. One can not just up and start a nation because they feel like it, or because they have ancestors who may or may not have been citizens of that Nations. U.S. descendants in Vietnam can not seven generations from now start the USA in Vietnam without legitimate authority and expect to be recognized etc.

Indian Nations have authority from two sources. One would be traditional. The traditional authority for the Tsalagi Nation went with on the trail of tears and is in Oklahoma. No traditional government can exist anywhere else-hence the Eastern Band rather than Eastern Cherokee Nation. The other authority comes from the Howard/Wheeler Act-Indian reorganization Act tribal councils created by tribal constitution as the interface the BIA recognizes between the Nation and the US government.

The so-called Southern Cherokee Nation has no authority under either to exist as a Nation or government and therefore can have no legitimate claim to such. What it can do is create confusion, serve to help those who seek to destroy Indigenous National sovereignty. That's why most Indian Nations and groups oppose these associations of lineal descendants, at best, that form these upstart "tribes" and "nations" and muddy an already unclear issue to most Americans and bring more trouble to Indian country at no expense to themselves.