Liz Warren. Why the Cherokee rolls can be used to prove but NOT to disprove heritage.

[Runningdawg]

12. To understand how the rolls can be so incomplete

you have to understand why people did not want to be listed on them.
Research Native American Boarding Schools. Just a few generations ago if you admitted to being NA, your children would be taken from you by the government. If they returned it was as young Christian adults with all trace of their heritage, culture, language and religion beaten out of them.
Most people are familiar with the Cherokee Trail of Tears, where the majority of Cherokee were removed from their native lands. Fewer people know there is more than one band and the band that stayed behind to fight removal are label Eastern Band Cherokee. Different rolls. There is a third group, that even fewer people have heard of, the Cherokee who left on their own, before forced removal. These are the Western Band Cherokee. Another roll. The WB Cherokee were trying to stay hidden, they weren't going to volunteer the information that they were Native, many claimed to be Spanish.
My blood quantum comes only from my fathers side, as none of my mothers family were ever registered. My fathers maternal side was not registered, only his paternal side, so for all legal intents and purposes, I had only one NA ancestor to trace my lineage from.
To sum it up, there is no easy answer and more than one correct answer to the question-are you Native American.