This Powerpoint is subject to continuous
revisions.
Written and revised by Scott Fritz, Ph.D.
on December 3, 2015 at 2:45 p.m.
Western New Mexico University
REVIVING THE
HOMELANDS
PART FOUR
USING SELF-DETERMINATION TO
REBUILD COMMUNITIES
• Assimilation and Termination destroyed Indian
communities
• “Now after a long deadening time, they (Indian tribes) had
to rebuild their communities to capture the best of their
traditional ways and also meet the demands and
opportunities of the modern industrial superpower within
which they lived.” (Blood Struggle, p. 271)
• How did tribes use their ‘self-determination to
revitalize their communities?
• Lets look at examples of revitalization in Indian Country
CONFEDERATED TRIBES OF THE WARM
SPRINGS RESERVATION, OREGON
• Context:
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•
•
•
•
Tribes: Warms Spring, Wasco, and Paiute (became recognized as one tribe
Poverty, Relocation, Loss of Culture, reservation allotted to non-Indians
BIA overcut forests on reservation
Incorrect survey of reservation, i.e. the McQuinn Strip
Tribal constitution created in 1938 (under Indian Reorganization Act)
• Warm Springs use money given to them to buy land
• Warms Springs Indians receive $4 Million in payment for Celilo Falls being
flooded in 1958
• Payout to families ($1 Million) and $3 Million to tribal government (Tribalism)
• Used that money to buy land
• Land along Warm Springs River and nearby hot springs
• Buy parcels of allotted lands within the reservation
• Buy lands that had been ceded in 1855, like fishing areas along Deschutes
River
• Used government money to fund reservation businesses and
programs
• Also reacquired the McQuinn Strip
WARMS SPRINGS INVESTS IN BUSINESS
WITH CELILO FALLS MONEY
• First tribal businesses
• Kah-Nee-Ta Resort, est. 1964
• Hot springs, cater to non-Indian tourists
• Warm Springs Forest Products, est. 1967
• Timber mill in town of Warms Spring
• Other businesses
• Cultural Museum
• Shopping mall
• Dam on Deschutes River for energy
• Shows how Self-Determination was acted upon visà-vis tribal owned businesses
OTHER ASPECTS OF SELF
DETERMINATION ON THE WARMS
SPRINGS RESERVATION.
• Employment
• 700 working in tribal government
• 1,100 working in tribal enterprises, one of largest employers
Forest seen as backbone of
in central Oregon
the reservation. Forest used
• Education
for religious ceremonies,
hunting, fishing, gathering
berries
• Scholarship started in 1965
• 1986 = permanent fund of $6 million created for
scholarships; today $12 Million, tribal students can go to any
college
REBUILDING TRIBAL COMMUNITIES
AFTER TERMINATION
EDUCATION
DURING THE
ERA OF SELF-DETERMINATION
GOVERNMENT STUDIES RE:
EDUCATION
• Context:
• 1870s = on reservation day schools, run by missionaries
• 1880s = expanded number of boarding schools, with religious and
military discipline
• Merriam Report 1928
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•
•
•
•
40% Indian students in boarding schools
Lack of qualified teachers, low funding levels, bad food,
Criticized standardized curriculum
Tens of Thousands of Indian students had dropped out or not enrolled
Led to Indian Reorganization Act of 1934
• Senate report (1969) “Indian Education: A National Tragedy-A
National Challenge”  Kennedy Report
• Discrimination
• No teaching of their culture
• “alienation, hopelessness and powerlessness”
ROUGH ROCK DEMONSTRATION
SCHOOL
• Established in 1966 with EOE money on Navajo
Reservation
• First Indian tribe to control their own education
• Navajo teachers
• Community members volunteered time
• Started as an elementary school
• English and Math
• Navajo language and culture
Exercising Sovereignty
over Education
National Indian
Education Association ,
est. 1969
Coalition of Indian
Controlled School Boards
est. 1971
Promoted all-Indian
school boards
• Became first tribal college in American History
• Navajo Community College, est. 1969
• Later called. Dine’ College
SINTE GLESKA COLLEGE
• Established on Rosebud Reservation in 1971
• Passed by Rosebud Tribal Council
• Who was Sinte Gleska?
• Spotted Tail: tribe’s “wicasa itancan” (tribe’s highest leader) in
late 1800s
• Sinte Gleska said that to survive, Indians must learn white
society while retaining Indian ways
• He sent his children to Carlisle Indian School, but when he
learned that it was military like and assimilationist, he brought
them to teach them both white and Indian knowledge
• Pedagogy
• Lakota Studies Program: culture and language
• English, math and science
• Taught Indian and non-Indian students
• College’s Motto: “Never forget where you came from”
OTHER TRIBAL COLLEGES
Little Big Horn College, Crow Reservation
Sitting Bull College
Salish Kootenai College at Flathead
Today, 32 tribal colleges, there is still need for better
infrastructure, etc.
• Growing number of Native American college
students
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• 1950s = 2000 students
• 1970s = 10,000 students
• Today = 147,000 students
REBUILDING TRIBAL COMMUNITIES
AFTER TERMINATION
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
DURING THE
ERA OF SELF-DETERMINATION
INTRODUCTION TO LEGAL SYSTEMS IN
INDIAN COUNTRY
• Unlike European systems, Indians relied on
banishment and restitution to victims and their
families
• Ex: Crow Dog killed Sinte Gleska on Rosebud Reservation
because of his advocation of accommodating to whites
• Lakota decided that Crow Dog would pay eight horses, $600,
and a blanket to Sinte Gleska’s family
• BIA adopted in 1883, Code of Federal Regulations
(CRF)
• CRF Courts
• BIA jails and police
• Prosecuted against practitioners of ceremonies, like the Sun
Dance
TRIBAL COURTS
• Indian Reorganization Act, 1934
• CRF courts replaced by tribal courts
• By 1970, there were eighty-five tribal courts
• Like non-Indian courts
• Indian Civil Rights Act (1968) requires due process
and other protections of civil liberties (as required
by the U.S. Constitution
• Use of evidence, judicial procedures, etc.
• Looks like a typical court: flags, judge’s gowns, etc.
• Major crimes, like murder, are tried in nonIndian courts
• Unlike non-Indian courts:
• For non-serious crimes, tribal courts use traditional
forms of law (like restitution or the customary laws
of the tribe)
NAVAJO COURT SYSTEM
• In 1959, Navajo created their own judiciary
• Seven district courts and a 3-judge supreme court
• Chief Justice Robert Yazzie
• Oberlin College and University of New Mexico
• Court advocates for defendants who cannot afford
lawyers
• Use of Navajo Common Law
• Example: case can be heard in district where defendant’s
mother resides, even though they might not live their
• Allows for juries who are sympathetic to defendant
• Following slide: Navajo Peace Making Court
NAVAJO PEACEMAKER COURT
• Established in 1982
• Form of Restitution  to mediate disputes
• Use of ‘Peace-Makers’
Compare with Tohono
Oodham maka’i = medicine
men, troubled youth are
assigned to be mentored by a
maka’i
• Medicine men, elders chosen by respective Chapter
Houses
• Respected by both parties
• To get the wrongdoer and victim to talk out their
problems
• No one treated as “good” or “bad”
• No “eye for an eye” or “tooth for a tooth”
• Bring harmony back to parties involved
• Use of ceremonies
• To “purify” parties involved
• To ratify solutions
Anglo system:
Vertical
-Judges at top
-Judges viewed as superior in
solving problems with law
Navajo system
Horizontal
-Judges, defendants, victims viewed
as the same
• Legislation now requires use of peacemaking
court in all cases
INDIANS MANAGING THEIR LANDS
DURING THE ERA OF SELF
DETERMINATION
STEWARDS OF THE LAND
• Using Self Determination, tribes have
sought to control their own natural
resources according to their traditions
and western science
• Apache word ni’ = mind and land are
the same
• Vine Deloria Jr. “Indians can be unhappy,
but I do not think that Indians are ever
lonely. They are never alone. The plains,
the canyons all have so many stories.”
(Wilkinson, p. 305)
NATIVE AMERICANS CONTROLLING
FISHING RESOURCES
• After Boldt Decision 1974, Northwest
Indian Fisheries Commission was created
in mid 1970s
• River: Salmon, etc.
• Ocean: Rock Fish, etc.
• Columbia River Intertribal Fish Commission
(Nez Perce, Umatilla, Warm Springs, and
Yakima), est. mid 1970s
• Scientist staff
• Law enforcement
• Research
• Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife
Commission, est. in 1980s
Compare with: Intertribal
Bison Cooperative which
seeks to bring back the
Buffalo, central to Great
Plains Indians’ historic pasts.
Like bringing back the
Salmon is key to traditional
practices of the Northwest
tribes.
QUINAULT TRIBE RECLAIMS ITS TIMBER
RESOURCES
• Led by Joe DeLaCruz barricades the Chow Chow Bridge
from access to forest for timber companies, in 1971
• Forced negotiations
• Tribe argued that destruction of forest destroyed salmon runs
• After passage of the Self-Determination Act 1975, tribe
reclaimed control of its timber resources
• Quinault created a combined forest and fisheries
conservation program
• To protect and use timber resources efficiently
• To protect and conserve Pacific Salmon, Quinault River
Blueback, halibut, shellfish
OTHER EXAMPLES OF NATIVE
MANAGEMENT OF RESERVATION
FORESTS
• Warms Springs Tribe (Oregon) set policy
regarding timber cutting
• Warm Springs Forest Products, est. 1967
• Hired Oregon State University faculty to
conduct study
• Recommended that cutting be reduced for
cultural reasons, even though a larger cut was
sustainable
• Fort Apache Timber Co. does not allow
non-Indian timber companies on
reservation
WHITE MOUNTAIN APACHE ASSERTED
THEIR SOVEREIGNTY OVER HAWLEY LAKE
• Context: 1950s tribe dammed lakes to make deeper
and lakes opened up to non-Indians for recreation
• In 1959, non-Indians allowed to purchase 25 year
leases to land in the Hawley Lake area
• In 1977, tribal council prohibited new leases and did
not renew old leases  non-Indian homeowners angry
• Hawley Lake Homeowners Association appealed to
Interior Department, but were denied
• Homeowners lost houses, tribe reclaimed area
because self-determination gave rights to a sovereign
Indian nation
• Like the Menominee who stopped the Legend Lake
land sales
• DRUM supported ending the sale of reservation lands to
vacationers and succeeded in restoring Menominee tribal
government and reservation
DRUM =
Determination
of Rights and
Unity for
Menominee
Shareholders
INDIAN CASINOS
INDIAN CASINOS:
SEMINOLE INDIANS OF FLORIDA
• Tribal Chairman Howard Tommie
• Built high-stakes bingo hall, 7 miles from Ft. Lauderdale, in
the late 1970s
• Bingo Hall was against Florida state law
• Open 6 days a week, jackpot winnings over $100
• Sheriff Robert Butterworth of Broward Co. promised to close
down bingo hall and make arrests
• Seminole Indians sued Broward Co.
• In 1980, Judge Norman Roettger decided in favor of tribe
• Cited Worcester v. Georgia (1832), states cannot pass laws
on Indian land, only the federal government has jurisdiction
on reservations
INDIAN CASINOS: CABAZON AND
MORONGO INDIANS OF S. CALIFORNIA
• Cabazon Band open bingo and poker club in 1980, outside
of Los Angeles
• Sheriff of Riverside Co. closed club, issued citations, and made
arrests of employees and customers
• Cabazon Band sued Riverside Co.
• Morongo Indian Reservation opened bingo hall several
months later
• Riverside Co. was to raid bingo hall, and Morongo Indians sued
county
• Federal judge combined Cabazon and Morongo suits into
one case
• Cabazon and Morongo prevailed through several courts
• Supreme Court accepted the case in 1986
• Supreme Court case California v. Cabazon Band of Mission
Indians (1987) said tribe has right to have a casino and that
Congress can regulate it, not the state of California
• Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (1988) = Tribes can regulate their
casinos except when contrary to federal law
In 1995,
the Siletz
Tribe,
Oregon
establish
Chinook
Winds
Casino.
Indian Head
Gaming
Center at
Kah-Nee-Ta
PRESERVING THE OLD WAYS
TRADITIONALISM
• Aspects of contemporary Native American life that
predates non-Indian influence
• Language
• Dances and Ceremonies,
• Art
• Tribal museums
• Literature
• Analysis?:
• The old and new are often combined
• What else?
PRESERVING LANGUAGE:
BLACKFEET TRIBE (MONTANA)
• Darrel Robes Kipp founded Piegan Institute 1987
• Piegan Institute - research and preserve Blackfeet
language
Piegan =Pikuni “far
off spotted robes”
true name of the
Blackfeet.
• Kipp traveled to Hawaii visited Punana Leo
• Punana Leo, first native language immersion school
• Punana Leo gave Kipp ideas to have Piegan
Institute to teach the language of the Blackfeet
• Kipp established:
• Moccasin Flat School (k-8th grades), and later schools
• Students attending school take classes and speak
only in Blackfeet language
• (Like how boarding schools forced English, language
immersion schools only allowed Blackfeet language?)
Washoe Tribe
(Nevada) est.
Washiw
Wagayay
Mangal “The
House Where
Washiw is
Spoken.
“MEXICAN” INDIANS RECEIVED
RESERVATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES
KICKAPOO INDIAN TRIBE
• Originally from Great Lakes region, pushed onto
Great Plains and south into Coahuila, Mexico by
mid 1800s
• Received ‘ejidos’ as reward for generations of
Kickapoo raids which drove cattle from Texas into
Mexico
• Brought their traditions, like belief in Manitou, the Great
Spirit
• In the 1900s, tribal members crossed the U.S.
Mexican border for seasonal work
• Kickapoo put through a bill in Congress to create
a small reservation near Eagle Pass, Texas, their
tradition border crossing site
• Reservation approved in 1977
Mexican
President
Benito Juarez
gave ‘ejidos’
to Kickapoo.
PASCUA YAQUI INDIAN TRIBE
• Yaqui Indians = southern Sonora, Mexico
• Engaged in seasonal work, in Arizona
• Industrial production, large scale mining, ranch work
• Yaqui brought with them their traditions
• Replicated their culture in U.S., for generations
• Yaqui petition for a reservation in Arizona
• Took a long time
• Received reservation in 1964, Guadalupe, Arizona, in the
Tucson area
• Pascua Yaqui Association (non-profit) created to receive title
and funds
• Federal government recognize as a tribe in 1978
• Constitution created in 1988
HAWAIIAN INDIGENOUS MOVEMENT
HAWAIIAN INDIGENOUS MOVEMENT
• To preserve and promote Hawaiian culture and
empowerment
• Context:
• Missionaries convert King Kamehameha II, in 1820s
• Land redistribution forced onto King Kamehameha III
• Anglos get land, build ranches and sugar plantations
• Sugar planters toppled Queen Liliuokalani in 1893, Planters in
control of Hawaii until U.S. annexation in 1898
• World War II = military buildup, bases
• Post WWII = Anglo immigration
• Tourism  resorts during the 1960s and 1970s
• Movement began around 1976 with occupation of the
island called Kaho’olawe  see next slide
OCCUPATION OF KAHO’OLAWE
• History of Kaho’olawe
• King Kamehameha III distributed land to Anglos
• Goat and sheet ranching by Robert Wyllie
• WWII – Island target range for bombing, continued as property of U.S. Army
to the 1970s
• Kaho’olawe “embodied all the injuries to the land, the culture,
and the sovereignty.” (Wilkinson, 371)
• Group paddled to island and were arrested, in 1976
• Were arrested several times for other attempts to occupy island, “peaceful
non-violence”
• Raised national attention of the movement
• Hawaiian musician George Helm, “cultural leader”
• Doctor Noa Emmett Aluli, “political leader”, filed lawsuits against U.S.
military
• Military gave permission to conduct ceremonies on the island, 4days each month
• Empowered Hawaiian Indigenous Movement
• Agenda = Sovereignty, protection of beach access rights, environmental
restoration of Kaho’olawe and transfer of island to Hawaiian ownership
OTHER EXAMPLES OF
TRADITIONALISM
POWWOWS
Powwow from
Narragansett
Language
meaning
“meeting.”
• Evolved from the “Grass Dance”, popular on
reservations in 19th century
• Grass Dance Societies provided opportunities for
warriors to re-enact deeds in battle
• Became popular, commercialized by last half of
20th Century
• Powwows involve
• Traditional type dancing for competition
• Drumming for competition
• Vendors
• Open to the public, but alcohol sales
• Examples:
• Gathering of Nations Powwow, Albuquerque, NM
• Siletz Tribe (Oregon, confederated tribe), timed to
celebrate the Siletz Restoration Act
•
Confederated
Tribes of Siletz
became 2nd
tribe to have
reservation
status restored,
in 1877.
SACRED AREAS AND CEREMONIES
CLOSED TO NON-INDIANS
• Mescalero Apache’s sacred
mountain Dzil Ligai Si’an closed to
non-Indians
• White Mountain Apache do not
allow hikers on top of their sacred
mountain
• Tourists cannot go to Blue Lake, of
the Taos Pueblo
• Kachina Dances not opened to
outsiders
Native American Church
Peyote usage preColumbian
Combined with
Christianity (Quanah
Parker’s idea). Usually, all
Indians, but non-Indians
NATIVE AMERICAN
ART AND LITERATURE
• Art
• Allan Houser
• Trained at Santa Fe Indian School and Utah State University
• Receive Guggenheim Fellowship in 1949, became full-time artist
• “Sacred Rain Arrow” donated to Congress
• Literature
• Vine Deloria Jr., Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto
(1969)
• History: Challenged stereotypes, critical view of American History and
U.S. expansionism
• Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony (1977)
• Novel: Tayo, WWII veteran from Laguna Pueblo, shell-shocked,
alcoholism, but is helped by grandmother and a Navajo shaman
Betonie through traditional ceremonies, finds who he is as a member of
the Laguna Pueblo
• Sherman Alexie, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven
(1993)
• Novel: Protagonists are two Spokane Indians from Washington, plot
includes Indian man leaving his white girlfriend in Seattle and returning
to reservation, depicting Indians surviving in world that remains hostile to
their survival
QUINAULT CANOE JOURNEY
WASHINGTON, 1994
• Ocean canoes stopped being used in 1940s
• In 1980s, tribes of Northwest built ocean canoes
once again
• Ex: rebirth of traditional culture
• Canoes (historically for fishing), and totem poles (gods of
the ancestors) central to the culture
• Quinault Canoe Club sponsored the event
• Canoe journeys each year
OTHER ASPECTS TO CONSIDER
NAGPRA
• Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation
Act (1990) – Museums, individuals must return funeral
items, cannot dig up Indian burial grounds
• Background: Wana the Bear v. Community Construction
(Echo-Hawk Ch. 10)
• California, Miwok Indians, driven away by miners in 1800s
• Bulldozing, Stockton, CA housing development, unearthed
Miwok graveyard
• Wana the Bear sued company
• California law of 1854 said six or more human bodies
constitutes a ceremony
• Calif. Court of Appeals: Burial ground is not cemetery in
it was not used continuously for five years
• Did not take in account: Miwok had been driven away
• Disagreement – led to NAGPRA
• Suzan Shown Harjo (director of NCAI) and Colorado Sen. Ben
Nighthorse Campbell (Cheyenne)
AMERICAN INDIAN RELIGIOUS
FREEDOM ACT 1994
• Background: Employment Division v.
Smith (1990) (ch. 11)
• Native American Church members in
Oregon fired from a drug rehabilitation
clinic, as employed counselors
• Counselor included Al Smith – Klamath
Indian Reservation
• Peyote saved him from alcoholism
• AIRFA of 1994 overturned Supreme
Court Decision
• Native American Church now legal
LYNG V. NORTHWEST INDIAN
CEMETERY ASSOCIATION (1988, CH. 12)
• First Amendment (religious freedom) does not
necessarily apply to Indians worshiping on sacred
ground
• Background: Six Rivers National Forest – open “High
Country” in N. California to logging
• Yurok, Karok, and Tolowa Indians asked courts to
protect their worship in the mountains
• Smith River National Recreation Act 1990, created
Siskiyou Wilderness
• Protected sacred sites from logging
• Compare: Taos Blue Lake and Tee-Hit-Ton Indians v.
United States (1955)
CONCLUSION
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Warms Spring Reservation
Ka-Ne-Tah Resort, Inn of the Mountain Gods
Red Capitalism
Education: Rough Rock Demonstration School, Diné
College, Sinte Gleska College
Law: Restorative Justice, Navajo Peace Making Court
Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission
Indian Gaming: California v. Cabazon Band of Mission
Indians (1987)
Hawaiian Indigenous Movement
Preserving Language, Religion
Powwows
Grave protection, religious freedom, etc.