An effort to ban hunting on public lands in Mashpee was hastily withdrawn during a selectman’s meeting last month after Town Manager Rodney Collins fielded dozens of complaints and concerns.

Dozens of community members including many Mashpee Wampanoag hunters attended the meeting ready to voice opposition to the petition article proposed for the spring Town Meeting. News that the article was being withdrawn was met with applause and audible gratitude. However the withdrawal alone was not enough for Mashpee Wampanoag Tribal Chairman Brian Weeden who addressed the select board to remind them of the Wampanoag time honored and hard fought rights to hunt and fish in their ancestral homeland.

He reminded the board of the decision by the Supreme Court that protects the aboriginal rights of the Wampanoag to hunt and fish in the “usual and accustomed places.” It is a right that includes an easement over private lands.

“These aboriginal rights are of critical importance of the physical survival of the Mashpee Wampanoag and their community, traditions, lifeways and culture,” he said. “The tribe will continue to protect and practice its aboriginal rights and will not take any attacks on our sovereignty.”