Chief Steve Adkins

Chief of the Chickahominy Tribe

Chief Adkins is one of his nation’s leading advocates of American Indian rights, culture, and tradition. Charismatic and inspirational, Chief Adkins travels the nation and the world pushing for recognition of American Indians and their 400-year plight. He has successfully lobbied to have Native American policy classes instituted at the University of Virginia and the University of Richmond’s law schools. Chief Adkins is also the first American Indian to hold a post in Virginia’s state government.

Long overlooked by history books, the role of American Indians after the 17th century – how they were denigrated, persecuted, and denied an identity – is a story Chief Adkins wants heard. As part of the Jamestown 2007 commemoration, Chief Adkins, along with Chief Ken Adams of the Upper Mattaponi Tribe, traveled to the United Kingdom on the first official visit by American Indians since the 17th century.

“It represents the closing of a circle that has been incomplete for the last 398 years. It’s a reconciliation between England and the indigenous people of Virginia, an acknowledgement that Jamestown would not have existed, and could not have existed, without a relationship between the settlers and Virginia’s indigenous people,” Adkins said before the delegation left in 2005.

One of Chief Adkins’ most passionate pursuits is lobbying the federal government for recognition of the Virginia Indian Tribes – a long journey that will hopefully end in success in 2008.

Speaking Topics

·        “Indian Law and Culture Through History”

·        “Government Policy as it Relates to American Indians”

·        “Preserving History and Culture”

·        “Native American Policy”

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