From gars@netcom.com Wed Jan 14 00:02:00 1998 Date: Tue, 6 Jan 1998 19:56:47 -0800 (PST) From: Gary Night Owl To: Internet Recipients of Wotanging Ikche Subject: Wotanging Ikche--nanews06.002 _ __ _____ __ _ __ ___ ____ _ __ ___ ' ) / / ') / / ) ' ) ) / ) / ' ) ) / ) / / / / / / /--/ / / / ___ / / / / ___ (_(_/ (__/ ( / (_ / (_ (___/ '__/_ / (_ (___/ ' O ____ _ , ___ _ , ___ O o O / ' ) / / ) ' ) / / ' O o O / /-< / /--/ /-- VOLUME 06, ISSUE 002 O o o o o O __/_ / ) (___/ / ( (___, 10 January 1998 O o O KANOHEDA ANIYVWIYA Otapi'sin Atsinikiisinaakssin O o O Es'te Opunvk'vmucvse ni-mah-mi-kwa-zoo-min Aunchemokauhettittea O ( N A T I V E A M E R I C A N N E W S ) This issue contains articles from AISESnet, NAT-Film and Triballaw lists; Workers World News Service; Settlers In Support of Indigenous Sovereignty; NASC News; Newsgroups: alt.native,soc.culture.native; UUCP email Articles appearing have been previously posted for public dissemination and/or permission for inclusion has been secured. Letters of authorization are on file. A list of those granting permission to repost their words in this issue are listed at the end of part A. I thank each of you for allowing your words to be shared with the people. IMPORTANT!! ----------- To all who send copywrite protected articles, make very sure you have permission from the copywrite holder (a newspaper, the AP, a magazine, an author) because a new law is now in effect that says you can be prosecuted even if there is no monetary gain. Just because a newspaper has a website where it posts some or all of its editions does not grant permission for their redistribution. Be careful and be sure you pass on the items you do with full permission. <----<<<< >>>>----> This newsletter is a way of keeping the brothers and sisters who share our Spirit informed about current events within the lives of those who walk the Red Road. ++ It may be subscribed to via email by sending a request from your own internet addressable account to gars@netcom.com ++ It is archived at http://www.nanews.org Thanks to Borries Demeler all _Wotanging_Ikche_ (part a) submissions to AISESnet are archived under AISESnet and can be accessed easily by World Wide Web: 1994: http://aises.uthscsa.edu/94_dis.html 1995: http://aises.uthscsa.edu/95_dis.html 1996: http://aises.uthscsa.edu/96_dis.html 1997: http://aises.uthscsa.edu/97_dis.html This is a searchable index to the AISESnet Discussion mailing list database archive, and the keyword "Wotanging" will retrieve all issues for that year. Source for this issue's quote: Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology published by J.W. Powell in 1888-1889. Reported by Brown Hat (Battiste Good in Anglo) Battiste told the following: A woman spoke to me and said, "I am the Eagle Woman, who tell you this. The whites know that there are four black flags of God; that is, four divisions of the earth. He first made the earth soft by wetting it, then cut it into four parts, one of which, containing the Black Hills, he gave to the Lakotas, and because I am a woman, I shall not consent to the pouring of blood on this dwelling place, the Black Hills. The time will come when you will remember my words; for, after many years, you shall grow up one with the white people." He continued, "She then circled round and round and gradually passed out of my sight. I also saw prints of a man's hands and horse's hooves on the rocks and two thousand years, and one hundred million dollars ($100,000,000). I came away crying, as I had gone. I have told this to many Lakotas, and all agree that it meant tha we were to seek and keep peace with the whites." There are those Lakota today who think it meant if they accept money for the Black Hills they will be destroyed as a nation by the year 2000. +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ | Indian Pledge of Allegiance | The Indian Pledge of Alleg- | | iance was first presented | I pledge allegiance to my Tribe,| on 2 December '93 during the | to the democratic principles | opening address of the Nat- | of the Republic | ional Congress of American | and to the individual freedoms | Indian Tribal-States Relat- | borrowed from the Iroquois and | ions Panel in Reno, NV. NCAI | Choctaw Confederacies, | plans distribution of the | as incorporated in the United | Indian Pledge to all Indian | States Constitution, | Nations. | so that my forefathers | | shall not have died in vain | Walk in Beauty! Night Owl +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ O'siyo Brothers and Sisters! I continue to see Rez Indian versus Urban Indian and Full Blood against Mixed Blood, or "I'm a real Indian, you're not" exchanges. I am sometimes asked why I include news about First peoples of Mexico and Canada. Let me address both issues with a simple statement. When the Europeans arrived on this continent, there were no U. S./Canada or U. S./Mexico borders. The Nations that lived here coexisted for the most part with occasional territory confrontations, largely over hunting grounds. Even these were sometimes settled with games. In the southeast woodlands Creek and Cherokee often settled disputes with a Toli Ball game. In short order after the arrival of the Europeans one tribe after another was pitted against each other, all to the gain of the new arrivals. Those who came to a Nation with a good heart were brought into the community and considered one of the People - period. It took the U. S. government ands its BIA to create a blood quantum requirement to be a member of a Nation. This is the same U. S. government that created boarding schools to strip our children of their heritage and force them to assimilate. This is the same U. S. government that forced sterilization on Native women in IHS hospitals. That same mentality by the occupiers prevails in Canada, Mexico, Brazil and any place else you can name on Turtle Island. Unless you agree with those who would have the final answer to the "Indian Question" be "What Indians?", and unless you really want the Tribes to have their sovereignty and identity taken away with the stroke of a pen, you better understand this. Either we stand together and survive or we become a "last bottle" club with no reason to give a damn if someone is Native or not. =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= Here's some potential good news for the Buffalo Nation: Source: Drovers Journal December '97 issue "A new vaccine against brucellosis in cattle shows promise for protecting bison against the disease. Bison and elk are the last major sources of brucellosis in the US, according to the US Dept. of Agriculture. Scientists with USDA's Agricultural Research Service have been checking the newest vaccines containing B. abortus strain RB51 for its effectiveness and safety in bison. One study showed the vaccinated bison's immune response was comparable to that of cattle vaccinated with RB51. None of the vaccinated bison shed live bacterium into the environment." =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= The friendly folks from Bentonville still want to dig up our ancestors: Date: Mon, 05 Jan 1998 10:49:45 -0600 From: Mike Subj: Heads up on WALMART The following information about the proposed WalMart site in west Nashville Tennessee requires your attention. We have confirmed that the proposed Wal Mart site will not be moved into the federal section 106 process of the Archaeological Protection Act. Termination of cemetery was supposed to have been filed for in October so this situation has now moved into a critical stage. Please step up your actions concerning WalMart and Lowe's as well as your senators and congressmen to stop the destruction of this native burial site. =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= In past issues of Wotanging Ikche's list of donation contacts, I mistakenly linked MORNING STAR OUTREACH in Bismarck, ND with MORNING STAR FELLOWSHIP CIRCLE in Wilmington, DE. Morning Star Fellowship Circle, Inc. 321 Beverly Place Wilmington, DE 19809 Phone: 302-764-1178 EMail - candy crow@aol.com MORNING STAR OUTREACH c/o Cassada 320 N. 31st #13 Bismarck, North Dakota 58501 These two organizations coincidentally have similar names but they are not connected in any way. Candy Crow's Morning Star Fellowship Circle in Delaware collected goods which were delivered to South Dakota over the holidays. Dawn and Douglas Cassada direct Morning Star Outreach, which continues to provide assistance as described below. If you'd like to help Morning Star Outreach, please contact them at their address in North Dakota. I apologize to both organizations for any confusion. MORNING STAR OUTREACH c/o Cassada 320 N. 31st #13 Bismarck, North Dakota 58501 Charitable organization founded and directed by Dawn & Douglas Cassada. MORNING STAR OUTREACH chooses to offer direct as well as mediation assistance to the United States American Indian Reservations in the form of clothing, bedding, food provisions, toys for the children, scholarship funding and household provisions. This also includes craft items, fabrics, beads, patterns, yarns and notions. MORNING STAR OUTREACH chooses, because of the census reports, to Support the reservations of the Native Lakota Sioux Nation within the United States,South and North Dakota. =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= The tragic plight of our elders on the various reservations is so great, their peril so real, their walk so close to the edge that I will continue to feature contact addresses where you can send donations of clothing, food, blankets, money to purchase fuel and repair throughout the winter. Christmas has come and gone. Winter has not. The need for clothing and food did NOT take a holiday. As new contacts are received they will be added to the list. PLEASE help the elders. PLEASE help grow this list and help ALL the elders. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - For additional information or to make donations contact: For the Red Shirt Community: Marvin Helper P.O. Box 312 Hermosa, SD 57744 For Porcupine, Oglala and Wounded Knee: Joe Chasing Horse % P.O. Box 8392 Rapid City, S.D. 57709 For Truck loads & UPS Shipments: Joe Chasing Horse 714 Paha Sapa Drive Rapid City, SD 57701 From: Lora Czarnowsky Adi Defender Project New Dawn PO Box 616 McLaughlin, SD 57642 This is for the various communities on the Standing Rock Reservation. Another contact is actually two projects: One is Santa's Workshop and the other is called Wakanheja Tipi. They are both run by Liam Paterson and his wife. Liam Paterson 1434 Creek Road Manheim, PA 17545 717-665-2727 From: tusweca Darlene Cross PO Box 52 Kyle SD 577075 From: yona@infi.net Toy drive going on for the Cheyenne River Reservation in Eagle Butte If you would like to donate a toy or more information, you may contact me by email: yona@infi.net or phone me 757-425-7992..you may also drop off a toy if you are in the vicinity of our store Na-va'kee 618 Hilltop West. biah yazzie From: DORSEY.THOMAS_J+@ALBANY.VA.GOV Norma Grassrope Lower Brule Reservation Lower Brule, South Dakota 57028 (605) 473-5594 She is the chair of a charitable group called the Womens Support Group. From: Pioquark@aol.com Clay Watson Pioneer Industries 1100 E. 24th St. Cheyenne, Wy. 82001 (307)778-7860 pioquark@aol.com These donations will be gifted to the Rose Bud and Pine Ridge Reservations in South Dakota and the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. I'm on the road a lot, out back loading the truck etc. PLEASE leave a message if there is no answer.. From: ALBERT SUN BUTLER Ti Ospaye PO Box 200 Wanblee SD 57577 Supporting the elders through personal contact: Adopt A Grandparent Mountain Light Center PO Box 241 Taos NM 87571 TEL: 505 776 8474 FAX: 505 776 8050 For information call 800 291-8474. email: agpmlc@aol.com For the Cherokee, NC Rez and South FL (Now taking one load/week): From: "lonewolf" Lone Wolf -or- Bob and Linda Crowe 1060 N. Bee St. 2800 West Highway 5 Deland, Fl 32720 Bowden, GA 30108 770-258-1536 From BIGMTLIST The Dineh could use some blankets to help with the cold winters. Bonnie Whitesinger Box 1073 Hotevilla, AZ 86030 Bonnie is Dineh elder and resistor Pauline Whitesinger's daughter. Bonnie, her husband Bob, and their children are at this address. Anything would have to be sent by US postal service, and not UPS as UPS doesn't deliver to PO boxes. BTW, I have been told that often people who send clothes usually send in sizes too small; apparently the Dineh are generally large people. From: FNAIC@aol.com Walking Shield in Southern California regularly send truck loads of food, clothing and needed items to many reservations. They are located at 2472 Chambers Rd. Tustin, CA. 922680 telephone 714-573-1434 Hugh Stevens is the boss. they will only take fairly new and clean used items - any new items - and donations form large corps. They seem to be on the up and up and have helped many local reservations and native organizations. Carol --------------------------------------------- From: leslie@neca.com Pathways to Spirit in Fort Collins Colorado Contact: Carmeen Klausner Phone: 970 282 8573 email pathways@webaccess.net This group is non profit and takes tractor trailer loads of clothes and furniture to Pine Ridge several times each year. --------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 17 Dec 1997 14:03:10 -0800 From: POP ACCOUNT We would ask simply that you take a few minutes to visit our web site at http://www.nightwalker.org/holidays and review the information provided there. If you find it in yourself to help these children, there is a link on the site there to our SSL Secure server for online donations, or you can download and print out a form that can be mailed instead. If you do not have access to the World Wide Web, but would still like to help out, you can send an email to donate@nightwalker.org, and a donation form will be automatically sent back to you. Night Walker Enterprises is an all volunteer, 501(c)(3) non profit corporation, and all donations are tax deductible to the extent permitted by IRS regulations and current US tax law. -------------------------------------------- Those shipping large amounts of materials to reservations may have a great opportunity to facilitate your shipping. This arrived in this week's email, and I have not had an opportunity to pursue it further. I offer it now, in hopes it will help some in the contact list. A lot of reservations are near military facilities. PLEASE let me know how things go if you do attempt to use this service: Date: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 11:45:42 -0600 Subj: transportation of relief materials Senders name removed by request. FYI For transportation of relief materials by non-profit agencies or groups. Telephone all of your local congressman's offices and request in writing, their assistance in obtaining military transportation assistance. Then contact the nearest military base with an airfield, Public Affairs Office (PAO) and also a written letter to the Base Commander also requesting assistance. The military and in particular the USAF has many cargo aircraft (C-130 Hercules, KC-10, C-141, C-17 and C-5). The State Air National Guard's own C-130's and the US Marines owns a number of C-130 aircraft. Flying Aircrews require a number of training flight hours per quarter to maintain their Flight Proficiency. There is always some aircraft heading in the correct direction. The aircraft cannot deliver to the door but can deliver to within a few hundred miles at the most. Please consider that some of these aircraft weigh 140 Tons or more and will "sink" into concrete less than 18+ inches deep. Therefore they cannot land at just any airfield runway. The shipped materials must be shipped securely fastened on pallets (no loose material, everything sealed in boxes, some restrictions on flammables and no propellents (explosives)). The PAO will provide the necessary guidance. The local Flight Engineers, Loadmasters and even Boy Scouts will help with the inspection, boxing and palletizing. The USAF is always hauling materials (on a non-interference basis naturally) for charitable purposes. No one likes an empty cargo aircraft. =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - If any of you have addresses/contacts to add to this list for other Rez's PLEASE email me with them soon. Include some name/info for me to verify where gifts will be sent and how. Winter winds have already brought snow. I am especially concerned about the lack of contacts for the Montana Rez's. email to gars@netcom.com =/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\=/\= Peace! Night Owl , , Gary Night Owl gars@netcom.com (*,*) P. O. Box 672168 gars@nanews.org (`-') Marietta, GA 30067, U.S.A. gars@igc.apc.org ===w=w=== gars@bellsouth.net Fax: 770-528-9643 gars@juno.com ----------- News of the people featured in this issue ---------- - Leonard Peltier/Political Prisoner - Stand Off with Quebec - Joe Crow must Go - Last Refuge Campaign Update - Rally For Justice Update - Pre-Land Bridge Indians - The Destroyers - First 16 Buffalo Saved - Behind the Chiapas Massacre - Funding for Indians - Info about Oaxaca-Kahnawake Trade - Native Prisoner - Wal Mart Sued for Discrimination - A Hundred Years Ago - Buffalo Nations December Report - Poem: Winged Stone - Councilor Abhors Living Conditions - Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days - Link to Askwitteachik - Conferences and Powwows - Tunica-Biloxi Nations --------- "RE: Leonard Peltier/Political Prisoner" --------- Date: Thu, 1 Jan 1998 13:01:03 -0600 (CST) From: Carol Liu Subj: FWD: !*LEONARD PELTIER - Native American P.P. "Any movement that fails to support its political internees is a sham movement!" - Ojore N. Lutalo --------------------------------------------- The following information comes from "CAN'T JAIL THE SPIRIT", Third Edition, October, 1992; Editorial El Coqui, Publishers - 1671 N. Claremont, Chicago, IL 60647, 312-342-8027. Cost $12.00. VERY WELL worth the money! ============================== LEONARD PELTIER - Native American Political Prisoner =========================== Leonard Peltier is a 49-year-old Anishinabe/Lakota born on the Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota. Peltier traces the roots of his political activism to the racism and brutal poverty which he witnessed growing up there. In 1958, during a period when the United States was attempting to "terminate" reservations (i.e. unilaterally abrogate the international agreements allocating these lands to Indian people) and relocate Indians to urban ghettos, Peltier joined his relatives in the Pacific Northwest. In 1970, an opportunity presented itself for him to express his aspirations to actively help his people. A group of Indians occupied Ft. Lawton, an abandoned military base in Seattle, Wash. The base was legally Indian land, and Peltier joined the occupiers who were demanding its return. It was here that Peltier first met American Indian Movement (AIM) organizers. After the occupation ended, Peltier became increasingly active in AIM politics. In 1972, he helped to organize the Trail of Broken Treaties in the Milwaukee, Wis. area. The Trail, a march from reservations across the U.S. to Washington, D.C., intended to focus public attention on the oppression of Indian people, ended, due to dishonesty and incompetence on the part of federal officials, with the occupation and destruction of the Bureau of Indian Affairs headquarters. Peltier actively participated in the occupation, acting as security coordinator. It was following the Trail of Broken Treaties that the FBI targeted the "AIM Leadership" for neutralization, either by embroiling them in endless, fabricated court cases or by outright assassination. Upon his return to Milwaukee, Peltier was brutally assaulted by two off-duty policemen and then charged with attempted murder for trying to defend himself. He spent five months in jail on the charges and went underground soon after making bond. He was later acquitted of the charges and the FBI was implicated in instigating the attack. During 1973 and 1974, the Northwest AIM Group of which Peltier was a member became increasingly relied upon to provide security for AIM activities. In the spring of 1975, the group established an encampment on the land of the Jumping Bull Family near Oglala, S.D., on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Since 1972, Pine Ridge had been the scene of a massive paramilitary "peacekeeping" operation by then FBI Director William Webster; it was, like the British "peacekeeping" operation in Northern Ireland, actually counterinsurgency warfare. Carried out under FBI direction by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) police and a private army known as the GOONs, this large-scale terrorist operation was directly responsible for the deaths of more than sixty AIM members and supporters and for hundreds of assaults. The Jumping Bull camp was established at the request of Oglala organizers and traditional elders to protect their community from further GOON depredations. The FBI found the presence of the camp and AIM interference with GOON activities intolerable, but noted that military force would be required to assault the camp. What they lacked was a justification. This was created on June 26, 1975, when FBI Special Agents Jack Coler and Ronald Williams entered the Jumping Bull property to, as one AIM member put it, serve a warrant they didn't have on someone who wasn't there for a crime over which they had no jurisdiction. This rash act precipitated a firefight which eventually involved more than 200 federal troops and left Coler, Williams, and AIM member Joe Stuntz Killsright dead. Despite a massive manhunt characterized by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights as "an over- reaction which takes on the aspects of a vendetta ... a full-scale military invasion," the FBI was unable to find the participants in the firefight. Eventually, they charged three Northwest AIM members, Leonard Peltier, Bob Robideau, and Dino Butler in the deaths of the agents. Butler and Robideau were tried in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in July 1976. To the dismay of the FBI and federal prosecutors, the jury, horrified by evidence of FBI complicity in a large-scale campaign of terrorism, found the defendants not guilty on the grounds that they had acted in self- defense. The government vowed to ensure that this did not happen in the case of Leonard Peltier. He was fraudulently extradited from Canada in 1976 and run through a sham trial in the spring of 1977 in Fargo, N.D. Judge Paul Benson cooperated with the FBI in refusing to allow the jury to hear testimony of FBI misconduct and interfering with the cross- examination of prosecution witnesses who were clearly lying. Peltier was found guilty of two counts of first degree murder on the basis of fabricated evidence and coerced testimony. He was sentenced to two consecutive life terms. His conviction has been upheld through two rounds of appeals despite the FOIA documents proving that the FBI lied concerning the most important evidence presented by the prosecution and an admission by DA Lynn Crooks that he "couldn't prove who shot those agents." Peltier was sent directly to USP Marion, disproving recent media allegations that it is used only for prisoners who have committed crimes in prison. Peltier continued to function as an activist within the "super-max" prison. He, his family, and his supporters participated in the struggle for prisoners' rights and were in the forefront during the hunger strike, work stoppage, marches, and rallies of the early 1980s. In April 1984, Leonard, Standing Deer, and Albert Garza began a spiritual fast to call attention to the systematic denial of religious rights at Marion. Leonard was transferred to Springfield Medical Center and eventually to Leavenworth, where he remains today. Peltier's uncompromising resistance fueled the growth of an international movement which has focused attention not only on his case but upon broader issues of indigenous land rights and POWs/political prisoners in the U.S. Millions of individuals have written letters and signed petitions demanding a new trial, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu, fifty members of the U. S. Congress, and fifty-one members of the Canadian Parliament. Mikhail Gorbachev evoked a wave of protest from the U.S. press when he responded to Reagan's "human rights agenda" by suggesting the U.S. clean up its human rights violations, citing Indians in general and Leonard Peltier in particular. Currently, Peltier supporters are calling for a Congressional investigation into the FBI's criminal activity which led to his imprisonment. In light of recent revelations of FBI misconduct, public support for such an investigation is growing. As Leonard has recently said, "We still have a long way to go, but my heart is strong, knowing that one day I will be free, as will all political prisoners, as will all people." WRITE TO BRO. LEONARD PELTIER: Leonard Peltier, No. 89637-132, P.O. Box 1000, Leavenworth, KS 66048 OUTSIDE CONTACT: Leonard Peltier Defense Committee P.O. Box 10044 Kansas City, MO 64111 ======================== DISTRIBUTED FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY Build and Support Jericho '98 March on the White House! Demand Amnesty for Political Prisoners/POW's! http://www.jericho98.togdog.com --------- "RE: Joe Crow must Go" --------- Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 23:39:52 -0700 From: "S.I.S.I.S." Subj: CBC's 'Joe Crow' Must Go! :-:-:-:-:-:-:-Settlers In Support of Indigenous Sovereignty-:-:-:-:-:-:-: CBC TV'S "JOE CROW" MUST GO! The racist stereotyping of indigenous people by the colonizer media is one aspect of Canadian genocide. A case in point is the 'Joe Crow' character on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's "This Hour has 22 Minutes". In a recent edition of Windspeaker magazine, one reader put it this way: "I write to urge all readers of Windspeaker to write or telephone the nearest CBC studio to bitterly complain about a character called 'Joe Crow' who appears almost weekly in a mercifully brief segment of...This Hour Has 22 Minutes. Played by Cathy Jones, this 'Joe Crow' character offers the viewer a rambling, feeble-minded, and racist monologue that begs to be banished from the small screen as soon as possible. Time to tune it out!" At the same time as it systematically excludes covering the truth of Canadian colonialism, it actively aids the Canadian settler-state such as at Gustafsen Lake where it made propaganda broadcasts into the Ts'peten Sundance camp as part of the RCMP's "psy-ops" against Shuswap traditionalists defending against the largest paramilitary operation in Canadian history. Not only does CBC steadfastly refuse to correct the "smear and misinformation", hate propaganda and demonization of indigenous resisters, or investigate the high-level criminality of Canadian officials, it continues to ridicule, humiliate and patronize Aboriginal people via creations such as the Joe Crow character played by the white Canadian actress Cathy Jones. 'Joe Crow' Must Go! Tell them So! This Hour Has 22 Minutes: thishour@atcon.com CBC Ombudsman: cbcinput@toronto.cbc.ca cc: sisis@envirolink.org Racism and Genocide is Not Funny! --------- "RE: Rally For Justice Update" --------- Date: Mon, 29 Dec 1997 14:36:01 EST From: AIMAZ (by way of ishgooda ) Subj: UAINE Jan. 4 1998 message UUCP email January 4, 1998 Sisters and brothers: We apologize for not sending a message in a couple of weeks, but we wanted to take this time to meet, plan out a course of action for the next couple of months, and set some things in motion. In a few days, we will have a message and some important announcements about upcoming events resulting from the police attack in Plymouth on National Day of Mourning (thanksgiving day) 1997. Meanwhile, the Destroyers -- those who only know death and destruction -- were not taking any time off. They never rest. The day after the winter solstice, on December 22, the Destroyers in the incarnation of a paramilitary group massacred 45 unarmed Indigenous people in the village of Acteal in Chenolho, Chiapas, Mexico. The thoughts and prayers of millions of Indigenous people and many non-Native people also have been centered on this event. As we write this on the morning of January 4, 1998, there are many reports beginning to come out that the Zapatista strongholds in Chiapas may be under a massive assault by the Mexican Army. Whether it is happening today or not, such an attack has long been predicted by the EZLN. There are many actions taking place in many cities of the world to protest the massacre and to show support for the Zapatistas. Different cities are having actions on various days. For example, in Boston, there will be a day of action on Wednesday, January 7 (see below). PLEASE. Attend a demonstration in your area. Organize something. Write letters and send faxes and e-mails. DO SOMETHING. The Indigenous people of Chiapas and the Zapatistas who are seeking justice and land need the support of people from around the world just to survive. We are convinced that we need to do more than condemn the actions of the government of Mexico. For those of us who live within the U.S., it is critical that we point out the role of the U.S. government in training and funding the Mexican military and, by extension, paramilitary groups. Under the guise of the "war on drugs," many Mexican army officers have been trained at the notorious U.S. Army School of the Americas. The CIA has also been heavily involved with training elements of the Mexican Army and other agencies. The economic policies of the World Bank and other U.S. lending institutions have forced millions more Mexican people into the most bitter and harsh poverty. The policies of multinational corporations based in the United States are forcing many Mexicans off their land. The blood of the innocent civilians in Acteal, massacred while they were praying, is on the hands of Bill Clinton as surely as it is on the hands of the paramilitary assassins. We include information below about not only the upcoming Boston Day of Action, but also include a listing of people to whom you can send letters. Finally, at the request of a number of people. we include the Message of Solidarity from the Maya Elders which was read at the UAINE public meeting on December 20, 1997, two days before the massacre in Acteal. ---------------- [1. Press release about Boston action] DAY OF ACTION CALLED TO PROTEST CHIAPAS MASSACRE BOSTON, MASS. -- WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 7, 1998 A coordinated day of action has been called for January 7 in Boston, Mass. to show support for the EZLN (Zapatistas) and to protest the massacre of 45 Indigenous civilians in Chiapas, Mexico on December 22. The victims were refugees who had been displaced from their own villages by the encroachment of the Mexican army. These unarmed civilians were murdered by a paramilitary group supported and financed by Mexico's ruling party, the PRI. The actions are as follows: Tonantzin (Committee in Solidarity with the People of Mexico) is asking people to gather at 11:15 a.m. outside the Arlington Street Church (near Copley). From there, protesters will march to the Mexican Consulate, which is located at the Park Plaza Hotel. According to Juan Gonzalez, "We plan to deliver to the Mexican Consul 45 crosses, representing the innocent civilians massacred on December 22, as well as a letter with 3 demands: 'to investigate and bring to justice all the people involved in the massacre; to identify, dismantle and prosecute all the paramilitary groups, death squads, and private armies in Chiapas and throughout Mexico; and to honor and implement all the peace agreements, and to continue the peace talks with the EZLN (Zapatistas) in Chiapas.'" The protesters will then continue on to a downtown rally at 4 p.m. United American Indians of New England and the National Peoples Campaign are sponsoring a rush-hour rally at 4 p.m. in front of the John F. Kennedy Federal Building in Government Center, downtown Boston. This rally will honor those who were massacred and target the role of the U.S. government in financing, training, and supporting Mexican government military and paramilitary attacks against the EZLN and Mexican Indigenous peoples. Wednesday's actions are part of activities being organized throughout the week in cities around the U.S. and internationally in response to the bloodbath in Chiapas. -------------------------------- [2. Addresses] President of Mexico: Ernesto Zedillo: webadmon@op.presidencia.gob.mx Presidente de la Republica Palacio Nacional 06067 Mexico D.F. Fax (52-5)-271 1764/515 4783 Presidente de la Comision Estatal de Derechos Humanos de Chiapas Lic. Yesmin Lima Adam Argentina 455 Col. El Retiro 29040-Tuxla Gutierrez- Chiapas Tel. (52-961) 40632/40674 Presidente de la Comision Nacional de Derechos Humanos - CNDH - Periferico Sur 3464 Col.San Jeronimo Lidice 10200 Mexico DF. Tel. (52-961) 631004 Lada sin costo: 0180000869 E-mail: cndh@laneta.apc.org Pres. William Clinton The White House Washington, DC Fax: 1-202-256-4562, 1-202-456-2461 Telephone: 1-202-456-7639; 1-202-456-1111 E-mail: president@whitehouse.gov U.S. Secretary of State Fax: 1-202-647-6434 Telephone: 1-202-647-4000 State Dept. / Section for Inter-American Affairs Fax: 1-202-647-0791 Telephone: 1-202-647-7285 U.S. Congressional Switchboard Telephone: 1-202-225-0791 United Nations Secretary General Fax: 1-212-371-436- Telephone: 1-212-963-1234; 1-212-963-5012 -------------------------- [3. Message of Solidarity from the Council of Maya Elders to UAINE meeting held on December 20, 1997] Message of Solidarity from the Council of Maya Elders December 20, 1997 We join your struggle to stop government crimes against our Indian sisters and brothers. We send our Solidarity to demand JUSTICE. We offer you our Strength in achieving SOVEREIGNTY. We feel and share your grief. The soil that covers IX'MUKANE, our Mother Earth, is colored with the red blood of our relatives -- slaughtered by the vicious brutality of the police and soldiers. Every time the weapons of the police and soldiers are used against our Nations, and our blood is spilled on the streets and walls of the fancy cities, and our blood is spilled on the streets of working class neighborhoods, and our blood is spilled on the roads of rural communities, and our blood is spilled on the desolate fields, we must be outraged and fight back with one thousand fold strength. The new "smart weapons" of violence that are used against us today are: + cultural homogenization via consumerism + indoctrination of the people through historical perversions regarding our Nations via massive 'education' and media + the 'sell-outs' working for the institutions executing their 'civilized' plans to exterminate our Nations + the kaxtlanes/wannabe Indians dressing up in plastic costumes to steal and sell off our culture . We have been violated too long. We owe it to our Ancestors to demand Restitution for ALL the crimes committed against our Nations. We owe it to Ourselves. We owe it to our Children. We owe it to our Generations yet to come. Our weapon of warfare is the Truth. With this weapon, we will overthrow ALL the institutions that historically have tyrannized our Nations and plunder away what is rightfully ours: + OUR SOVEREIGNTY + OUR HOMELAND We enlist with United American Indians [of New England] and call to ALL the Indian Nations of North America to join the Struggle. We also call to ALL the people of the Four Directions to join in OVERTHROWING ALL the racist institutions and VANQUISH Columbus' legacy of genocide once and for all. WE PLEDGE OUR ALLEGIANCE TO RECONSTRUCT ALL INDIAN NATIONS. --------- "RE: Behind the Chiapas Massacre" --------- Date: Thu, 1 Jan 1998 12:19:05 EST Subj: BEHIND THE CHIAPAS MASSACRE: PENTAGON, CIA BUILD ASSAULT UNITS IN MEXICO ------- FORWARD, Original message follows ------- Date: 97-12-31 11:27:59 EST From: sandra@ntl.sympatico.ca (Sandra Mitchell) <><><><><><><>NASC NEWS<><><><><><><> Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the January 8, 1998 issue of Workers World newspaper ------------------------- BEHIND THE CHIAPAS MASSACRE: PENTAGON, CIA BUILD ASSAULT UNITS IN MEXICO Poverty & Repression Grow in Wake of NAFTA By Deirdre Griswold When an event as ghastly and horrible as the Dec. 22 massacre of 45 unarmed villagers in Chiapas, Mexico, occurs, it is absolutely to be expected that every political figure, every news organ, every public voice associated with U.S. imperialism will express shock and outrage. And so they did. President Bill Clinton called on the Mexican government to conduct an exhaustive investigation of the matter. He sounded indignant. But it would have been more to the point if he had ordered an exhaustive investigation of his own agencies' conduct in Mexico. What has been the role of the U.S. Army's School of the Americas in training "counter-insurgency" officers deployed against the Zapatista movement in Chiapas? Is the Central Intelligence Agency, now deep in what is called a joint U. S.-Mexican "war on drugs," using this as a cover to carry out what has always been the agency's historic mission--to subvert, undermine and wipe out movements of workers and the oppressed? Did the economic agreements foisted on Mexico by U.S. banks--like the "bailout" loans of 1995--contain the tacit understanding that the two countries would collaborate in suppressing revolutionary groups and their supporters in the interests of the "free market" and the restructuring of Mexican agriculture to produce cash crops for export? There is much evidence to indict the U.S. government in all three areas. NAFTA SET THE STAGE The corporate, monopolized media here will never mention it in connection with an atrocity like the Chiapas massacre, but the U.S. presence looms over Mexico like a 400-pound gorilla in a room. The North American Free Trade Agreement, crafted in Washington and New York, opened the Mexican economy to further penetration by Wall Street banks and U.S. corporations seeking markets and cheap labor. It led to an economic crisis in Mexico and a plunge in the standard of living of all but the very rich. But it also sparked an uprising of Indigenous people in Chiapas. The Zapatista movement there became known to the world when it took over a village on Jan. 1, 1994--the day NAFTA took effect. Since then, the Pentagon has greatly increased its military aid to the Mexican armed forces. They in turn have spawned paramilitary groups like those accused of the Dec. 22 massacre. These death squads have been responsible for a "low-intensity" war in Chiapas that has claimed hundreds of lives. Almost all those killed were Indigenous people, who are being squeezed off their traditional lands by cattle ranchers and farmers drawn into the expanding export market. TRAINED IN MURDER AT FORT BENNING AND FORT BRAGG The U.S. Army's School of the Americas, now at Fort Benning, Ga., has been the training ground for many officers implicated in systematic state-sponsored terrorism in Latin America. On Nov. 16, 1997, some 600 people were arrested there for protesting the U.S. military's role in massacres similar to the one in Chiapas. The date was the eighth anniversary of the murder of six Jesuit priests in El Salvador. The protesters charged that of 26 Salvadoran Army officers eventually charged in those deaths, 19 were graduates of the School of the Americas. In addition, the U.S. is training elite Mexican troops called Air-Mobile Special Forces Groups at Fort Bragg, N.C. The group Nuevo Amanecer Press-Europa in Spain says that some of these troops have been deployed in the Chiapas area. It cites a Dec. 25 report from the Mexican news agency APRO that "an important detachment, composed of members of the Airborne Special Forces Groups (GAFE) was sent to the community of Acteal, in the municipality of Chenalho." That is where the massacre took place. "The soldiers of the GAFE, experts in counterinsurgency and specializing in operating in rough terrain as can be found in Chiapas, immediately set up three roadblocks on the highway that leads from the Chenalho to Acteal in order to meticulously search all vehicles that passed through the troubled area." NAP-E comments: "Oddly enough, on Dec. 26, the Mexican daily La Jornada published an article on a recent operation of the GAFE in the state of Jalisco where more than a dozen young men were kidnapped and tortured. One of the youths, Salvador Lopez Jimenez, died as a result of this Special Forces action." The daily said that charges were being brought against "Lt. Col. Julian Guerrero Barrios and Capt. Rogelio Solis Aguilar, who are accused of the crime of violence against the people, as authors of homicide." Nuevo Amanecer Press-Europa says it has "been able to confirm that Lt. Col. Julian Guerrero Barrios is a graduate of the U.S. Army's School of the Americas, which he attended in 1981 in a course titled `Commando Operations.' "We do not know yet how many others of those charged have received training recently at Fort Bragg. We also wish to point out at this time that the mastermind behind Mexico's counterinsurgency strategy in Chiapas, Gen. Mario Renan Castillo Fernandez, has received instruction at Fort Bragg as well. "The general, now the ex-commander of the Mexican Army's 7th Military Region in Chiapas, has recently been pointed out as having served as an `honorary witness' at a ceremony where the state government of Chiapas handed over half-a-million dollars to the paramilitary group Paz y Justicia." The massacre in Chiapas is said to be the work of Paz y Justicia (Peace and Justice), which is affiliated with the ruling PRI party. PENTAGON FOCUSES ON MEXICO AND COLOMBIA Mexico and Colombia are now the biggest recipients of U.S. military aid in Latin America. They are also the countries where paramilitary groups connected to the army have been carrying out the most massacres. Can it be only coincidence that wherever the U.S. focuses its military aid there is an epidemic of murder and mayhem directed against communities trying to resist exploitation and poverty? A few years ago it was El Salvador and Nicaragua. Before that, Guatemala. Now, Mexico and Colombia. Since naked imperialism no longer generates support at home, the excuse now given for these U.S. military operations in Latin America is the "war on drugs." This war is never won, of course. The same excuse allows the police and federal SWAT teams to terrorize oppressed communities right here in the United States. On Dec. 29, the New York Times ran a big, detailed article about how the Mexican and U.S. armed forces are collaborating in this ostensible war on drugs. The article tells how U.S. pressure got Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo to put the armed forces in command of this war instead of federal police. "In October 1995, when William J. Perry made the first official visit to Mexico in memory by an American secretary of defense, anti-drug aid was at the center of several cooperative ventures he proposed to Mexican military officials," wrote the Times. "Within months, a first group of young Mexican Army officers were training in anti-drug operations at Fort Bragg, N.C." The Times reported that some 3,000 Mexican soldiers are expected to have passed through U.S. Defense Department training courses by next fall. Of them, 328 officers are being sent "to train air-mobile special forces units that are now stationed at the headquarters of the 12 regions and 40 zones that make up Mexico's military geography." SPECIAL FORCES DEPLOYED IN CHIAPAS The Pentagon has given Mexico 73 Huey helicopters to transport these troops of the Air-Mobile Special Forces Groups. "The helicopters may be used only for anti-drug operations," wrote the Times. "But Mexican and United States military officials said there was nothing to stop the transfer of American-trained army officers to similar special forces units that might be deployed against leftist insurgents in southern states like Guerrero and Chiapas." The Times article contained a wealth of information. But instead of "U.S. Helps Mexico Army Take Anti-Drug Role," the headline should have read: "U. S. Sponsors Bloody Counter-Revolution in Mexico." CIA CREATES MEXICAN UNIT And there's more. According to the Times, the CIA has created a unit in the Mexican military that, while "probably the least visible," has emerged as "probably the most active of all Mexican anti-drug units." It is called the "Center for Anti-Narcotics Investigations." This CIA- trained special force has been provided with "sophisticated surveillance and intelligence-gathering equipment" not given to civilian anti-drug units. All this is taking place while most people in Mexico are falling into the deepest poverty, caused by the relentless drive of U.S. banks and big businesses to completely take over the economy of their country. In the recent election, the ruling PRI party got its first setback in 70 years. The big winner was the social-democratic party of Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, which took over Mexico City and the Federal District. Another big shift has been in the labor union movement. Workers have been leaving the PRI-dominated Congress of Mexican Labor in droves and joining the more militant National Workers' Union, a new federation with 1.5 million members. An intractable economic crisis, a rising popular movement of struggle, and now the intervention of the Pentagon and the CIA. The Chiapas massacre was no isolated incident. It must become the spark to awaken a progressive response on both sides of the border. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@workers.org. For subscription info send message to: info@workers.org. Web: http://workers.org) --------- "RE: Info about Oaxaca-Kahnawake Trade" --------- Date: Wed, 31 Dec 1997 10:48:55 -0500 From: Project OK Subj: Info about Oaxaca-Kahnawake Trade UUCP email Here is some more information on Project OK as reprinted from "Our Affairs" Onkwarihwas'shon:'a Volume 6, Number 9 December 1997 In the late spring of 1997, with contacts established by the Kahnawake private sector, a project was initiated which has become known as the OK Project. The purpose of the project is to explore ways that would facilitate trade and commerce arrangements between and amongst the aboriginal people of Mexico and the Mohawks of Kahnawake. To conduct this work, a Task Force was created consisting of three aboriginal representatives from the State of Oaxaca (wa-ha-ca) and three from Kahnawake. This task force met five times and discussed various ways that Indigenous trade and commerce initiatives could be facilitated. The first recommendation of the Task Force was to sign a Convention between the aboriginal peoples of Kahnawake and Oaxaca which would set up a framework for communication and future collaboration. A convention was drafted and given approval in principle by the parties. The Convention would create an Indigenous Trade and Commerce Commission that would be empowered to achieve the objectives of the convention. More specifically: To facilitate commercial venture, trade and commerce between Indigenous persons, businesses or organizations in Canada and Mexico, through promotion and support for joint ventures for the production and marketing of indigenous products. The Convention also establishes abiding principles to guide the activities of the Commission as follows: a)Aboriginal or Indigenous Peoples have rights of self-determination and the capacity to enter freely into the inter-nation agreement of economic, social or political relations; b)The undertakings entered into are directed to the advancement of the economic prospects of Kahnawake and Oaxaca in connection with international inter-Indigenous trade and commerce; c)Indigenous cultures shall be protected and natural and traditional vocations promoted, and the parties shall be committed, in their respective and joint production and marketing activities under this convention, to authenticity in relation to Indigenous products and services; d)The parties shall share human resources and technical and traditional skills in the advancement of the objects of this convention and; e)Decisions respecting products for development, production or marketing shall be jointly taken as between the Parties, through the Commission. The second recommendation of the Task Force is to propose that the countries of Canada and Mexico sign a "protocol" that would recognize the OK convention and the Commission and commit these governments to undertake discussions with the Commission on problem areas of the North American Free Trade Agreement that negatively affect the free trade rights of the aboriginal people. OK TRADE AND COMMERCE UPDATE There are 16 Indigenous nations in Oaxaca, representing almost 2.5 million people and over 70 % of the total population. Without "reserves" as we know them in Kahnawake, our allies in Oaxaca seek protection for their community economies through Indigenous joint venture arrangements to shift from reliance on the American branch-plant "Maquiladoras" (factories) and to market Indigenous products and services worldwide. Like the Lower Nicola agreement with our brothers in British Columbia approved by the MCK in 1996, the Trade and Commerce Convention with Oaxacan Indigenous peoples is aimed at assisting our people - in the private sector as well as generally - in finding new markets, and new opportunities for joint venturing. As with all trade and commerce agreements, the Oaxaca - Kahnawake Convention requires both parties to create a positive climate for the Aboriginal private sector to prosper, and for our communities to benefit through new jobs and export related trade. In addition, Canada and Mexico will work with us to assist in the enforcement of generic marketing labels, trade-marks and certification criteria to make sure that Indigenous products and services are protected from rip-off producers in the non-Aboriginal sector. To maximize exposure on this historic venture, it is anticipated that the OK Convention will be signed in January as part of the Team Canada Mission to Mexico City. It is hoped tha the Canada - Mexico protocol can also be signed at the same time. As you can see, the OK Project is structural and preliminary. Neither of the anticipated agreements compromise Indigenous/Mohawk rights nor do they compromise the Indigenous peoples of Oaxaca or the Mohawks of Kahnawake in our efforts of self-determination. As a matter of fact, the guiding principles of this relationship promote self-sufficiency and ensure that the Indians of Oaxaca and Kahnawake and their products will not be negatively exploited. Further, it ensures tha the cultural identity and integrity of the parties and their products are protected. --------- "RE: Wal Mart Sued for Discrimination" --------- Date: Mon, 5 Jan 1998 17:03:26 -0700 (MST) From: Kay Marie Porterfield Subj: Wal Mart Sued for Discrimination UUCP email [Editorial Note: Sincere thanks to _Indian Country Today_ for granting permission to redistribute this news item!] Wal-Mart Sued for discrimination, intimidation K. Marie Porterfield Indian Country Today Volume 17 Issue 28 Jan 5-12, 1998 Edition Rapid City, SD-"When Bryan Ray went Christmas shopping two weeks ago at Wal-Mart on Lacrosse Street, the Seneca man got more than he bargained for. According to Mr. Ray, an assistant manager threatened to hit him. 'I've experienced racism at Wal-Mart before, but what happened to me this time took the cake,' said Mr. Ray, who has a degenerative bone disease and must use one of the store's motorized carts to do shopping. On Dec. 12, after he redeemed merchandise from layaway, he felt shaky from low blood sugar triggered by his diabetes. Having already paid for his purchases, which had a receipt and security tape affixed to them, he headed toward the in-store McDonald's to order something to raise his sugar level. 'My wife worked at Wal-Mart, so I know the security procedure,' he said. 'Besides there is no way to get outside of the McDonald's without going through a door with security.' According to Mr. Ray, no sooner had he driven his cart into the fast food restaurant than a store greeter chased after him. 'He was yelling, "You can't take that cart out; you people are always trying to take those carts.' Mr. ray said. 'Because people were Christmas shopping there must have been at least 150 people who heard. I felt humiliated. The check out lanes stopped and the place got really quiet.' Mr. Ray asked for the store's manager as he'd been instructed to do after experiencing other incidents at the store which he believed were racially motivated. 'The greeter called, Don, the assistant Manager and he got there first,' Mr. Ray said. 'By that time I got angry and started cussing. I hadn't done anything wrong and all I was thinking about was eating something.' He said that the assistant manager leaned over him while he was still seated on the cart, balled up his fist as if he were going to hit him and threatened to, 'take care of you people once and for all." Only when store manager Mark Haberman arrived, did the assistant manager back off. 'One thing I can assure you is that Wal-Mart does not discriminate against anyone in any way, shape or form," Mr. Haberman told Indian Country Today. When asked about Mr. Ray's complaints and those of several other American Indians that some employees at his store treat American Indian customers rudely, he responded, "All I can say is that they are absolutely unfounded." When asked, that although racism is not a stated company policy, if perhaps individual clerks may be rude to American Indian customers, he denied it had occurred. Interestingly, a note from management handed to employees with their paychecks this month, admonished them to spread holiday cheer and cited a recent complaint to store managers that: "A door greeter says hello to white people, but doesn't greet African Americans and Native Americans." Mr. Ray, who has contacted a lawyer and plans to file a lawsuit against the corporation, said the he has experienced discrimination at Wal-Mart stores throughout the country, but personnel at the one in Rapid City have treated him the worse. "One time I was buying a $6 bra for my wife and it was in a box," he said, "When I got to the checkout, the clerk opened the box and told me, 'You Indians are always stealing, so I have to make sure there isn't a $12 one in here." He said that he has been discouraged from looking at merchandise by clerks who have told him he can't afford it and that greeters have repeatedly told him the motorized cart which he needs to make his way around the store is broken and refused to let him use it. "They make snide remarks about my weight and race," he said. "One time when the cart battery was low I plugged it into a power pole and a clerk came up to me and told me if I wasn't so fat, I wouldn't have to ride it." Mr. Ray isn't the only American Indian suing the Rapid City store. Attorney Bruce Ellison is representing Shirley Lewis and her daughter Nicole Erdman who filed a suit against Wal-Mart last summer after Will Bacon, then an assistant manager at the Lacross Street store, accused them of stealing a piece of facial tissue two years ago. "They were accused of opening a box of Kleenex," said Mr. Ellison. "When they saw the box it was already open, so they thought it was a sample and tried it, then put two boxes in their cart." According to the women's complaint, they were first accused of shoplifting by a store associate near the display. When they arrived at the checkout lane they were confronted by Mr. Bacon who accused them of opening the Kleenex and said he had personally seen them do it. "He screamed at them that they had stolen the merchandise," Mr. Ellison said. The complaint states that Mr. Lewis and Ms. Erdman repeatedly asked him to review the tapes and he refused. "He yelled at them and called them thieves, publicly humiliating them," Mr. Ellison said. After detaining the shoppers for 20 minutes, the women said, Mr. Bacon finally allowed them to go through the line where they purchased $50.25 in merchandise. In addition to claiming that Mr. Bacon slandered them and caused them mental anguish, the women have charged that they feared he would bodily harm them because of his threats and 'agressive and menacing body language'. Because the mother and daughter are American Indian, Mr. Ellison said, he will try to introduce the discrimination factor in the jury trial which the women have requested. Mr. Ellison said such incidents are not isolated to Wal-Mart. "It's like that all over Rapid City," he said. "An obviously Indian person walks into a store and they are followed and watched." In Wal-Mart sometimes American Indian customers don't have a chance to get beyond the door before they face hostility. Last summer when Glenda Black Feather tried to return styrofoam cups and plates to the Rapid City Wal-Mart because a relative had already bought enough for a dinner they were giving, she was stopped by an elderly door greeter who demanded in a sharp tone of voice that she hand over her packages so he could look inside. "I didn't know I was supposed to stop," she said. "He didn't have to be so rude. I asked him why people like him treat Indians in this way when they shop at this store," she said. "He told me, 'You Indians are all alike.' He mumbled something else racial and at that point I became so angry I started crying, I couldn't help it." The store manager said he would talk to the employee and Ms. Black Feather made up her mind never to shop at Wal-Mart again. She said she is concerned at the effect such treatment has on people who have a difficult time being assertive. "When it happens to Elders, they just put their head down and walk away," she said. Some American Indians aren't aware that they are being discriminated against. Last weekend Brooke Schiavi witnessed a Wal-Mart head clerk call a bank to verify a check for $217 that an obviously American Indian woman had written. When questioned by another customer why she was calling the bank, the woman reportedly replied, "Sometimes I do this if the person looks suspicious to me." "Wal-Mart runs checks through their verifying machine to make sure you're not on their infamous bad list, so this was an act of deliberate discrimination," Ms. Schiavi said. "The next customer in line, a white woman, wrote a check for $300 and they didn't call the bank. I stood there with my mouth open." Mr. Ray's wife, Gina Marie, a non-Indian, was a Wal-Mart employee until turning in her resignation after her boss threatened her husband. "You should hear clerks talk about Indian customers in the employee lounge," she said of the two months she worked at the store. I'd hear, 'Oh this Indian lady stole a VCR and brought it back to get money to drink' or 'All those damned Indians do is steal," she said. "Wal-Mart was founded on the premise that the customer is always right," said Mr. Haberman. "American Indians are very valued customers, as are all our customers. We appreciate their business." Mr. Ray agreed that business should be the bottom line. "My money is just as green as anybody else's. We Indians spend a lot of money at that store," he said. "If people want to be racist, they should stay home and do it, not as a represenative of a major corporation," he said. "People like this are humiliating Indian people and we need to make a stand. I don't think our ancestors would be happy if we kept quiet and kept putting up with things like this." The Wal-Mart handout encourages employees, ".....Lets all continue to surpass all expectations of our countless customers this holiday season and each day thereafter." What the memo doesn't say is that many American Indian customers have come to develop a different set of expectations from Wal-Mart than non-Indian shoppers." End of Article [Addendum: Contacting Wal-Mart via e-mail:] You can help us respond more efficiently to your specific questions or comments by directing your e-mail to the appropriate areas listed below. In your message, please include your... Return e-mail address Your full name Mailing Address, City, State, Zip Daytime telephone number If you reference a store or club, include the city/state and if possible, store or club number. This will allow us to expedite your message. We appreciate your business and your correspondence. NOTE: E-mail attachments cannot be accepted. Letters to the President - letters@wal-mart.com Complaints General Comments Suggestions Letters to Wal-Mart marketing/public relations - alwyatt@wal-mart.com Press Releases Public Relations Student Research Packet Wal-Mart History --------- "RE: Buffalo Nations December Report" --------- Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 13:41:04 -0700 From: stop-the-slaughter@wildrockies.org Subj: Update ******** Below: Buffalo Nations December 29th Update One thing you can do..... Quick Technical Note Thanks for your support...May 1998 be a year wherein no buffalo are killed! +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ TECHNICAL NOTE If you receive this by accident...kindly hit REPLY and write me a note. I'm a human not a listserve. Same goes for duplicates...hit REPLY to both alerts. Folks receiving these updates (about 2 a month) are helping by forwarding this to friends...If this was forwarded to you and you would like to receive updates about the Yellowstone Buffalo...please mail me a quick note (stop-the-slaughter@wildrockies.org) Thanks Pass this on and take care! +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ December 29th Buffalo Nations Update Temperatures around West Yellowstone have dipped down to -30F, but the sun's out by mid-morning. The Department of Livestock has created its own imaginary closure on Forest Service land (public land) surrounding their capture facility. Insiders from the Park Service have expressed their belief that this closure is illegitimate and illegal. The Forest Service is the agency in charge of our federal public lands (Department of Livestock is a state agency), is still uncertain whether the closure is legitimate or not. It seems to us that the closure was made up on the spur of the moment to intimidate us, without the consent of all 5 agencies listed on their signs. We remain undaunted. Last year hundreds of bison were killed on Forest Service land west and north of Yellowstone National Park. One local resident was disgusted to learn that his dog had gained 60 pounds from gorging on the gut piles left near his Horse Butte home. Millions of acres of Forest Service land, public land, SHOULD be open and available as a reservoir for the bison to spill over onto during winter months. We need people to help us focus on this aspect of the campaign. If we all had one wish on Xmas day, I think we all wished for more folks to join us out here in this winter wonderland. This is a fantastic opportunity to learn and practice winter camping skills, cross-country skiing, snow shoeing, and tracking animals. If you enjoy these activities, we can accommodate you. We also need people who are good researchers, writers and canvassers. Those of us already here roam the fields with the buffalo daily and have a kinship with them. The magnificence and ruggedness of these beautiful animals has all of us in awe of their role in nature and humble us in our own role. There is nothing quite like the site of buffalo playing while a bald eagle flies overhead, a coyote hunts for scurrying food, a wolf howls in the not-so-far distance, while we keep a watchful eye out for the D.O.L. All in a day's work at Buffalo Nations.... So come out and be ready for action or help support us in anyway you can. Buffalo Nations PO Box 957 West Yellowstone, MT 59758 406-646-0070 phone 406-646-0071 fax buffalo@wildrockies.org ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ IF YOU CAN ONLY DO ONE THING........ Millions of acres of Forest Service land, YOUR public land, SHOULD be open and available as a reservoir for the bison to spill over onto during winter months. We need people to help us focus on this aspect of the campaign. Many of these lands are leased to a very few cows and the rest are empty! PLEASE Write and tell them what you feel.. a quick phone call, postcard or email can make a difference! Mike Dombeck, Chief; Forest Service, USDA 14th and Independence Avenue, SW 201 14th Street, SW Washington, DC 20250 4th Floor; NW Tel: (202)205-1661 E-Mail: comments@www.fs.fed.us ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Please Pass this on to five friends!!! For the Buffalo! ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ For more information about the plight of the Yellowstone Bison check out this web site http://www.wildrockies.org/bison Mitakuye Oyasin (All My Relations) --------- "RE: Councilor Abhors Living Conditions" --------- From: Summerfield/Marvin&Linda Subj: Councilor Abhors Living Conditions -12/28-Muskogee Phoenix By Donna Hales Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 08:29:46 -0600 Newsgroups: alt.native,soc.culture.native The following article was published 12/28/97 in the Muskogee Daily Phoenix. It is posted courtesy of your only independent Cherokee newspaper, THE CHEROKEE OBSERVER. http://www.cherokeeobserver.org ------------------------------------------------------------------------- COUNCILOR ABHORS LIVING CONDITIONS Family Must Haul Water From A Creek By Donna Hales, Phoenix Staff Writer The three-room trailer nestled among the oak and blackjack trees in rural Delaware County has no running water, the roof leaks and the family who lives there struggles to make ends meet. A small christmas wreath hangs on the front door. A single strand of tiny Christmas lights twinkle above. Inside, school papers of 6-year old Michael Foreman are displayed on a hall wall. Small knick-knacks sit dust-free on shelves nearby. One of three beds in the home, a day bed, takes up most of the front room, which is clean and neat. Matthew, in remission from leukemia, and his 5-year-old sister, Kathy, tossed their long, shiny hair as they laughed and talked Friday morning. They're too young to understand the struggle their parents face. "My family's lived like that all my life until the last couple of years when my mother got her house," said Claudine Sixkiller Foreman, 34 -"And my grandmother before her (Polly Blackfox) lived in a home without water." Inadequate housing is a widespread problem in the 14 counties of the Cherokee Nation. Of the more than 180,000 Cherokee Nation tribal members, about 80,000 live in the 14 counties, according to census records. Census information indicates as many as 20 percent of those Cherokee families living in some rural areas "lack sanitary sewer systems, which means they don't have running water, and lack kitchen facilities," while the figure is close to 12 percent in other areas, said Joel Thompson, director of the Cherokee Nation Housing Authority. That is why tribal councilor Barbara Starr Scott is furious that federal dollars to help Cherokees like the Foremans are being spent on non-Indians. The tribe's Community Development division receives federal grant money from the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to renovate homes and dig water wells. Scott visited four homes in need of running water and home repairs within a five-mile radius near Jay Friday morning. "We could go on all day," she said. Many Cherokee living in substandard homes and in poverty have never been visited by tribal social workers and are unaware of available programs that would provide better housing, Scott said. Others are on long waiting lists, which are subject to political pressure, according to a former tribal Community Development director, Steve Woodall. "This is the basic - if you don't have housing - health care and everything else is going to go to pot," Scott said. She stopped her vehicle for a minute after driving across Cloud Creek, the Foreman's only source of water. They haul water from the creek in what was meant to be a big trash can with a lid on it. Since there is no running water, the bathtub is used for storage. When it's warm, the family uses an outdoor toilet. In the winter, they just haul more water to flush an inside toilet. The family is managing well on what little they have, Scott said. Not every family has the skills to do as well on so little, she said. Claudine Foremena's husband, Marvin, has a maintenance job at a chicken plant in Decatur, Ark. The family trailer is on restricted Indian land owned by his relatives. Scott is in the process of seeing about a possible long-term lease on the land in order for the family to be eligible for tribal help in getting a well and renovations to their trailer. Just down the road from the Foremans lives Vonda Lyman, 31, whose family's two-room trailer once sat on tribal land where there was a well. But her husband got a written notice from the tribe to move the home last February. They moved, but Lyman still doesn't know why they had to move, she said. Scott said she will find out why Monday when the tribal complex reopens. The small trailer with its roof falling in now sits on land Vonda Lyman's stepmother owns. The Lymans get drinking water from her dad's nearby home. They haul other water from a creek four miles away in a large plastic storage tank her father bought. He also bought the family their $800 trailer. In a very good month, she said her husband gets to work at least two weeks at an Arkansas chicken ranch. She cooks on a heating stove. Her five children, ages 9 months to 9 years, received sleeping bags for Christmas so they could keep warm. Cold air pours through the sagging bedroom roof. Sandra and Tony Foreman live nearby in a two-room trailer with no running water. Rooms consist of a kitchen and one bedroom with a small room in between that Sandra Foreman said is too cold to sleep in. She was unaware the tribe had money available for more than a year for Cherokees to purchase double-wide trailers at a low interest rate and low monthly payments. Her husband, who works at a chicken plant in Arkansas, might have been interested, she said. After the Phoenix reported earlier this months that HUD said the $800,000 grant was one of three the tribe hadn't utilized, Community Development Director Bud Squirrel told tribal councilors there was little interest in the grant. He said in the December tribal council meeting that community Development employees could find only four families interested but needed 10 families in order to purchase 10 trailers at a discount. Squirrel asked for the funds to be redirected to another Community Development program. A new trailer would be good, "but even just water would help," the Cherokee mother said. Jenella and Vance Daniels and daughters ages 2 and 4 live in a three-room house Jenella's father owns. They have no running water, no cook stove, a refrigerator that doesn't keep food very cold and practically no furniture. The heating stove has no damper and doesn't get warm enough to cook on. All meals are cooked in an electric skillet. Daniles brings water home in five-gallon jugs every day when he gets off work at an Arkansas water company. The couple showed Scott a Dec. 4 letter from the Cherokee Nation Housing Authority reminding them to update their application for Indian housing. Vance Daniels and most of his $240 take-home pay every week from a water business in Gravette, Ark., goes to pay the electric bill, $100 a month house payment when he can afford to pay it, his car payment, repairs needed to keep his car running and to buy tires and insurance so he can get to work. "But we're making it here," he said. Scott shook her head as she left the home. "If these kids live here and think they're making it - they'll never know what they're missing out on," she said. "They don't know what's available to them. "You can't tell me a child raised in this environment has the same opportunity as my child or yours." --------- "RE: Link to Askwitteachik" --------- Date: Sat, 3 Jan 1998 05:24:37 -0700 From: Denise C Stoner Subj: link to Askwitteachik Mailing List: AISESnet Discussion List (aisesnet@victor.umt.edu) BILLS I will save reporting on new bills for my next update, but I want to address one piece of *APPARENTLY* false information that's been floating around. There is a post claiming that a "Native American Assimilation Act" is in Congress, and that if "it should become federal law is a mandate to disband every Native American Tribe in the United States through a sweep of a pen..." The poster goes on to say that it will "destroy once and for all time Native American Culture, Language and Independent Nation status" and "dissolve tribal lands." I have searched for this bill, and have not found anything with that title, or any bill that seems to do what the post claims the "Native American Assimilation Act" would do. (Note, I said *apparently* false - just because I haven't found it yet doesn't mean that there might not be some nefarious back-room scheme to introduce such a bill.) The post which I received was a forward which had no way to contact the apparent originator of the post, a person named Deidre McDaniel-Miller. The original post seemed to be addressed to the National Congress of American Indians. There are few bills which bear a *remote* resemblance to the above claims - all except H.R. 2743 are old bills, but perhaps it's time to revisit them anyway because they aren't particularly favorable to Native American interests: H.R. 123, which would declare the English language as the official language of the Government. H.R.2743, which would "reduce fractionated ownership of Indian lands," apparently through buying back individual interest in "allotted lands" (held by descendants of the original owner of the allotment) and return them to tribal "trust status" lands. H.R. 2107(The Interior Spending bill) Senator Gorton's infamous attempt to require tribes to waive sovereign immunity as a condition of receiving funds, (which was withdrawn from the Interior bill before passage but which will definitely come up again.) H.R. 1340, which includes a provision requiring tribes to waive sovereign immunity in order to obtain permits for mining activities covered by the bill. H.R. 128, which seems to give states authority over "waters within their boundaries" regardless of any federal "withdrawal, designation or other reservation of lands" - which I suspect would include Indian reservation and trust lands, since there is no exception made for such lands. H.R. 992, which may limit the authority of a tribe to regulate or impose use restrictions on tribal lands held by individuals instead of in trust. Again, none of these bills would truly "destroy Native American Culture, Language and Independent Nation status" - but all except HR 2743 seem to have leanings in that direction. ASKWITTEACHIK REORGANIZATION - FEEDBACK REQUESTED! Askwitteachik has now been running for almost a year. We have had a chance to see what is working, and what isn't. So, I have made some changes, and there will be several more before the Congress re-convenes in late January for the second session. This report marks the beginning of one of them... I will be sending reports weekly instead of monthly. I'll use the time during the congressional recess to bring myself (and you) up to speed on the new bills since my last report to you. (24 new bills in the House, and 39 new bills in the Senate.) Updates will also be posted on the Askwitteachik Web board at Native Web (URL below) for discussion, questions and feedback. The "Numerical Index" page(http://www.askwitteachik.org/federal/number.htm) has been updated with all the new bills. Clicking on the bill number will take you directly to the Thomas "summary and status" page for that bill. I will no longer be producing a "local" version of the status page; I found I was spending too much time repackaging information that was already easily available, and not enough time delving into the content of the bills. I am planning to provide slightly more information on the index pages. (The numerical index page has gotten *very* large (almost 70,000 bytes) so I will be splitting it shortly into separate "House" and "Senate" indexes.) A link to a "notes and links page" regarding the bill will be added, which will include links to sites maintained by other people that provide more background on specific bills or issues than I can. (Some bills already have this.) Also a link to a breakout of the "Indian Provisions" on the larger bills will be available from the Index pages, and links to any Committee Reports available. I intend to focus more time and attention on the "issues" pages. Several people who are interested in specific issues have contacted me about linking to their sites, rather than trying to duplicate the information, and we are working toward "dividing up the work" and coordinating our efforts, so that all of our research and information is available to any visitor who accesses any of our sites. So some of the issues pages will primarily list the relevant bills and direct you to the "expert" site, others will have whatever background I can dig up on my own. While this reorganization is still in the planning stages, I want to ask for your input. Do you have a site which covers a specific legislative issue in detail? Let me know! Is there any type of information you'd like to see at Askwitteachik that isn't there now? Let me know! Karen J. Gould http://www.askwitteachik.org Askwitteachik Discussion Board: http://www.nativeweb.org/community/webboard/askwitteachik/index.html "If people are genuinely interested in honoring Indians, try getting your government to live up to the more than 400 treaties it signed with our nations." ...Glenn T. Morris - Colorado AIM --------- "RE: Tunica-Biloxi Nations" --------- Date: Thu, 01 Jan 1998 8:24:43 CST From: David Rider Subj: Tunica-Biloxi Nations UUCP email Some Louisiana news you may be interested in: The Tunica-Biloxi Indians operate the Grand Casino in Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana. Until recently, they charged their own licensing fees and conducted their own background checks on companies that provide wholesale liquor to the casino. Louisiana officials, annoyed at this show of Tribal Sovereignty, suspended the Tribe's liquor license on December 12 and threatened to shut down the casino. After meeting with state alcohol regulators, tribal Chairman Earl Barbry, Sr., said the Tribe would suspend its licensing requirements for vendors wanting to do business with the Tunica-Biloxi. As a result, the State of Louisiana reinstated the Tribal liquor license. dave --------- "RE: Stand Off with Quebec" --------- Date: Sun, 04 Jan 1998 15:24:53 -0500 From: ishgooda Subj: STAND OFF WITH QUEBEC, RESULTS STILL PENDING: From A'kiawenrahk Longhouse, Wendake, PQ UUCP email Khwe, Few are aware outside of the Huron people of the 18 hour standoff between the traditional Longhouse people of Wendake Quebec and armed representatives of the Quebec government in 1994. This confrontation occurred when the Quebec government interfered with the hunting and fishing rights reserved to the Huron people by the Murray Treaty. They resisted arrest, their equipment and hunting supplies were confiscated. This case is yet pending.. Recent rulings in the British Columbia courts that oral histories of the people are binding on land settlements may have definite implications for the Huron in this pending court case in Quebec. Ish Teweshon'onh +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Teweshon'onh said: The Supreme court has ruled that Oral Histories of the people are binding on land settlements in the Gustafsen ruling. Might this effect the Murray treaty case you have pending? Tarehta'deh replied: Yes, we have an oral history that binds us on our land too, but the main problem in defending our rights is with the Wendake chiefs, I should say the band council chiefs. These chiefs are not fighters, they do not fight for the Huron-Wendat rights or believe in these rights. They just sit down, and take whatever the government of Quebec or Canada gives to them. For instance, we have only to remember that it is only some members (The Sioui's brothers) of our Nation who fought for their rights, 15 years ago. These persons used an old British and Huron treaty (or if you want the Murray treaty), made in 1760. At that time, the band council never believed that this treaty was still good. The Chiefs, at that time, told the Sioui's brothers that this paper (treaty) was not good. The Sioui's brothers had to fight alone and using their own money without any help from the band council. After they had lost in the first Court, the Sioui's asked the appeals Court to hear them and then, the band council had no choice but to get involved with that case. (Also, one of the Sioui's brothers got elected for a short time but enough to force the band council to get into it). The band council does not believe in our rights, there is a conflict of interest between them and the Nation's rights. On one side they have to defend the Nation against the Government of Canada and Quebec and then, on the other side they are paid (grant) by this same Government they are fighting against. So most of the band council in order to get more money have to stop fighting and negotiate away the rights's of the Nation for nothing. You will see in the next lines what I mean by nothing! After the Sioui brothers and the Huron Nation won in the Supreme Court of Canada (.. ie the Supreme court recognized that we have native rights according to the treaty), all the Hurons were happy and we thought that we would be able to go to our former hunting territory without being bothered anymore by the Government of Quebec. This treaty means a lot for our people, it means that we can live off of our land and finally grow up as a Nation, teaching our customs to our children and have a chance to survive as a specific Nation. The Government of Quebec never stopped harassing us in the forest after this Supreme Court decision. Quebec never respected the treaty. The Government of Quebec arrested most of the Hurons and took their bush equipment and most of the time they gave them fines. The strategy of Quebec was to still continue to harass the Huron and they said that our customs were not explained well in the treaty, so they started to put pressure on our Nation and the band council chiefs to negotiate. The main position of Quebec is that the Huron have to follow the regulation of Quebec in regard to fishing and hunting activities. In about 3 or 4 years, between 1990 and 1993, about 150 fines were given to different members of the Huron Nation for non-observance of their laws. A few moose were sized by Quebec without considering the protestation of the Huron. The Huron told that we have rights according to the treaty, to hunt and live in the forest according to the way of our Nation. -- As we know, the time for the hunting season of the Huron always been longer than that of the French Canadian.-- The Government of Quebec denied that we can hunt according to the treaty and then that we do not have any specific season or customs related to our life in our hunting territory. Quebec also says that the hunting and fishing is not included in our customs, moreover that the Huron people have to demonstrate and show in Court that we have our custom include hunting, fishing etc. As we know Quebec argues that the word hunting is not written in the treaty, and that the treaty mentioned that the customs of the Huron have to be recognized and protected. Quebec is asking to the Huron to show that they lived off of the land and that the Huron used to hunt in 1760! (Here Quebec wants to be recognize as a distinct Nation but they still not want to recognize the Huron-wendat nation to be distinct and they have their own customs related to the life in the forest. So, Quebec is arguing that the words hunting and fishing etc. are missing or are not written in the treaty. Do you think that Huron was fast food eater and that there were food store at the time of the treaty ? it is ridiculous!! So through the year the members of the Huron Nation got more and more fines. At that time, the band council decided to negotiate with Quebec, by saying that we do not have choice. YES, they do have a choice to force the Government to finally go in to Court. (it is only with a Court judgement that the native people got a recognition of the rights since 1982, it is not with a negotiation -- look what Cree got from negotiating with Quebec, the first condition was to erase for ever the Cree title on their land-- ) The Government of Quebec never brought our people into Court , they always postpone and postpone. How they can go in Court against a Supreme Court decision of the Huron rights ? So they prefer to harass our people, the Huron ask the federal government to interfere but they have never done nothing to re-inforce the judgement of the highest Court of Canada, and ask Quebec to stop harassing the Huron. In 1992, few sport hunting Huron men (brain washed Huron) persuaded the band council to negotiate with Quebec a short time period of hunting for the Huron . They were saying that the Huron hunter would no longer be stopped by the Government,and that this was better than nothing (it was their slogan) and that they were tired to fight ( those person have never fought for their rights). So, the band council after negotiating with Quebec offered to the Huron people something, but the Huron rejected this proposition. During all this time , the longhouse people were fighting hard to affirm their rights in the territory . Quebec seized theirs canoes, their bush equipments many times. The longhouse people at one time, afraid to see their rights negotiated for nothing and thus erased by the band council, decided to make a proclamation. In this proclamation, the longhouse people said that the band council (BC) has no right to speak for them and then the BC have no rights to include the longhouse in any agreement with Quebec. Longhouse people are refusing to give any mandate to the band council chiefs. They are saying that the only legal government of the Huron Nation is the Longhouse government according to our tradition and it is recognized by the treaty. They say that the band council is the stranger's politic way, the band council system was imposed to our people by the government of Canada, in 1876. This band council system is a discriminatory toward our traditional three fires councils ( women council, men council and the elders council). Government of Canada do not recognize any form of traditional government in Wendake. Today, this band council is illegal according to our ways. And it showed in the past that this council is not able to deal correctly with our rights. In 1994, the Government of Quebec and the band council signed a agreement for the hunting season. ( a treaty is between at least two Nation, here Quebec is not a Nation , so why the Huron is negotiating their rights issue from a treaty with a province that is not a Nation, Any agreement, if there is any acceptable, should be between two Nations -- Canada and the Huron Nation-- The band council never consulted with the entire Nation. This agreement, for the year 1994, was -- for one week of hunting, -- Hurons have to follow the law of Quebec, -- the permit was from Quebec through the Huron Nation etc.. In the fall of 1994, few days before the sporting white moose hunt season, , few members of the A'kiawenrahk longhouse got arrested and Quebec seized their moose, canoes etc on their traditional hunting territory. Quebec said that the longhouse people were not allowed to be in the bush at that time, because they were not conforming to the agreement written between Quebec and the band council. They added that they did not have any permit. The only card (I.D) the longhouse people had, was their I. D that show that they were members by blood of the Huron traditional nation of the A'kiawenrahk longhouse. Quebec wildlife conservator officer refused to consider the traditional ID. The Longhouse people resisted arrest and they blocked the road for 18 hours, Quebec confiscated their moose and bush equipment... The Longhouse people never succeeded in getting their moose and canoes back. These traditional members got a fine for killing a moose outside of the season and for resisting arrest. The band council refused to defend the Longhouse people or if they were to defend them, they would ask the Government to forget all the fines. Last fall, the band council lawyer suggested the Huron to plead guilty for few fines related to our fishing rights and hunting. Quebec said to the band council that they will not give any charge if Huron plead guilty. Most of the people trusted the band council and they pleaded guilty, the Longhouse People refused to plead guilty for what they believe to be their rights. So, the Longhouse people think that this kind of agreement (outside Court) would not bring peace to them and bring any respect for the fundamental rights of the Huron people. The Longhouse people (LP ) also refused twice an outside Court agreement, so far, because they do not have any promise that the Huron can live unmolested in their territory. Also, Longhouse people want to see if the Court will say that the hunting is not part of the Huron customs and clarify it for ever, here we have to remember that it is the main argument of Quebec to harass Huron. So far, the Longhouse people have spent $10,000 to pay an historian, who has written a report which shows that hunting was a part of our customs, (it is not yet deposited in Court). The lawyer, so far, has cost $8,000. Quebec Court postponed 4 times in the last two years any hearing of the case. Now,it has once again been postponed to the middle of april instead of the beginning of January. In the meantime, the band council has renewed the agreement with Quebec for another 5 years, just this past fall. Ridiculous !!!! This new Grand Chief who signed this new agreement for 5 years is Jean Picard. He signed without speaking with the members of the Nation. Jean Picard is a sports man and has said that he considers hunting to be a sport. No one has seen this new agreement so far. It was made in secret between Quebec (which is not a Nation) and the Huron band council. We HAVE our ways, why does the band council force us through agreements with Quebec to assimilate to the white ways! --------- "RE: Last Refuge Campaign Update" --------- Date: 98-01-02 17:56:11 EST From: wild-rockies-alerts@wildrockies.org (Wild Rockies InfoNet) Subj: Last Refuge Campaign Update UUCP email Last Refuge Campaign Update January 1, 1998 As we step into a new year of defending the wild, it's a good time to reflect on some of the places we have worked to protect. The Native Forest Network's Last Refuge campaign focuses on ten threatened areas in the Northern Rockies as examples of the fate of unprotected roadless public lands across the US. By no means are these necessarily the most threatened areas, nor should these places take all our efforts at the expense of other important wildlands. But these are some of the finest and most threatened wildlands in the lower 48 states. The Native Forest Network has just completed a 24-page booklet on the Last Refuge Campaign, describing threats to critical wildlands and how you can help protect these places. A map showing the "troubled ten" areas is included. Please write us and let us know how many copies of this booklet you can use. If possible, send a contribution to cover printing and mailing costs. Here's a New Years update on some of these imperiled wildlands. White Sand Area, Clearwater National Forest, Idaho White Sand Project Decision Withdrawn! Here's the big news: On December 12, James Caswell, Clearwater National Forest Supervisor, announced the withdrawal of the Record of Decision on the White Sand Ecosystem Management Project! Signed on April 30, 1996, the White Sand Project would have meant 19 million board feet of logging on 1,680 acres, and 6.1 miles of new road in the 33,454 acre North Fork Spruce-White Sand roadless area. Most of the logging would have been in Elk Summit Basin and would have resulted in loss of 3500 acres of roadless land and 679 acres of old growth. Caswell's letter said that a new decision may be released "pending the outcome of further review." This is good news indeed, and will allow us to focus our energies on protecting other areas for the time being. The Gallatin Range, Montana Land Exchange Up for Grabs The Montana Wilderness Association is calling for Wilderness designation for 202,000 acres in the Gallatin Range, to be designated as the Gallatin Unit of the existing Lee Metcalf Wilderness. The Native Forest Network has collected hundreds of petition signatures for protection of the entire Wilderness Study Area as Wilderness. Let us know if you can help circulate this petition. Montana's three congressmen each introduced a land exchange bill at the end of the 1997 legislative session. The three are expected to collaborate on a final bill early in the next session, which would offer certain federal assets to the landowners, Big Sky Lumber, in exchange for their private inholdings in the Gallatin National Forest. Conservationists are concerned about timber sales which may be included in the exchange package and about the possibility of "sufficiency language" in the final bill, which would preclude legal challenges of any timber sales included. Please ask the landowners to accept cash for their lands instead of federal land and timber, and ask the Montana delegation to seek maximum funding for the land exchange. Mel MacDougal, Tim Blixseth Big Sky Lumber 114 SW 2nd Portland, OR 97209 Max Baucus, Conrad Burns US Senate Washington, DC 20510 Rocky Mountain Front, Montana Southern Front Threatened with Development As you may be aware, in September, Gloria Flora, Supervisor of the Lewis & Clark National Forest, made the courageous decision to withdraw much of the Rocky Mountain Front from oil and gas development. Not surprisingly, the oil and gas industry is appealing her decision. Ms. Flora needs letters of support for her choice to put recreation and natural values before resource exploitation. Please write Gloria Flora, Supervisor, Lewis & Clark National Forest, PO Box 871, Great Falls, MT 59403. The Helena National Forest, which manages the southern Front, has taken a stance in favor of development and proposed oil and gas leasing at Alice Creek. Please take a moment to write the Helena Supervisor and ask if he works for the same agency as Gloria Flora. Tell him you are opposed to any development at Alice Creek or elsewhere on the Front. Tom Clifford, Supervisor, Helena National Forest 2880 Skyway Drive, Helena, MT 59601 Friends of the Rocky Mountain Front are calling for a withdrawal from mineral entry of all public lands on the Rocky Mountain Front. Please support the call for withdrawal of the Front from all mineral entry. Write: Mike Dombeck, Chief, US Forest Service, PO Box 96090, Washington, DC 20090-6090, and Bob Armstrong, Asst. Secretary, Dept. of Interior (Lands and Minerals), 1849 C St. NW, Washington, DC 20240. Cove/Mallard Roadless Areas, Idaho Crimes Against Cove/Mallard Continue (from The Networker, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, Winter 97-98) The Nez Perce Forest, in complete defiance of the Endangered Species Act (ESA), continues to allow Shearer Lumber Products log the Jack Timber Sale. This illegal operation is ongoing despite Threatened listing of Steelhead Trout on October 17 by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Under provisions of the ESA, once a species is listed all irretrievable and irreversible commitments of resources must stop until critical habitat is designated, a biological opinion prepared, and consultation with NMFS completed. The Nez Perce knows that Steelhead are present in the lower reaches of Big Mallard Creek, yet they continue logging. The new and highly contested Jack Timber Sale Road crosses tributaries of Jack Creek (which flows into Big Mallard) 18 times. Monitoring by activists has revealed massive sediment problems near cutting units and on the road. The Cove/Mallard Coalition is asking that you contact Region 1 Supervisor Dale Bosworth, Nez Perce National Forest Supervisor Coy Jemmet, and NMFS Director William Steele. Mention the above information in your call or letter and ask that all logging activities in Cove/Mallard cease until consultation is completed as required by the ESA. Coy Jemmet, Supervisor, Nez Perce National Forest, Rt. 2 Box 475, Grangeville, ID 83530 (208) 983-1950 Dale Bosworth, Region 1 Supervisor, PO Box 7669, Missoula, MT 59807 (406) 329-3315 William Steele, NW Regional Director, National Marine Fisheries Service, 7600 Sand Point Way NE, Seattle, WA 98115-0070 (206) 526-6150. Have a Happy and Roadless New Year! --------- "RE: Pre-Land Bridge Indians" --------- Date: Thu, 01 Jan 1998 13:31:31 -0400 From: not@inthe.game (justanoldman) Subj: Pre-Land Bridge Indians Newsgroup: alt.native THE BONES FROM BRAZIL OMNI MAGAZINE by Heather Pringle During the summer of 1986 Brazilian scientists made a perplexing discovery in an arid, sun-scorched highland not far from the equator. Burrowing into the floor of a limestone cave some 900 miles north of Rio de Janeiro, Museu Nacional archaeologist Maria Beltrao and her colleagues unearthed hundreds of broken bones of long-extinct animals, along with strikingly primitive stone tools. Convinced that ancient hunters had once feasted in the cave, Beltrao approached Henry de Lumley, one of France's foremost authorities on Paleolithic humans for assistance in dating the site. Much to their astonishment, uranium-series tests placed the age of the bone samples between 200,000 and 350,000 years - hundreds of millennia before the most widely accepted dates for man's arrival in the New World. The ancient bone bed, however, is only one of three recent Brazilian discoveries stirring up heated controversy over New World prehistory. Discoveries of rock paintings and a possible astronomical observatory are also challenging traditional thinking about America's first people. As one archaeologist joked, "It's beginning to look like early man crossed over from Asia and ran all the way down to Brazil." Until recently archaeologists generally agreed that America's first immigrants were bands of modern men - homo sapiens sapiens - who crossed the Bering Strait from Asia sometime between 12,000 and 20,000 years* ago. In the wake of recent South American reports, however, tantalizing new questions are being raised: Could Homo Erectus - a robustly built, heavy-browed species of man who arrived in China 700,000 years ago and who harnessed fire at least some 400,000 years ago - or some other archaic humans have tackled the stormy Arctic route to the New World? If so, what became of these early migrants? Could they have given rise to a sophisticated culture? *[Note: Subsequent to the publication of this article, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, at their annual meeting of 1992 heard, and accepted, the report of Richard MacNeish of the Andover Foundation for Archaeological Research, demonstrating beyond all doubt that the Foundation's findings of fire-hearths, human palm prints & fingerprints discovered in caves on the grounds of Fort Bliss, New Mexico, were 28,000 to 38,000 years old.] Intriguingly, all three Brazilian discoveries come from the same remote northeastern plateau guarded by thorny thickets of nettles and twisted trees known in the local native dialect as ca'atinga (literally, "white forest"). Although the area is now prone to severe drought and has long discouraged agriculture, humid conditions during the last Ice Age gave rise to tropical rain forest and lush prairie inhabited by mastodons, horses and giant ground sloths. Ancient climatic fluctuations, moreover, seem to have played an important role in conserving the region's rich archaeological records. At Toca da Esperanca, as Beltrao has named her discovery, mineralized water dripped from the ceiling during times of high humidity. As the millennia passed, it then sealed the ancient bone bed and tools beneath three feet of concrete-hard marl - protecting them like food in a mason jar. "The region preserves anything," Beltrao says. "That is the key. It is incredible." So far, Beltrao's team has exhumed more than 220 pounds of fossilized bones representing nine extinct Ice Age species, primarily from the horse family. What is startling the researchers is that some fragments appear to have been shaped by human hands into sharp drills and scrapers, and one such possible bone tool was recently dated to at least 200,000 years ago. In addition, the researchers have uncovered several quartzite stones showing signs of human use., imbedded with the bones. "The nearest source of quartzite is two miles away," Beltrao says. "Many geologists and geomorphologists examined this limestone cave and are convinced beyond any doubt that it is completely impossible for this quartzite to have arrived here without human intention. Man must have been here, and at the same time these bones were laid here." Beltrao and de Lumley are convinced that the cave holds the earliest known records of Man in the New World. Reporting their findings in the official bulletin of the French Academy of Sciences, they suggest that Homo Erectus could have crossed the Bering Strait to the Americas several times. "If [wooly mammoths, bison and other] fauna crossed the Bering Strait in both directions since the Pleistocene [a fact no one argues]," Beltrao reasons, "why should man, a nomadic hunter, not have done the same?" The Brazilian archaeologist is quick to concede, however, that American populations of Homo Erectus could have remained very small. Excavators elsewhere in the New World have uncovered scant evidence of such early migrants. Objects that may have been stone tools found in California's Mojave Desert at a site that has been uranium-series-dated at 200,000 years, as well as the discoveries of similar tools by Dr. Louis Leaky in Baha California similarly dated at over 300,000 years, remain highly controversial. "It is entirely possible," Beltrao and de Lumley cautiously wrote in their official report, "that the descendants of [Homo Erectus as] the first inhabitants of the Americas became extinct." While Beltrao faces an uphill battle with the ultra-conservative archaeological establishment for her claims, Brazilian colleague Niede Guidon is beginning to win acceptance for an early rock-shelter site just 200 miles to the north of Toca da Esperanca, called Boqueirao da Pedra Furada. Hollowe out of sandstone cliffs overlooking the ca'atinga, Pedra Furada protects more than 1,000 prehistoric rock paintings of stylized animals as well as simple human figures engaged in hunting, dancing, lovemaking and childbearing. Attracted to the site by its art, Guidon began excavations in 1978, hoping to unearth evidence to date the painted figures. Using hand trowels, team members dug down into the cave floor searching for fragments of fallen art. Over the centuries, sand crumbling from the shelter's walls had buried the traces of human activity. As Guidon's team painstakingly removed the mantle of overlying soil inch by inch, they came across an unexpected discovery: A primitive stone hearth yielded chunks of charcoal dated to 25,000 years of age. Astonished, the cautious fifty-six-year-old archaeologist expanded excavations with an international interdisciplinary team of experts, primarily from France. By the end of the 1988 field season, the team had exhumed definite 41,800-year-old traces of man. Guidon, however, has drawn a frustrating blank with the lowest and oldest layer of charcoal and stone tools, found almost two feet lower than the 42,000-year-old fragments. "It's impossible to date them because they are too old," she says. To get around the problem, a French specialist is now attempting to determine an age with the aid of thermoluminescence. This experimental technique, similar to spectrography, first heats a sample and then measures the visible burst of light caused by the release of electrons trapped within the sample over time. Exactly who took shelter in Pedra Furada 41,800 years ago or earlier remains a mystery to the team. Many archaeologists and physical anthropologists now believe that the Old World was home to modern humans and archaic Homo sapiens such as Neanderthals, some 90,000 to 30,000 years ago. Which of these very different groups, they wonder, braved the Arctic route to the New World and ultimately camped at Pedra Furada? Guidon's team has now embarked on excavations specifically designed to turn up telltale evidence. "Our program is to try and find a human bone," she explains. "Perhaps somebody died or had an accident in the bottom of the cave." Many questions about Pedra Furada remain, but Guidon has found evidence of previously unsuspected cultural development in the New World. From studies of rock art traditions, archaeologists had long assumed that prehistoric art in the New World was a relatively recent phenomenon, at least 10,000 years younger than the murals of galloping horses and charging bison at the famous cave at Lascaux in France. It is now clear that the Americas' early dwellers were far from being artistic philistines:At Pedra Furada, Guidon's team has unearthed fragments of painted rock well over 32,000 years old. To Guidon, the evidence argues for the antiquity of art in the New World. Rock paintings were "a very important cultural tradition," she says. "At the same time in prehistory, all over the world, man was able to register his history and beliefs. We have rockart more or less at the same time in Europe, Africa, Australia, and America." Not Far from Pedra Furada, near the Brazilian town of Xique-Xique, another rock art site offers quite a different glimpse into early human life in the Americas. Discovered in 1984 by Canadian archaeologist Ruth Gruhn and her husband, Alan Bryan, what has become known as The Grotto of the Cosmos bears testimony to man's long fascination with and study of the heavens. Inside this cave, ancient paintings depict comets streaking across the grotto's broad ceiling. Blazing suns rise and set; stars flicker brightly. Nearby, painted lizards, animals often associated with the sun, keep restless watch on the records of this ancient observatory. According to Beltrao, who has studied this 3,230-year-old site with the help of two of Brazil's leading astronomers, the grotto once served as an ancient observatory. These early astronomers left a counting system to record lunar phases and employed a small, carefully cut notch at the entrance to the grotto to mark the winter solstice. "It's like Stonehenge," she explains. "When the light comes in, it hits the mark on the wall." By painting the spot with a red sun, prehistoric American astronomers could observe the sun's annual progress and keep track of time. Early British farmers did much the same thing with the famous standing stones in England. The Brazilian astronomers Betrao consulted were very surprised at the levels of knowledge of their prey historic American counterparts, she says. "This changes all previously held concepts about the 'lack of cultural and scientific development' of prehistoric man in the Americas." Although the controversy over all three 'white forset' discoveries has only just begun and is likely to swirl for many years to come, Guidon echoes Beltrao's view. "I really think that we have had a story of humans in the Americas being told before there was any data to back it up. Only now is the true story coming to light." Addendum Inquiries into the current situation concerning these archaeological sites (made by the transcriber in 1995) revealed that Professor Guidon was killed in 1991 by Brazilian state security forces who apparently "mistook her for a drug smuggler". Doctor Beltrao was fired from her post at the University of Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and has not been allowed to work or to leave the country since. Both the Toca da Esperanca and the Boqueirao da Pedra Furada sites have been sealed off by the Brazilian army "for national security reasons". It may be a coincidence that the state governments presently trying to have Native land rights removed from Brazil's laws are basing their counter-claims on the premise that the Indian populations in Brazil are 'relative newcomers' to South America, with no real roots on that continent. --------- "RE: First 16 Buffalo Saved" --------- Date: Wed, 31 Dec 1997 13:55:38 -0500 From: Buffalo Nations Subj: buffalo nations saves first 16 UUCP email At dawn on Monday, 12/29, Buffalo Nations (B.N.) activists prevented the slaughter of 16 bison. Members of America's last wild herd, the animals had wandered from Yellowstone National Park onto private land near the town of West Yellowstone, Montana. The landowner, who openly expresses his antagonism toward bison, has threatened to have the animals killed if they "trespass" onto his property. He allowed the Montana Department of Livestock (D.O.L.) to construct a capture facility on his land--a natural migration corridor between the park and the bison's winter range. Last winter most bison that were herded into such facilities were killed. The B.N. morning patrol, observing a freshly plowed road to the capture facility and unfamiliar vehicles, including a livestock trailer, decided to act. Before anyone was out of their truck, cross-country skiers had slipped under a fence onto the property and quickly shepherded the bison to safety inside the park. B.N. doesn't routinely haze the animals or otherwise interfere with their migration patterns. With winter on its way bison can't afford to waste energy, nor can they be kept inside park lines as their winter feeding grounds are outside the park. Because Bison are considered wildlife inside park boundaries and livestock outside the park, hazing is sometimes the only means of preventing slaughter. Immediately after the morning action Buffalo Nations received a phone call from a local landowner with two bison on her property. They had eaten her dog's hay-bale house and cornered the pets. She wanted them off her land. In previous years her only option would have been to call the D.O.L. who would come kill the Buffalo. According to Mike Mease, Buffalo Nations co-founder, "No one has learned a lesson after killing over 1,000 bison last year and that's completely unacceptable. People aren't going to stand by and watch the state of Montana kill off the last wild buffalo." Buffalo Nations enjoys overwhelming public support. Last week, the owner of a 400 acre ranch asked us to post our "Buffalo Safety Zone" signs around the perimeter of her land. The signs, dotting fence lines throughout the community, let the D.O.L. know they are not allowed to slay bison on the property and make it easy for activists to quickly move bison to safety in emergency situations. Our unpaid volunteers have been patrolling the park boundaries and monitoring herd migrations since October. We are with the bison all day every day, ready to defend this uniquely American species. Monday's rapid response evinces our seriousness and dedication to preventing a repeat of last year's massacre. Thanks to this hard work and dedication no bison have been killed this winter. Buffalo Nations PO Box 957 West Yellowstone, MT 59758 406-646-0070 phone 406-646-0071 fax buffalo@wildrockies.org --------- "RE: Funding for Indians" --------- Date: Mon, 5 Jan 1998 05:30:38 -0800 (PST) From: tle@rapidnet.com (Howard Valandra) Subj: funding for Indians Mailing List: TRIBALLAW (triballaw@thecity.sfsu.edu) I have been looking for this letter for 2 months and finally found it. I think it will be good information to share with others. March 12, 1997 The Honorable Pete V. Domenici Chairman Committee on the Budget United States Senate Washington, D.C. 20510 The Honorable Frank R. Lautenberg Ranking Minority Member Committee on the Budget United States Senate Washington, D.C. 20510 Dear Chairman Domenici and Senator Lautenberg: This letter is in response to your request for the views and estimates of the Committee on Indian Affairs on the President's Budget Request for fiscal year 1998 for Indian programs. On February 26, 1997, the Committee held a hearing on the President's Budget Request to receive oral and written testimony from the Department of Interior, the Indian Health Service, and numerous other Federal agencies and tribal organizations. Overall Federal Spending Patterns on Indians and Non-Indians As in previous years, the Committee requested the Library of Congress to prepare an analysis of the Federal spending trends on programs for American Indians and Alaska Natives over the past twenty three years, as well as a comparison of this spending relative to spending for other Americans. We have attached a copy of the Library of Congress report for your reference. The Library of Congress study reveals that, despite the efforts of the Committee on the Budget and the Committee on Appropriations to respond to the acute needs of Indians and Native communities, the gap between what the Federal government has annually spent overall on Indians, in contrast to the funds which the United States has spent on non-Indians for purposes other than the national defense, has steadily worsened for Indians since 1985. The Administration's fiscal year 1998 budget request seeks measurable increases in absolute dollars for many Indian programs. It also proposes to spend a significantly larger portion of these funds at the local level in Indian Reservation or Native American communities. In 1994 constant dollars, the fiscal year 1998 budget request for Indian programs overall would effect a modest reversal of the growing gap between the funds the United States annually spends on non-Indians and those it applies to the benefit of Native Americans. Given the harsh conditions and continuing needs that exist in much of Indian Country, the Committee supports the overall Indian program funding levels requested by the Administration for fiscal year 1998. In its action on the fiscal year 1997 budget, the Congress applied minor increases in absolute dollars for many Indian programs with an emphasis of directing, where possible, greater resources to priorities identified by tribal governments for the provision of fundamental governmental services at the local level and which typically are spent under the direct control of Indian tribes. The Administration's fiscal year 1998 budget request seeks to continue efforts to acknowledge and fund priorities identified by tribal governments, while also continuing with reform initiatives to streamline the administration of services. Tribal governments are, of course, the governments closest to the American Indians and Alaska Natives who suffer the most dire and unmet needs. Yet most of the Federal funds that have been made available for Native Americans in the past two decades have tended to result in an expanded Federal bureaucracy rather than an increase in tribally-controlled budgets. For Indian people, this fact has compounded their problems, as their tribal governments face greatly increased responsibilities without corresponding financial support. Relative Need for Federal Spending on Indians When compared with all other citizens of the United States, American Indians and Alaska Natives continue to suffer the worst conditions of unemployment, dilapidated and overcrowded housing, poor health, inadequate education, deteriorating or non-existent social and physical infrastructure systems, and other social and economic factors that seriously, and sometimes critically, erode the dignity and quality of life. 1990 census data released by the Bureau of the Census last year confirms these conclusions in the area of housing: 18% of all American Indian households on Reservations are "severely crowded." The comparable figure for non-Indians is 2%. Likewise, while 33% of all Reservation households are considered "crowded", the comparable figure for all households nationally is 5%. Approximately 90,000 Indian families are homeless or underhoused. One out of every five Indian homes lacks complete plumbing facilities. According to the Census Bureau, nearly one in three Native Americans lives in poverty. The number of Indian families below the poverty line is nearly three times the national average. One-half of all Indian households headed by a female live in poverty. One-half of the Indian children under the age of six living on reservations live in poverty. For every $100 earned by U.S. families, Indian families earn $62. The average per capita annual income for an Indian living on the reservation is $4,478. Poverty in Indian country is a persistent, everyday reality. Poor health is the twin sister of poverty. Tuberculosis strikes down Native Americans at four times the national mortality rate for this disease. The Indian mortality rate for diabetes exceeds the national average by 139 percent. Indians are four times more likely to die from alcoholism than are other Americans. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome rates among Native Americans are six times the national average. In some Indian communities, reported cases indicate that child abuse has victimized as many as one-fourth of the children. By all measures the health status of Native Americans lags significantly behind every other group of Americans. In recent decades, there have been two basic justifications given for the Federal funding of Indian programs. The first can be understood as a desire by the United States to address the compelling human needs revealed in statistical surveys like those summarized above. Tribal and Federal officials continue to inform the Committee on Indian Affairs of the existence of an overwhelming backlog of underdeveloped social, physical, and human infrastructure in Indian Country, which they attribute to years of Federal under funding and relative Federal neglect. The second basis for Federal funding of Indian programs can be understood as one expression of the unique, government-to-government relationship between the United States and each tribal government arising from well-settled principles of Federal Indian law. The courts have construed this law on the basis of treaties, agreements, statutes, Executive Orders, course of dealings, and