From gars@speakeasy.org Tue Apr 24 02:15:39 2001 Date: 21 Mar 2001 01:01:13 -0000 From: Gary Night Owl To: Internet Recipients of Wotanging Ikche Subject: Wotanging Ikche--nanews09.012 W O T A N G I N G I K C H E Otapi'sin Atsinikiisinaakssin KANOHEDA ANIYVWIYA O It-hah-pe-hah Ah-num pah-le Ha-Sah-Sliltha O o O ni-mah-mi-kwa-zoo-min Un Chota O o O Aunchemokauhettittea O o o o o O VOLUME 09, ISSUE 012 O o O Es'te Opunvk'vmucvse March 17, 2001 O o O Ximopanolti tehuatzin, Cherokee the wind moon O inin Mexika tlahtolli Zuni little sand storm moon ( N A T I V E A M E R I C A N N E W S ) ==>If you want your Nation represented in the banner of this newsletter<== email gars@nanews.org with the equivalent of "News of the People" in your tribal language along with the english translation +-----------------------------------------------------------+ | Much more happens in Indian Country than is reported | | in this weekly newsletter. For daily updates check | | http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm - also events | +-----------------------------------------------------------+ This issue contains articles from KOLA Newslist, NativeNews, owlstar.com, Indianz.com, ndn-aim, Our Red Earth, Iron Natives, RezLife, Innu-L, LPDC and MinnInd mailing lists; Newsgroup:alt.native; UUCP email; http://north.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2001/03/16/16nunmoose http://www.indianz.com/SmokeSignals/Headlines/showfull.asp?ID=law/3152001 http://www.indianz.com/SmokeSignals/Headlines/showfull.asp?ID=law/392001 IMPORTANT!! ----------- In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, all material appearing in this newsletter is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for educational purposes. <----<<<< >>>>----> 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@speakeasy.org ++ It is archived at http://www.nanews.org As historian Patricia Nelson Limerick summarized in The Legacy of Conquest: The Unbroken Past of the American West, "Set the blood quantum at one-quarter, hold to it as a rigid definition of Indians, let intermarriage proceed as it had for centuries, and eventually Indians will be defined out of existence. When that happens, the federal government will be freed of its persistent 'Indian problem.'" "My father went on talking to me in a low voice. This is how our people always talk to their children, so low and quiet, the child thinks he is dreaming. But he never forgets." __Maria Chona, Papago +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ | 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 +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ | Journey | In the summer and early fall | The Bloodline | of 1998 the Treaty Unity Riders | | rode a thousand miles on horse- | For all that live and live by law | back, carrying a staff and | We Stand, we Call, We Ride | praying each step of the way. | For All that fear and fear by sight | | We Hear, we Listen, we Ride | These prayers were offered for | For all that pray and pray by strength| each of us, and that the Unity | We Feel, we Move, we Ride | of all Peoples might happen. | For all that die and die by greed | | We Hurt, we Cry, we Ride | Tatanka Cante forwarded this | For all that birth and birth by right | poem on behalf of all the Unity | We Smile, we Hold, we Ride | Riders that we might stop and | For all that need and need by heart | ask if the next words we say, the | We Came, we Went, we Rode. | next act we make is for the good | | of the People or is it from ego | Treaty Unity Riders | for self. +- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -+ O'siyo Brothers and Sisters! This space is the one spot in this entire newsletter where I share my thoughts. Occassionally I have the wisdom to share my wife's thoughts. This week I am going to let someone else's words do the speaking, and wish the words had been mine. They will be sent to you as they came to me, as an anonymous email to KOLA. I regret I cannot share the authors name, because I do truly believe what has been said needs to be taken to heart by many in Indian Country and on the doorstep leading in. -- - - - Date: 3/12/01 2:45:19 PM Eastern Standard Time From: kolahq@SKYNET.BE Subj: Some Thoughts KOLA Note: we received this from a friend. He wishes to share some thoughts, but prefers to remain anonymous. Elsie === My Thoughts I wish to say a few things that concern me greatly, as it should also concern you. In my journeys and living the culture of my ancestors, I have noticed alot of changes with our people and it saddens me to say, they are not good when it comes to living the culture. First, I have seen great disrespect to our women, to our land, and to ourselves. Our warriors had great respect for our women, because they are the closest to mother earth and they have a strong spirit. Yet today I see alot of warriors who attack our women, whether it be physically,verbally,or mentally. This to me is wrong, it is not the mark of a warrior, but of someone who is not. I have seen disrespect of Mother Earth, by the distruction of her forest, her lands, and her waters. If we continue on this path of distruction to our lands and waters and all living creatures then we will have truely lost our way as a people, for we will have forgotten the teachings of our ancestors. I have seen the stages of distruction and lack of respect to ourselves, by selling out to alcohol, drugs, and selling the land that is not ours to sell. I have seen brother turn against brother, sister turn against sister, Indian nation turn against Indian nation, and I have seen bands of a single nation turn against themselves, and this is still happening today. On this I want to say - while we fight amongst ourselves, slowly destroying one another both physically and spiritually, the real enemy is setting back and taking our land, our way of life, our spirit, and our freedom. What I have also noticed, was how today all of a sudden everybody is Indian or claims to be, and everybody seems to think they know tradition, but all the while they condemn, blame, and point the almighty finger at everyone and tell them they are not indian, because you are doing it wrong. How to be traditional, to pray to the creator, and to live our culture? I have also seen alot of white people playing indian and telling an elder he knows nothing of his culture. This is shameful for those to claim to be what they are not, but it is a greater shame the Indian Nation/Peoples allows them to go on this way and believe their lies. Now I know you are saying "We've heard this several times before, nothing will ever change". Heard the words spoken, but you really have not read or listened to what they are telling you. Because I believe we can return to what our ancestors have taught us, we can have our language, ceremonies, and culture the way it was meant to be. Look around you--there are those with whom it has already begun. So in closing I want to leave you with some questions to ask yourelf. Am I truly living the culture the ancestors taught me? (not copying stereotypes) Do I really believe that I am helpless as far as my rights are concerned? Do I think that the indian nation is a dying race? Is my spirit truly free? (letting me be myself, stand up for my People despite the frowns of others) Do I truly respect all things? (myself, others) Thank You for taking the time to read my words. BaMapii , , Gary Night Owl gars@nanews.org (*,*) P. O. Box 672168 gars@speakeasy.org (`-') Marietta, GA 30012, U.S.A. gars@olagrande.net ===w=w=== gars@sdf.lonestar.org ----------- News of the people featured in this issue ---------- - Grandmother Mali - White Swan Oyate Letter - Chief Arthur Leonard Adkins - Shunned Oneidas - Judge Allows - Native American Navajo Lawsuit to Continue Charged with Hate Crime - Davis Inlet Children - Man Arrested in Ready to Go Home Fatal Stabbing on Reservation - Nunavut Climate Change - Death Penalty by Standing Deer - UKB Tribal Functions Still Frozen - LPDC Report - Groups Struggle With Labelings - Native Prisoner - Claiming Indian Ancestry -- Incarcerated Juveniles: Part 2 Can Skew Federal Funding -- Prisoner Request - Norton Targeted for Contempt -- Bus Tour: I Heard Your Cry - Trust Fund Investigation Continues -- Spiritual Needs - More Trust Documents - History: Carlisle Indian School Reported Destroyed - Rustywire: Why Are We Here - Effort to Fix Indian Trust Funds - Poem: I Have Them Imploding - Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days - Indian School Heads for Demolition - Eastern Band of Cherokee - Catholic Boarding School - Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma Abuses in SD - AISES Science & Engineering Fair - Council Discussing - Upcoming Events Indian School Site - Native America Calling --------- "RE: Grandmother Mali" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 07:54:29 EST From: ShngSprt@aol.com Subj: Grandmother Mali--Elder passes ------- FORWARD, Original message follows ------- From: abenaki@mint.net Respectfully forwarding this news of the passing of Abenaki Grandmother Mali Keating.... Steps In It Dear Sisters and Brothers In case you have not already heard, Grandmother Mali (Keating) made her transition this afternoon while at home with family, ending her bout with leukemia and cancer. Keep her in your prayers. Please pass on to all you feel appropriate. --------- "RE: Chief Arthur Leonard Adkins" --------- Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 05:24:44 GMT From: "John Smith" Subj: Death Notice - Chief Adkins (Chickahominy Tribe in Virginia) Newsgroup: alt.native Mar 12, 2001 ADKINS Chief Arthur Leonard "Lone Wolf" Adkins, age 74, of Providence Forge, VA passed away on Saturday, March 10, 2001. He is survived by his wife of 50 years, Marie S. Adkins; two sons, Wayne B. and his wife, Sandra W. Adkins, Monte L. and his wife, Pat Adkins; one daughter, Carmen Lenora Adkins; one granddaughter, Hope M. Adkins; one brother, Curtis Wynn and his wife, Gerri; many nieces, nephews, relatives, and lots and lots of friends. Chief Adkins was Chief of the Chickahominy Tribe and a retired Charles City County School Teacher and bus driver. He was a member of Samaria Baptist Church and a World War II Army veteran. Remains rest at Nelsen Funeral Home, 4650 South Laburnum Avenue, where the family will receive friends Monday, March 12 from 12 Noon to 8:30 p.m. Funeral services will be conducted 2 p.m. Tuesday at Samaria Baptist Church. Interment in the church cemetery. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Chickahominy Indian Tribe or Samaria Baptist Church Building Fund --------- "RE: Judge Allows Navajo Lawsuit to Continue" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 20:09:11 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="PEABODY LAWSUIT" http//www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm Judge allows Navajo lawsuit to continue Joel Eskovitz Associated Press March 19, 2001 13:15:00 A federal judge has allowed the Navajo Nation to proceed in its $600 million lawsuit against the Peabody Group and Southern California Edison Co. stemming from a coal royalty dispute. U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington rejected the two companies' motions to dismiss the case but has yet to rule on a similar motion filed by Salt River Project, a Phoenix area utility. Peabody is the world's largest coal company and Southern California Edison and SRP both had roles in a discussion the Navajos believe was illegal. The Navajo Nation, now joined by the Hopi Tribe, alleges the companies excluded them from negotiations between 1985 and 1987, when they hired a friend of then-Interior Department Secretary Donald Hodel to represent their interests. The lawsuit claims fraud and misconduct in the dealings that resulted in an agreement that gave the Navajos less than the 20 percent royalty they were seeking on coal dug from two strip mines on the Arizona portion of the tribe's vast reservation. In 1987, the Navajo Nation agreed to a 12.5 percent royalty. Its attorneys claim the disparity between the two figures cost the tribe $600 million. A spokesman for St. Louis-based Peabody said today that he was disappointed with the ruling but not surprised, given that the company was seeking a ruling without a full presentation of evidence and testimony. "It's somewhat of a stretch to think there is some grand conspiracy here," said Frederick D. Palmer, executive vice president for legal and external affairs. Thursday's ruling allows the case to move forward into a discovery stage, although both sides acknowledge it will likely be a few years before it is resolved. Copyright 2000, The Arizona Republic. All rights reserved. --------- "RE: Davis Inlet Children Ready to Go Home" --------- Date: 3/8/01 1:15:06 PM Eastern Standard Time From: kolahq@SKYNET.BE (KOLA) Subj: Davis Inlet children ready to go home <+>=<+>KOLA Newslist<+>=<+> [source: NativeNews; Thu, 08 Mar 2001 11:57:33 -0500] Davis Inlet children ready to go home Need long-term plan Justine Hunter National Post OTTAWA - The bureaucrat responsible for the care of 35 Innu children being treated for chronic gas sniffing says she is ready to release them -- provided the federal government and the Innu can convince her at a meeting today that they have a long-term treatment plan ready. Marilyn McCormack, the Newfoundland director of child, youth and family services, said yesterday the children, from the impoverished Innu community at Davis Inlet, are ready to leave the province's care. In January, the children, aged 11 to 18, were placed with Ms. McCormack and flown to St. John's, to a makeshift detox centre. Now that they have gone through withdrawal, the next stage is to return them to their communities. The Innu want the children moved to residential homes in Goose Bay, 200 kilometres south of Davis Inlet, for long-term treatment, but Ms. McCormack said she is waiting for assurances that the plan is ready before she'll agree to turn the children over. The Innu proposal will require special training for caregivers before the children can been moved. The plan would cost roughly $3- million a year compared with the $1.4-million a month the province is spending to keep them in St. John's. Government officials will meet today in St. John's with the band's lawyer to discuss the move. "We're all working on a March 31 date for the children to move into that part of the program. The other pieces are done for the children right now. They have been detoxed, they have had their clinical assessments," Ms. McCormack said. She said the province has been responsible for the initial treatment stage but the Innu have been working with the federal government on the long-term treatment program and the physical placements for the children. The lawyer for the Innu community, John Olthuis, said yesterday the homes have not been chosen yet because Ottawa must first approve the proposal. "What we hope to come away with [from today's meeting] is an agreement so we can identify the people, send them for training and, over the next week or two, acquire the physical facilities." <+>=<+> News ARCHIVES: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KOLANews/messages <+>=<+> --------- "RE: Nunavut Climate Change" --------- Date: Sat, 17 Mar 2001 04:08:46 -0500 From: Stephan Fuller Subj: Nunavut climate change Mailing List: Innu People Forum list http://north.cbc.ca/cgi-bin/view?/news/2001/03/16/16nunmoose Time to act on Nunavut climate change RANKIN INLET, NUNAVUT - Scientists visiting communities along the western shore of Hudson Bay this week say government and local people have to start preparing for big changes ahead. They say global warming will bring dramatic social, economic, and environmental impacts to Nunavut. Dr. Peter Scott says climate change is bringing some species to the Arctic that have never been seen there before. Scott is the scientific coordinator at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre. "We may get southern animals. We're seeing a lot of moose now," he says. "I've got reports from elders that moose were in Chesterfield Inlet. A moose was seen south of Baker Lake as well. We now have moose in Churchill, where 20 years ago moose virtually didn't exist." Besides new species in the region, climate change and economic development from mining could have a further impact on Hudson Bay and the communities that surround it. Helen Fast is with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. "You could argue that one should wait until there are major issues," she says. "There are major issues on the horizon such as climate change, increased shipping traffic, barge traffic, increased use in demand in resources." The department wants to set up a group that would come up with a management plan for Hudson's Bay. Stephan Fuller Environmental Advisor Innu Nation Box 119 Sheshatshiu, Labrador A0P 1M0 709-497-8398 (Main Office) 709-896-2041 (Environment Office) 709-896-7797 (cellular) 709-497-8396 (main fax) 709-896-2831 (ED fax) fuller@innu.ca --------- "RE: UKB Tribal Functions Still Frozen" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 09:36:12 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="UKB FROZEN" UKB tribal functions still frozen By Gerald Wofford Legal decisions concerning the (UKB) United Keetoowah Band of Oklahoma election results continues to be at a stalemate. After being reviewed by the UKB Tribal Council, a decision was made to create a legal tribunal to look into the matter further, and to make a decision concerning the November 2000 elections. The need to seek a legal decision stems from the election protests filed by Tribal Council Member Jim Lambert, and the late Charles `Chooch' Christie. Lambert specifically contested `voting irregularities' within the Keetoowah Election Board's process of handling the November elections. Lambert had lost in his bid for the Office of Secretary to Ernestine Berry. The UKB election board found no `voting irregularities' and confirmed the November election and December run-off results were official and conducted legally. An inauguration date was set for January 6 with newly elected council members and administrative officers, including a new Tribal Chief, Dallas Proctor, to be officially sworn-in. As of press time, the tribunal had not made any legal decisions concerning this matter. Members of the newly elected Council and officers are protesting that the legal process involving the tribunal is taking too long to come to a decision. In a letter filed to the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office in Muskogee, newly elected members Henry Dreadfulwater, Betty Holcomb, Ernestine Berry, Archie Mouse, Dallas Proctor, Charles Deason, Clifford Wofford, Frank Swimmer, Julie Moss, and Adaline Smith have asked for the BIA to intervene and certify the election results. The response from the Bureau is that it is the long standing policy to refrain from involvement in internal tribal matters and that the BIA's responsibility to interpret government to government relationship may not be used to invade the legitimate domain of tribal sovereignty. Basically, the BIA is letting the tribe handle it as it sees fit. It is this handling of the matter by still current UKB Council members and still current Chief Jim Henson, that has gotten newly elected members to call for immediate action. The members feel the election protests filed, specifically those of Lambert, are filled with `false allegations, assumptions, rumors and misinterpretation or misreading of the UKB election ordinance.' The members also feel that protests filed by Lambert have received swift and proper action, such as the creating of a tribunal and postponement of the January Inauguration. While their call for actions have not been immediately handled. The letter filed to the BIA further stated that protests filed by Lambert `did not meet the time deadline and was not timely filed.' Lambert's argument is the protests filed involve `voting irregularities', and he did not feel at liberty to discuss them specifically. However, he did comment that his protest filings represented many UKB citizens and their feelings concerning the November election process. Copyright c. 2000-2001 Oklahoma Indian Times, Inc. All Rights Reserved. --------- "RE: Groups Struggle With Labelings" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 08:24:24 -0600 From: "John D Berry/grad/res/Okstate" Subj: (FWD)Indian News 03-14-2001 ----- Forwarded by John D Berry/grad/res/Okstate on 03/14/2001 08:24 AM Groups Struggle With Labelings By GENARO C. ARMAS .c The Associated Press 03-13-01 WASHINGTON (AP) - Curtis Zunigha applauds those Americans who, for the first time, officially acknowledged their diverse racial backgrounds on their census forms. But don't count him as one of the 6.8 million people that did just that, even though Zunigha considers himself half-white and half-American Indian. He feared that marking two or more categories could undermine the population total and federal funding for his tribe. While many civil rights groups praise the new era of race categorizations ushered in with the 2000 census, some members of minority groups are grappling with just how beneficial the multirace classification system may be to their communities "In my efforts preceding the census, I kept telling people to put down `American Indian,' even if you are mixed race like I am," said Zunigha, director of the Delaware Tribe Housing Authority in Bartlesville, Okla. "I just wanted the Indian count to be as high as possible to have numbers to substantiate federal funding," Zunigha said. The 2000 census was the first to offer the option of checking off more than one race category, thereby increasing the number of classifications from five in 1990 to 63 now. As a result, direct comparisons on race between the two counts were impossible. The issue has especially been a concern with the American Indian population, which demographers had forecast may have higher proportions of people identifying with more than one race because Native Americans, historically, have married outside their race more than other groups. Census figures released Monday indicated that 40 percent of the 3.4 million non-Hispanics who identified themselves as "American Indian and Alaska Native" also marked down they were a member of another race. Nationally, about 2.4 percent of the country's total population of 281 million considered themselves as belonging to more than one race group. The data is part of a wealth of detailed information the Census Bureau must produce to all states by April 1. State lawmakers will use the figures to redraw congressional, state and local legislative district lines, and the numbers will also be used to distribute about $185 billion in federal dollars among states and communities. Data for Kansas and Nevada were released on Tuesday, with 11 more states scheduled to be sent their figures this week. Numbers for 13 other states have already been released. The eagerly anticipated figures also will show the country's emerging demographic portrait - one more racially diverse and complex, said Levonne Gaddy, president of the Tucson, Ariz. based Association of Multi-Ethnic Americans. "It will be very interesting to see how things develop in the 2010 census, after things become more acceptable and normal to look at our multiracial heritages," Gaddy said. But while Gaddy and others encouraged people of mixed-race backgrounds to check off all that applied, tribal leaders in states with larger Native American populations were more hesitant. Part of the confusion arose from the 1990 tally, which did not include a multirace option. So someone who still marked down, for example "white" and "American Indian," would be counted only within the first group they wrote in. The Census Bureau's Claudette Bennett, who oversees race statistics, ensured that the 1990 incident would not happen again: people who marked down more than one race would be counted in each of those categories. In Oklahoma, 3 percent, or 104,230 of the state's 3.5 million people classified themselves as "white" and "American Indian and Alaska Native." In South Dakota, 5,181 people, or 0.7 percent of the state population, chose the same category, the highest percentage among the 63 multirace options. Brenda Hampton, director of tribal membership for the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma, said the real test will come once funding based on 2000 census figures finally get distributed - dollars used to help build schools and community centers. "I hope in the next 10 years, that if you are of American Indian descent from any tribe, that you mark down American Indian only to ensure the Indian population is a true count," Hampton said. On the Net: http://www.census.gov --------- "RE: Claiming Indian Ancestry Can Skew Federal Funding" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 07:17:32 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="CENSUS/FUNDING" Published Sunday, March 18, 2001, in the Akron Beacon Journal. Claiming Indian ancestry can skew federal funding More people mark American Indian on census, which could increase funds -- or take them away BY PAULA SCHLEIS Beacon Journal staff writer Your pride in having a Cherokee ancestor 100 years ago could mean fewer federal dollars to help American Indians today . . . Or it could be a gift that will help local native families in need. Whether boon or bane, a spike in the area's American Indian population was expected. Even before 2000 census figures were released this week, demographers were talking about the "Dances With Wolves effect" -- a phrase based on the title of the 1990 Academy Award-winning movie in which a Civil War veteran befriends a band of Sioux Indians. The assumption is that people would think it fashionable to acknowledge a drop of Indian blood now that they were able to mark more than one race on their census form. As it turns out, it was a pretty good guess. In the five-county region, there are 2,698 people who marked only American Indian -- only a 3.4 percent increase over 1990. But almost 6,000 others stated they were partially Indian. Statewide, the census reported nearly 25,000 checked only the American Indian category -- a 20 percent increase from 1990. Add to that another 51, 000 who marked American Indian and another race. There are two very opposite schools of thought on what practical effect that change will have. Lanna Samaniego, head of the North American Indian Cultural Center in Akron, said she believes recognition of a larger American Indian population will mean more state and federal dollars for programs at the center. Samaniego is convinced that Indians have been undercounted for decades. When she learned that the 2000 census allowed residents to check more than one race, she was delighted at the possibility of seeing that number move nearer the true mark. But Clark Hosick, who headed the center for 18 years until retiring recently, says that friendly figure could end up biting. He points to a federal grant the cultural center receives for a job placement program -- a grant that is tied directly to the financial outlook of local Indians. Non-Indians of better financial means who claim that heritage can falsely inflate income and employment levels, Hosick said. It happened in 1990, when 2,609 people in the five-county region stated on their census form that they were American Indian. Hosick doesn't believe that was an accurate count of Indians who are members of federally recognized tribes. But the harm was done. Because the census painted a rosier picture of American Indian life in Akron, the center's job placement grant was reduced from $800,000 to $460,000, Hosick said. Hosick is also concerned that casual recognition of distant Indian ancestry will affect school scholarships. Already, many students apply for minority scholarships because they have a Sioux or a Lakota great- grandparent on their family tree, he said. Ohio's public colleges do not require proof of race, so some scholarships that were meant to find their way to a disadvantaged group may be going to students with a very thin claim. If the census encourages people to openly claim such distant ties, how many more might compete for those scholarships? But while Hosick is very strict in his definition of an American Indian -- card-carrying members of Native American tribes -- Samaniego said she's happy to count anyone with Indian blood if it works to improve programs offered at the center. "What difference does it make if one or two people who get our help don't carry tribal membership cards if we are creating programs that can reach hundreds or thousands?" she said. Still, Hosick finds himself musing over why people are so quick to want recognition for belonging to a minority group. "How many people, if they found out they had black in their background, would claim both white and black on their census form?" he asked. "But if they even suspect there's a little bit of Cherokee way, way back, they're quick to check it." Paula Schleis can be reached at 330-996-3741 or pschleis@thebeaconjournal.com Copyright c. The Beacon Journal Publishing Co. --------- "RE: Norton Targeted for Contempt" --------- Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 06:16:14 -0800 (PST) From: Paul Pureau Subj: Norton targeted for contempt Mailing List: Our Red Earth Indianz.Com. In Print. http://www.indianz.com/SmokeSignals/Headlines/showfull.asp?ID=law/3152001-1 Norton targeted for contempt in retaliation incident MARCH 15, 2001 Making good on earlier threats, the plaintiffs in the billion dollar trust fund lawsuit against the federal government on Wednesday asked a federal judge to add Secretary of Interior Gale Norton to a long list of officials alleged to have retaliated against a Bureau of Indian Affairs employee who could be fired this week. The move marks the first time Norton has been specifically cited for contempt by the plaintiffs in the five-year-old dispute Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colo) has called a "national disgrace." Although recent contempt of court motions have identified top Department Interior officials and management, Norton's name had been left out. Now in her second month of duty, Norton can safely say the honeymoon is over. Amidst pressure from Congress and the courts, Norton faces another crisis over the impending fate of Mona Infield, the employee against whom Norton is alleged to have retaliated. One year ago this month, Infield, a senior computer analyst at a BIA office in Albuquerque, New Mexico, criticized her employer's attempts to fix the historically mismanaged trust fund system. Soon after, senior BIA management stripped her of her duties and assigned her to home duty, where she has continued to draw an $80,000 yearly salary. In an attempt to resolve the issue, Norton earlier this month offered Infield up to $100,000 to pay legal expenses. But in a letter to a Department of Justice official, Infield's lawyers rejected the settlement with a warning: "We will not permit you or Secretary Norton to threaten or otherwise abuse the Cobell plaintiffs or witnesses . . . The culture of fear and intimidation fostered by Interior and Justice . . . is now over." Although the special master assigned to the case has recommended Judge Royce Lamberth hold a contempt of court trial, Lamberth has yet to decide on the issue. Such a trial wouldn't be the first in the history of the Cobell v. Norton lawsuit: in 1999, Lamberth slapped former Secretary Bruce Babbitt, former Assistant Secretary Kevin Gover, and former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin -- all Clinton appointees -- with contempt of court charges and fines. Even though Babbitt and Gover have since left the Interior, the plaintiffs aren't letting them off easy. Both are still being cited for contempt regarding the treatment of Infield. Additional Interior officials and management identified in yesterday's motion include: Sharon Blackwell, BIA Deputy Commissioner. Appointed June 2000 and like Norton, had been left off contempt of court motions until yesterday. Hilda Manuel, former BIA Deputy Commissioner whom Blackwell replaced. Said to have ruled the BIA with an "iron fist" and now works with Gover at Steptoe & Johnson, a Washington, DC, law firm. Deborah Maddox, BIA Director of Management and Administration. Overseeing the BIA's new trust records office in Virginia which Special Master Alan Balaran last month reported was riddled with security problems. Infield had been ordered to report to this facility but declined. Dominic Nessi, BIA Chief of Information Officer. He personally called Infield and assigned her to home duty last year. According to Norton's March 2 settlement offer, Infield could face potential dismissal as early as tomorrow. Interior spokesperson Stephanie Hanna said Infield has been offered a variety of positions within the Department but rejected them all. Norton was unavailable for comment yesterday. ===== Paul Pureau to subscribe to ndn-aim send a blank mail to: ndn-aim-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.com ndn-aim is now archived on line at Http://www.escribe.com/life/ndn-aim/ FREE PELTIER NOW! STOP ETHNIC CLEANSING OF THE LAKOTA! --------- "RE: Trust Fund Investigation Continues" --------- Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 06:03:31 -0800 (PST) From: Paul Pureau Subj: Trust fund investigation continues Mailing List: ndn-aim Indianz.Com. In Print. http://www.indianz.com/SmokeSignals/Headlines/showfull.asp?ID=law/392001-1 Trust fund investigation continues MARCH 9, 2001 The court-appointed special master in the billion dollar trust fund lawsuit on Thursday informed the government of his plans to interview a top Bureau of Indian Affairs official who assigned an employee to home duty where she has remained for a year. But the subject of the proposed investigation isn't Mona Infield, a BIA computer analyst who continues to draw an $80,000 annual salary from the comforts of her Albuquerque, New Mexico, home. Instead, Alan Balaran is seeking to interview Dominic Nessi, under oath, about efforts to preserve the records of an estimated 300,000 American Indians throughout the country. Nessi is the BIA's first chief information officer, charged with modernizing the agency's outdated computer systems. It is a monumental task for Nessi, who in the past has been vocally critical of Congress for not providing the Department of Interior with enough money to help bring the heavily burdened BIA into the 20th century. Yet putting Nessi before the special master where his testimony would probably catch the eyes of lawmakers eager to find a solution to what Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-Colo) last week called a "national disgrace" is exactly what the government doesn't want. In a court motion filed last month, the Department of Justice asked Judge Royce Lamberth to prevent Nessi from providing testimony on any aspects of the trust fund debacle. And in its court-mandated quarterly status report, the Interior last week lamented about top officials and senior management being distracted from their duties by the five-year-old Cobell v. Norton lawsuit. In particular, the Interior said Balaran's investigation was hindering trust reform progress. Under pressure from Congress and the courts, its understandable that the government wants to keep people like Nessi in the field working instead of in the courtroom testifying. Lead plaintiff Elouise Cobell, however, sees it differently. "Its been one huge cover-up," she asserted. Whether or not Balaran's planned interview of Nessi will reveal a cover- up is uncertain. For almost a year, Balaran has been keeping track of the BIA's move of the national trust records center from New Mexico to suburban Washington, DC. During the move, workers in Albuquerque discovered some computer tapes labeled as related to the BIA's trust fund accounts. A number of them were unreadable and the BIA in May 2000 promised to try and recover the information stored on them. But in January, the government admitted it was behind schedule and couldn't provide Balaran with a status update until the end of this month. Apparently hoping to get a jump on the update, Balaran has asked to interview Nessi as soon as possible. Meanwhile, Nessi is one of several BIA employees whom Cobell and the other plaintiffs have targeted for conspiring to retaliate against Infield. Judge Lamberth has yet to decide if he will hold a contempt of court hearing addressing those claims. ===== Paul Pureau to subscribe to ndn-aim send a blank mail to: ndn-aim-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.com ndn-aim is now archived on line at Http://www.escribe.com/life/ndn-aim/ FREE PELTIER NOW! STOP ETHNIC CLEANSING OF THE LAKOTA! --------- "RE: More Trust Documents Reported Destroyed" --------- Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 10:14:24 EST From: ErthAvengr@aol.com Subj: More Trust Documents Reported Destroyed Mailing List: ndn-aim http://www.indianz.com MORE TRUST DOCUMENTS REPORTED DESTROYED MARCH 16, 2001 The U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights is investigating a complaint it received that names UND. OCR spokeswoman Melinda Ulloa said she's forbidden to discuss what the complaint alleges. A federal law also gives anonymity to people who report human rights abuses. She said the complaint was received Dec. 18, and the investigation was opened Feb. 27. OCR is also evaluating a second complaint it received in February from a UND student and a professor. The second complaint is connected to UND's use of its Fighting Sioux nickname, a source told the Herald in February. OCR's Kansas City office received the second complaint Feb. 2. The office, however, declined a Freedom of Information Act request from the Herald to release either complaint. "One is under investigation. The other is under evaluation," Ulloa said. "If it's found that it is unwarranted, it (the investigation) is dropped. If it's found there is a problem, the department works with the university to rectify it." Complaints found warranted are almost always resolved voluntarily, Ulloa said. OCR received 4,897 complaints last year. If OCR finds UND not compliant with the federal Civil Rights Act, and UND's administration refuses to fix the problem, OCR could pull federal funding from the university. "Sometimes the school really doesn't know that they're doing something," said Ulloa. "In most cases, 99.9 percent of the cases work with the Office of Civil Rights to come into compliance." If UND isn't compliant with the Civil Rights Act, it would work with OCR to end the problem, said Julie Evans, UND general counsel. But because OCR hasn't notified the administration about the investigation, or complaints, Evans said, UND doesn't know what the university is allegedly doing wrong. "We have no idea what the substance of this complaint is yet," Evans said. "We haven't been notified. . . but we're always willing to work with the Office for Civil Rights." Bill Dittmeier, an attorney with OCR, said there is an exemption in the FOIA law that allows OCR to deny information requests if its release could hinder an investigation. ----- To subscribe to this group,send an email to: ndn-aim-subscribe@egroups.com Archived on line at: http://www.eScribe.com FREE LEONARD PELTIER --------- "RE: Effort to Fix Indian Trust Funds Imploding" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 01:49:43 -0800 (PST) From: Paul Pureau Subj: Effort to Fix Indian Trust Funds 'Imploding, Mailing List: ndn-aim Effort to Fix Indian Trust Funds 'Imploding,' Memo Says By Ellen Nakashima Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, March 17, 2001; Page A07 The federal government's effort to fix billions of dollars in Indian trust funds is "slowly, but surely imploding," according to a memo written by the man in charge of deploying a new computer system to untangle the accounts. Dom Nessi, the chief information officer at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, wrote to Special Trustee Tom Slonaker that the trust reform plan created in August 1998 to clean up records and institute an accounting system was "built on wishful thinking and rosy projections." The startingly candid memo was the latest blow to the government's troubled program to fix a century of neglectful management of the trust funds. Nessi had intended to keep the Feb. 23 memo private, but it was entered as a court document by Justice Department lawyers who are battling claims by Native Americans that the government has mismanaged tens of billions of dollars they say is rightfully theirs. The government lawyers are asking U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth to delay proceedings in the lawsuit to allow the Bush administration to examine what Nessi has to say. "In view of the wide-ranging nature of the concerns being raised in the memorandum and the importance of accuracy in reporting to the court," the lawyers wrote, they were requesting a postponement until May 4. The government has spent more than $40 million on a new computer system to track money going in and out of the individual trust accounts. In his memo, Nessi, who is in charge of information technology systems at the BIA, stopped short of saying the computer system is a failure. But the plaintiffs say the memo buttresses what they have contended all along: that the electronic Trust Assets and Accounting Management System (TAAMS) is a bust, and that the government does not know with reliability how much money has come in or gone out on behalf of the Native Americans. "This is a turning point, that finally the United States government has to fess up that they have lied to American Indians for all these years, they have lied in court that they can fix the problem," said lead plaintiff Elouise Cobell, a member of the Blackfeet tribe in Browning, Mont. "This is a powerful piece of evidence that tells us that this reform plan is not working." Interior Secretary Gale A. Norton testified to a Senate committee on Feb. 28 that "much progress has been made" on trust reform and TAAMS. Interior's trust reform efforts "present huge challenges," Norton said, "but there is no doubt that they can be concluded satisfactorily." Nessi's memo is less sanguine. He states that the reform plan was based on optimistic projections. "No in-depth analysis was performed" before the plan was put in place, he wrote. "Instead, posturing for the court and between Department of Interior organizations seemed to be the primary influence on objectives." The plan "constructed milestones based on no analysis and now we are trying to live with impossible expectations," he said. "Trust has been neglected for decades in the Department of Interior. It cannot be corrected in a couple of years." He also blamed the "ongoing series of litigations and harassing activities by plaintiff's counsel," saying they had taken a toll on morale. With regard to the electronic management system, he said, "the lack of clear policies and procedures within BIA and between BIA and [the Office of Trust Fund Management] continue to plague the TAAMS project." He also said that "the philosophy of TAAMS has changed at least three times and the definition of BIA data cleanup seems to be different to everyone. As [baseball legend] Yogi Berra once said, 'If you don't know where you are going, you end up somewhere else.' I believe that quote describes trust reform to a T." The memo was made public 2 1/2 weeks after a federal appeals court ruled that the government has mismanaged the trust funds kept on behalf of Native Americans since 1887. The trusts were set up to compensate Indians for use of their lands. Royalties from the sale of oil, timber, coal and gas are channeled into the accounts, which are passed down through generations. And in a curious sequence of timing, six days after the memo was written to him, Slonaker filed a 72-page status report to federal district court, essentially saying that substantial progress had been made on reform. "As of Jan. 31, 2001, a cumulative total of 182 (out of 254) milestones have been completed," wrote Slonaker, who as special trustee for American Indians is supposed to ensure that their interests are protected. For instance, he noted that as of Dec. 29, all new land title documents are recorded in TAAMS in Alaska, eastern Oklahoma, the Rocky Mountain region and the southern Plains. But, he said, the title history data are not yet complete. However, Mona Infield, a senior computer specialist at the BIA, said that these accomplishments mean little without the title history. "If you don't know who owns the land or the resource," she said, "you don't know who gets the money." She said the original specifications for the TAAMS system were inadequate for what the government hoped to accomplish. Even if TAAMS functioned, she said, the data it would process are unreliable because the records are scattered among more than 100 field offices and in many cases have been destroyed. Infield, a longtime employee at the BIA, has had her supervisory responsibilities stripped -- she believes because she has spoken out about the trust management problems. A court-appointed special master said he has reason to believe that the Interior Department retaliated against her. Paul Homan, a former special trustee who resigned in 1999 in protest of the way the management reform was proceeding, noted that because of poor record-keeping, the government cannot find at least 50,000 of some 300,000 Native Americans who have trust accounts. He resigned after the department, under then-Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, proceeded with a plan that lacked what he thought were the necessary financial and managerial resources. Babbitt promised then that the data cleanup and record fix would be finished "on his watch." "The government has been all along saying it's under control. Now they have their chief person admitting that's not true," Homan said in an interview. Nessi would not comment yesterday. A BIA spokeswoman, Nedra Darling, would say only: "The new administration is aware of Mr. Nessi's memo and is reviewing his concerns, which are similar to those expressed by others doing the difficult work of trust reform. The new administration is committed to ensuring the success of trust reform." Staff writer Bill Miller contributed to this report. Copyright c. 2001 The Washington Post Company ===== Paul Pureau to subscribe to ndn-aim send a blank mail to: ndn-aim-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.com FREE PELTIER NOW! STOP ETHNIC CLEANSING OF THE LAKOTA! --------- "RE: Indian School Heads for Demolition" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 07:17:32 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="UTAH SCHOOL" With Memories Painful and Sweet, Indian School Heads for Demolition BY KRISTEN MOULTON THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE BRIGHAM CITY -- It has been 51 years since Navajo children first stepped off the bus here to begin new lives at the Intermountain Indian School. But Rose Curley, who was there to welcome 1,300 students that cold, pre- dawn morning in January 1950, remembers it well. Dozens of buses lined the school's streets, and children who had been plucked from their hogans and towns in Arizona and New Mexico the day before groggily stumbled out into this northern Utah town that would be their home for a year or maybe eight. The children, ages 12 to 18, had no suitcases or trunks. Each carried a cardboard box of belongings. The school would provide their clothes. "They had to get used to white man's food," says Curley, 87, who taught and counseled at the boarding school for more than 20 years. "They were lost when they came. These kids came up here not knowing a word of English." By the time they graduated from Intermountain Indian School, however, the Navajos -- and Sioux, Utes, Seminoles and other Indian students who later joined them -- had a firm grasp of academics as well as a trade such as carpentry or dental assisting. "They learned fast," Curley says. The last 30 buildings remaining at the school, which had a peak enrollment of 2,300 when Congress closed it in 1984, are being razed to make way for homes and apartments. Demolition began last month. Matt Petersen -- a partner in Cape Advisers, the New York-based company that owns the property -- has spent a decade trying to make redevelopment of the yellow-brick buildings work. Two were turned into townhouses and another is slated for the same, but Cape Advisers found the costs too high. The only way to make money, Petersen says, is to tear down the old buildings and start from scratch. Most residents of Brigham City applaud the plan. They are tired of looking at the ghosts of the campus spread over 90 acres at the southeast end of town. But some are not happy. Petition Drive: One Utahn is trying to persuade the developer to save the school's administration buildings, and resident Francelle Boman is circulating a petition asking the Brigham City Council to intervene to save the old gymnasium. Roger Roper, historic-preservation coordinator for the Utah Division of History, is hoping the developer will reconsider and preserve at least a corner of the campus. "We don't think [the buildings] should just sit there as an idle relic. We'd like to see them used," Roper says. "But sometimes it takes a while for the right use to come along. We hate to see demolition that can't be reversed." He points to other instances of preservation that took decades, such as Brigham Young Academy in Provo and the Ephraim Co-op, or even a century, such as the Washington Cotton Factory near St. George. Brigham City's Indian School property tells two important stories about Utah history, Roper says. The federal government promised the city a permanent military hospital in 1942, when it built Bushnell General Hospital on former fruit orchards. Rather than one sprawling structure, the military built smaller, separate buildings connected by covered walkways so any bombing attack would take out only what amounted to a wing of the hospital. Throughout World War II, wounded soldiers were trucked in from the West Coast. Bushnell originally was set up to handle primarily psychiatric cases but, as the fighting wore on, it became one of two Army hospitals nationwide specializing in amputations. The hospital could hold 3,000 patients and, at the height of the war, held Italian and German prisoners of war. The hospital shut down at war's end, having served 13,000 patients in four years. A New Mission: The buildings sat vacant for several years, until a proposal in 1949 to turn them into a boarding school for Navajo children, many of whom had missed out on an education because of the vast distances between schools on the reservation. George Albert Smith, then-president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, showed up at a meeting in the Box Elder Tabernacle where residents were discussing the pros and cons of a boarding school. "He spoke powerfully of the plight and the need of the Indian children," according to A History of Box Elder County, written by Frederick M. Huchel. The LDS president promised Brigham City would prosper if it would get behind the school. The city opened its arms. Sarah Yates, a reporter and editor for the Box Elder News Journal for nearly 40 years who is now retired, said the relationship between the Indian students and the city was good at times, bad at others. Many residents, perhaps remembering the LDS leader's plea, were paternalistic toward the youngsters from the reservation. They hired them for house and yard work. Yet instances of bigotry abounded. Curley remembers the school superintendent sending his white son along with several Navajos to see if it was true that ushers were relegating Indians to the back of a movie house. They were. One pharmacist, now dead, would not allow Indian students in his store. To be sure, some students made their share of mischief. There were numerous shoplifting cases, and Yates remembers stores stowing glue and paint behind the counters to prevent students from getting high from the fumes. Curley recalls runaways, too. Homesick children who slept on the buses that brought them to Brigham City often did not realize how far they were from home and set out on foot. But on the whole, says Curley, a Cherokee from North Carolina whose Navajo husband taught carpentry at Intermountain, the children blossomed during their years in Brigham City. "I'm proud I was part of it," says the Brigham City resident. Intermountain Indian School -- the big white letter "I" still adorns a hillside here -- had myriad activities. The indoor pool was a big attraction for the youngsters from the arid Southwest. Indeed, water in any form was a wonder. "They had never seen so much water in their lives," Curley says. "They were taking baths two or three times a day. It was a treat." Johnny Begay, a school counselor in Lukachukai, Ariz., rattles off a list of what he learned at Intermountain. "I learned to swim, play basketball, football, skate, run. I was in a singing group. I learned drafting," says Begay, who came to Brigham City in 1959 and stayed for eight years. "It had a lot of impact on my personal life." Begay, whose wife also attended Intermountain, brought his family to Brigham City's Peach Days celebration last fall and returned again to northern Utah several weeks ago. He is on a committee of alumni planning the next reunion, which may be this summer in Brigham City. He took a look around the old gymnasium, which has been used the past three years by former Box Elder District teacher Baty Morrison to teach basketball clinics and stage regional youth tournaments. Begay took copies of Boman's petition seeking to save the gym back to the reservation to gather signatures. Besides its value as part of the school's history and its potential as a community recreation center, the gym has a little known gem: a mural painted in 1954 by renowned Indian artist Allen Houser, a Chiricahua Apache who taught art at Intermountain for 11 years. Begay and others hope they can at least save Houser's artwork, although it was painted directly onto the foyer wall and could not be removed easily. Petersen, the partner in the development company, says the gym would require too much money to fix. "It's not feasible. The building is a liability, not an asset. I've already spent $150,000 on engineering and architecture to lay that site out." He is not happy that Boman and others now want to stop the owner's plans for Eagle Village. "I've been here for a number of years and never have these people come forward with the brilliant ideas that they now have," Petersen says. Forrest Cuch, executive director of Utah's Division of Indian Affairs, is still angry that the Indian school was closed in the first place. Other Indian boarding schools may have shut down as a result of pressure to return children to their own cultures, but the Intermountain Indian School was closed because Congress did not like spending the money, Cuch says. He particularly blames Rep. Jim Hansen, the Utah Republican who sought its closure. The school allowed students to speak their languages while it taught them English. "For once they were encouraged to learn about their culture, from beading to dance to drumming," Cuch says. At the same time, they had football, basketball and cross country teams that competed with other Utah high schools. "For the first time, there was pride developing among those students as far as being Indian," Cuch says. "It really became a model school. When it was at its most high, it was shut down." e-mail: kmoulton@sltrib.com Copyright c. 2001, The Salt Lake Tribune. --------- "RE: Catholic Boarding School Abuses in SD" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 01:19:35 -0600 From: "huhoogle" Subj: Catholic Boarding School Abuses in SD Mailing List: ndn-aim My Friends, We would like to pass this information out to the Many People who has been abused, here in the Dakotas, And on the Reservations, This message is for the People who suffered at the hands of the Catholic Church, and other Christian Chuches who controlled boarding schools. We need to gear up for this campaign to find Justice and to get Victory like they did in Canada. It is time that these Enitities are held accountable for there acts against Humanity, Below is what I sent out to one of the local papers, Ho Hecetu yelo Alfred Bone Shirt ( ps you people at res take notice) Dear Editor, In Canada, there has been a recent wave of Court victory for the Indigenous Peoples of Canada, There has been many victories in the Courts over the Law Suits brought against the Catholic Churches, along with the Other Churches who Abused the Native Indian People, I would like to share with the People of the Rosebud Reservation the information, that there is a Attorney who I am in contact with, who is currantly looking for Lakotas who were Victims of Abuse at the hands of the Catholic Church during the times when the Catholic Church ran the Boarding Schools, Like the Saint Francis Mission. Please pass this information along, that you can be part of a class action Lawsuit against the Catholic Church if you were Abused. Violated, Hurt. I will be posting additional information this week in Public places here on the Rosebud Sioux Indian Reservation, located in South Central South Dakota concerning the specifics of the Lawsuits. I am sincerely Alfred Bone Shirt, P.O.Box 586, St. Francis, SD 57572 ---------------------------------------------------------------------_-> To subscribe to this group,send an email to: ndn-aim-subscribe@egroups.com Archived on line at: http://www.eScribe.com FREE LEONARD PELTIER --------- "RE: Council Discussing Indian School Site" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 07:17:32 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="NEW MEXICO SCHOOL" http//www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm Monday, March 19, 2001 Council Discussing Indian School Site By Dan McKay Journal Staff Writer A neighborhood group and a corporation representing New Mexico's 19 Indian pueblos are working on revisions to a proposed agreement that would guide development at the old Albuquerque Indian School property. The proposed agreement - sponsored by City Councilor Vince Griego - is scheduled for action at a council meeting today. If approved by the city, the agreement would be sent to the pueblos for consideration. The 50-year agreement would require that any development at the Indian School site on Menaul NW be subject to the city's land-use rules. The city would provide water, sewer and other services to the property, which is surrounded by city land. But a citizens group - Neighbors for Rational Development - says the proposal is ambiguous and might be difficult to enforce. Pete Robinson, the group's president, also said he hopes councilors will amend the proposal to make clear that a casino isn't appropriate for the 44-acre site. "In general, we're pleased with the progress," Robinson said Friday, "but I wouldn't say we're at a final resolution of some of the issues." The Indian Pueblos Federal Development Corp. also is urging councilors to amend the proposed agreement. Darrell Felipe, the corporation's chief executive officer, said he prefers to shorten the agreement to about 15 years. The corporation also wants to exempt federal office buildings from the city's land-use rules, Felipe said. Those buildings are subject to federal regulations anyway, he said. Offices for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Indian Health Services are planned, Felipe said, as well as a hotel and performing arts center. And there's no realistic chance of a casino at the site, Felipe said. Two nearby pueblos that already have casinos would never agree to put a competing one in Albuquerque, he said. The old Albuquerque Indian School campus - which is at Menaul and 12th NW - has been vacant since the early 1980s, when the All Indian Pueblo Council closed it. City officials say the development agreement is needed to give surrounding neighborhoods an idea of what to expect at the site. The City Council is scheduled to meet today at 5 p.m. in the Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Government Center, One Civic Plaza. Copyright c. 2001 Albuquerque Journal --------- "RE: White Swan Oyate Letter" --------- Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2001 17:03:56 -0000 From: anne.bates Subj: Fw: White Swan Oyate letter ------- FORWARD, Original message follows ------- From: Frances Zephier Mailing List: RezLife Hau Advocates and All Nations; I call upon you today for your letter of support. We are in A battle with the State and U.S Corps of Engineers for our land and water right the people here on the Yankton Sioux Rez are beaten down from being mislead, lied to, and taken for granted. We are in need of moral support. It would be appreciated if we could get some letters of encouragement and support sent to my e-mail or P.O. Box so that I may read them to my people and they will know that they are not alone and that there really are people who truly care. It will take a lot of time energy and courage to come up against Indian and Non-Indian tyrant who hold our people down. Here is the preliminary letter we will be sending to Senator Daschle, Senator Johnson, Senator Thune, The Honorable Chuck Hagel, Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell and Senator Daniel K. Inouye, it reads. We are writing on behalf of the White Swan Oyate, Survivors, Descendants, Relatives, and Supporters. We are a Grassroots based group that formed, because we felt that our voices and rights were not being heard or respected. We also felt we were not being represented as a grassroots group. Our group of Survivors, Descendants, Relatives and Supporters work in an effort with the Tribal Membership as a whole by Surveys, Information Fliers, and Petition Letters. We were sanctioned on 10-10-00, at a regular Business and Claims Committee meeting. A Support Petition and Position Statement by resolution was brought to the B&CC, by Liz Marcellas and Frances Zephier. All funds to support our efforts are taken from our own pockets. Many of the Survivors have waited 50 years to receive recognition and compensation for their irreplaceable losses. They have endured 50 years of pain and suffering for the loss of their homes, foundations, lands, and community. A community that was close net, where everyone took care of one another, like maybe the community you live in. One lady is in her first stages of alzheimer, said she hopes that she will have one good memory of what has happened to her. Will she have something to pass on to her children, besides memories of a good spirited community. Therefore the Survivors of White Swan Community deserve adequate compensation for their loss of land, homes, belongings, and for a life style that can not be replaced. We would also like procure land along the Lake Francis Case at the White Swan Site, in an amount equal the land taken. We feel that the compensation amount compensate only for the loss of use of the total acres involved. This is in the Position Statement under #5 along with other important issues. There are a few question the we would liked answered about S.434 Bill: We want to know the status of the Bill? Why the amount changed and reduced from $34. million to $23,023,743. million,for the loss value of 2, 851.40 acres of land taken for the Fort Randall Dam and Reservoir of the Pick-Sloan program? According to our figures we are only getting 1/2 a cent an acre. The dollar amount for 50 years, $23,023,743. divide by 50 years equals $460,474.86 per year. Then divide this amount by 12 months and that equals $38,372.91. And last, divide that amount by 7,178 enrolled members of the Yankton Sioux Tribe. That equals $5.35, per person, per year. We ask these questions, so that we may get the facts out to the people. How did you come up with amount of $23,023,743 for compensation? In closing, we are requesting that The Honorable Chuck Hagel, Senator Johnson, Senator Thune, and Senator Daschle can come meet with White Swan Oyate, Survivors, Descendants, Relative, and Supporters group. Please send response letter to the enclosed list of names. Please contact us at Box 222, Wagner S.D. 57380, or if you need additional information the contact for the organization by phone at (605)384-5333. An E-mail can be sent to franceszephier@hotmail.com. Sincerely, White Swan Oyate, Surviors, Descendants, Relatives, and Supporters ----- For Rezlife egroups http://www.egroups.com/group/rezlife --------- "RE: Shunned Oneidas" --------- Date: Fri, 9 Mar 2001 07:13:07 -0500 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="ONEIDA" Shunned Oneidas By Associated Press, 3/8/2001 11:19 ONEIDA, N.Y. (AP) Oneida officials have ordered city employees not to patronize Oneida Indian Nation businesses while driving or riding in city- owned vehicles. "Under no circumstances are employees of the department while operating or riding in a City of Oneida owned vehicle visit any Save-on, Plaza mart or Oneida Mart for the purpose of making any purchase," wrote City Engineer Jim Bacher in a March 2 memo. Mayor James Chappell said he discourages all employees from patronizing nation-owned businesses on city time and in city vehicles because the Oneidas' businesses do not collect sales tax for the city. "I don't think it's appropriate," Chappell said. "I assume it was understood when I took over" as mayor in January 2000. He said workers in every department knew about this policy even before Bacher's memo went out. Bacher sent the memo after a city resident complained about seeing a city vehicle parked at a nation-owned station. The Oneidas don't pay property taxes on their businesses, maintaining they are members of a sovereign nation that isn't subject to U.S. taxation. Their stations are located in Oneida, Verona, Canastota, Lenox, Sherrill and Verona Beach. Chappell said the city doesn't encourage its employees to boycott nation-owned businesses on their own time. The Oneida Indian Nation is suing Madison and Oneida counties for the return of 250,000 acres the state purchased illegally in the 18th and 19th centuries. The local chapter of Upstate Citizens for Equality, a group of about 4, 000 landowners who oppose the nation's land claim and tax stance, called the city's policy a "good first step." Oneida Indian Nation representatives were not available for comment Wednesday. Copyright c. 2001 Boston Globe Electronic Publishing, Inc. --------- "RE: Native American Charged with Hate Crime" --------- Date: Sat, 17 Mar 2001 07:56:46 -0800 From: "Harvest" Subj: NA Charged with Hate Crime for Destroying Statue of Columbus Mailing List: Our Red Earth Thanks for sharing this story. It's very powerful. I'm going to forward it to as many people as I can. ----- Original Message ----- From: Guarionex Delgado Brothers and Sisters A local activist (Santa Cruz, CA) is being charged with a hate crime for destroying a statue of Christopher Columbus at San Jose city hall. Please take a few minutes to read the rest of this email and then let the Santa Clara District Attorney know what you think and how you feel. Please excuse the length and formatting. Your brother in the struggle, Guarionex. San Jose, Ca. - Wielding a sledgehammer, justice activist James Cosner smashed a life-size statue of Christopher Columbus in front of dozens of witnesses at City Hall in San Jose, California on Thursday, March 8th. As the seven-types of marble chips flew from the blows, Cosner shouted "Genocide!" "This man rode our backs!" "This man murdered us!" Most Americans do not know the murderous history of Christopher Columbus. Examining primary historical sources by Bartolome de las Casas, the biographer of Columbus' son, Columbus made four voyages to the New World. He encountered the Arawaks, who occupied Haiti. An early census of the Arawak was 1.1 million, not counting children. According to a conservative estimate over 3 million Arawak lived on Haiti in pre-Columbian times. Columbus kidnapped , enslaved, and murdered the Arawak people. He ruled with severe discipline ordering the cutting off of ears or nose as punishment for minor crimes. When the Arawaks fought back, Columbus used the excuse to wage war. On March 24th, 1495 Columbus set out to conquer the Arawaks. With 20 hunting dogs, horses, and guns Columbus set upon the Arawaks, tearing them up with dogs and mowing them down with volleys of bullets, and running them over with horses. Reporting back to Queen Isabel of Spain, Columbus boasted "In the name of the holy trinity, we can send from here all the slaves that Brazil will hold." The Spaniards hunted Indians for sport and murdered them for dog food. Seeking gold, he enslaved the remaining Arawaks to work the mines. Those who refused had their hands cut off. Conditions for the Arawak become so intolerable that as many as 100 at a time would commit suicide. Women were known to kill their newborn babies, rather than have them raised in such hideous circumstances. Columbus would reward his officers with women to rape. Girls 10 to 12 were especially desired for rape. When Columbus son took over in 1505, he continued the slaughter. Only some 12,000 remained by 1516. By 1555 not a single Arawak remained. Haiti remains one of the primary instances of genocide in human history to be followed by more instances of genocide in Puerto Rico and Cuba. The presence of the statue prominently placed in City Hall in San Jose has been reviled by native Americans as a sick reminder of the ruthless slaughter and conquest of indigenous people in the New World. Having smuggled the sledgehammer into City Hall, Cosner struck the marble statue breaking off the arm, both legs, and cracking pits into the face. He cracked off the top of the scroll held by Columbus, so that the torso only remained standing by the flowing waves of the marble cape, which was still connected to the pedestal. One passerby, Jaime Nava approached Cosner and tried to talk him into stopping. As Nava tried to calm Cosner, plainclothes officer Chris Galios, Mayor Ron Gonzales' bodyguard, arrived and tried to persuade Cosner to stop. But it was only when three uniformed officers came through the front door with their guns drawn that Cosner ceased. Nava used his body to shield Cosner, who had backed against a wall. Officers then handcuffed Cosner, who told them: "I'm not fighting. I'm very calm. I'm very calm." San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzalez vowed to restore the statue, which will then be moved in front of the new City Hall when it opens downtown. Cosner, a native American who has been active in protests against the injustice committed against the homeless in Santa Cruz under the Sleeping Ban, in the struggle to free Mumia Abu Jamal, and against the bombing in Yugoslavia. In 1996, he was one of six people who locked down at City Hall to protest the anti-homeless Sleeping Ban in Santa Cruz. In 1999 he was arrested in Rep. Sam Farr's office to protest the civilian bombing of Yugoslavia. He was arrested at another protest on May 22nd in front of the McPherson Center where a Democratic Party fundraiser was held, supporting ex- President Clinton's "Bomb Belgrade" campaign. He, along with Steve Argue, became one of the Santa Cruz 5, arrested for resisting a police disruption of a legitimate political protest. Later in 1999, he attended the protests in Seattle against the WTO. Cosner remains in the Santa Clara County Jail, booked on suspicion of vandalism, making terrorist threats and destruction of a civic monument. His bail, originally set at $4,000 has been raised to $50,000. As of Monday 3:30 PM, a female deputy at the jail who identified herself only as #132 refused to answer why the bail cost was raised, what the current bail was, and what the current charges were. She did state that Cosner was being arraigned and that his files would return by 2 a.m. Tuesday. She acknowledged that she did have current information on the computer, but declined to release that information. Informed sources confirmed later that Cosner was taken to court on Monday afternoon, not charged, and scheduled for arraignment on Thursday afternoon (1-5 PM). Sources for historical information on Columbus's genocidal policies: History of the Indies by Bartolome de las Casas translated by Andree M. Collard [1971]; Select Letters of Christopher Columbus translated and edited by R. H. Major [1847]; A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn [1980]; The Log of Christopher Columbus's First Voyage to America in the Year 1492, as copied out in brief by las Casas [1989]; all from Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen [1995] http://www.santaclara-da.org/contactus.html DA's office web page Mailing Address: 70 West Hedding Street San Jose, CA 95110 Phone:(408) 299-7500 Fax: (408) 286-5437 Native American Activist Smashes San Jose City Hall Statue of Christopher Columbus Revered Mass Murderer Sources for the Cosner information: San Jose Mercury News 3-9 & 3-10 Story by Becky Johnson For more information: (831)423-HUFF or wmnofstl@cruzio.com From: Jim Vivian To: Jim Vivian * Subject: CRITICAL BAIL HEARING and PRESS CONFERENCE MONDAY for JIM COSNER/re: COLUMBUS STATUE Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 02:42:55 -0800 THE PROSECUTION IS NOW CHARGING JIM COSNER WITH A "HATE CRIME" FOR SMASHING THE COLUMBUS STATUE IN SAN JOSE CITY HALL; AND THREATEN TO ADD MORE CHARGES JIM COSNER'S BAIL WAS ALREADY RAISED FROM $4000 TO $50,000 AFTER HIS ARREST NOW THE PROSECUTION WANTS TO INCREASE JIM'S BAIL AGAIN ! DEFENSE TO ARGUE FOR REASONABLE BAIL -- $50,000 BAIL IS USUALLY ONLY FOR SERIOUS VIOLENT FELONIES SUCH AS RAPE AND MURDER MONDAY, MARCH 19th (Press Conference 12:30pm, Bail Hearing 1:30pm Courtroom TBA) Santa Clara County Superior Court, 200 West Hedding, San Jose, CA (between 1st St. and Guadalupe Highway 87) PRESS CONFERENCE IN FRONT OF COURT AT 12:30 PM BAIL HEARING 1:30 PM COURTROOM TBA needed: character reference letters Info: (831) 423-HUFF or (408) 562-2556, wmnofstl@cruzio.com Then what is afraid of me comes, and lives a while in my sight. What it fears in me leaves me, and the fear of me leaves it. It sings, and I hear its song. Then what I am afraid of comes. I live for a while in its sight. What I fear in it leaves it, and the fear of it leaves me. It sings, and I hear its song. Wendell Berry ----- Thank you for your participation at Our Red Earth. --------- "RE: Man Arrested in Fatal Stabbing on Reservation" --------- Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 07:17:32 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="STABBING" Monday, March 19, 2001 Man arrested in fatal stabbing on reservation Associated Press PORT ANGELES, Wash. _ A man arrested in the stabbing death of a teenager on the Lower Elwha Klallam Reservation has been taken to the Pierce County Jail in Tacoma. The victim, Cordell Singleton, 18, was declared dead early Saturday at Olympic Memorial Hospital after he was stabbed during a weekend party on the reservation. Christopher Paul Hawk, 21, was arrested shortly afterward and first taken to Clallam County Jail, then transferred to Tacoma. He was scheduled to be arraigned in U.S. District Court in Tacoma today. It may be the reservation's first slaying since intertribal raids in the latter part of the 1800s, said tribal police. Neighbors said they'd heard a small party was planned Friday at the home where the stabbing occurred. Hawk, whose family lives in California and Oklahoma, was dating a Lower Elwha tribal member, neighbors said. Neither he nor Singleton were believed to be members of the tribe. Cordell and Meridi Singleton had a daughter on July 29, Olympic Memorial birth records show. Copyright c. 2001 The Associated Press. Copyright c. 2001 Idaho Spokesman-Review. --------- "RE: Death Penalty by Standing Deer" --------- Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 20:37:26 -0800 (PST) From: orion-c@webtv.net Subj: Death Penalty/By Standing Deer Mailing List: Iron Natives Message to the People This solidarity statement was written to be delivered to the People at the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty 3rd annual Memorial Day weekend protest in Huntsville, Texas on May 30, 1998 In The Spirit of Crazy Horse, the chiefs, elders, clan mothers, grandmothers and grandfathers, I send warmest greetings and solidarity to the members, friends and supporters of the Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty! AHO! My name is Standing Deer, and I am being held captive by the State of Texas at the Pack One Prison in Navasota, Texas. In america, one of the few things that the poor have better access to than the rich is the death penalty. There are no rich folks on death row. That archaic, barbarous teaching of "an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth" applies only to us, the poor. The official document issued by the coroner when a prisoner is murdered by the state says: "HOMICIDE". Yet the killers walk tall like they were John Wayne before his stomach rejected him. It's madness, but their position is constantly validated by the violence and ragged horror displayed on television. I'm afraid the conscience of america has crawled off under the White House and died. There are employees of the TDCJ -- it is impossible to know how many because they have to stay in the closet for fear of losing the respect of their fellow employees, or worse yet their jobs -- who believe as we do that EXECUTIONS ARE WRONG! I know one who believes that executions are being carried out by moral imbeciles with high I.Q.s who will be looked upon by history as we, today, look upon Hitler's Nazis. The day they killed Karla Faye, I dozed off while waiting for some kind of word, and had a dream that I was at the Execution Chamber watching in horror as they strapped her on the gurney. Suddenly, at the last moment, the man with the poison came out from behind a curtain and just said: "NO!" Another guard said, "BASTA!" And one, "STOP!" "ENOUGH!" Shouted another, "I WILL NOT BE AN ACCOMPLICE TO THIS MURDER!" And with that, the first guard threw the poison to the floor and began releasing Karla Faye from her bonds. The preacher and warden (the same ones who had held another victim down at another day, another time) became enraged and attempted to re-secure her bonds, but the guards restrained them while others poured into the murder chamber with tears in our eyes, helping Karla Faye to her feet while there was laughing and crying all around, and she was free at last. The guards were dancing with the people, and in the dream I heard the voice of Nietzche saying, "Whoever fights monsters whould see to it that in the process he does not become a monster." I awakened in my dark, dank cage to the cold reality that our sister was with us no more, and the mass murderer known as the State of Texas still stalked the land. When I think about how wrong the death penalty is, a shiver runs up and down my spine: "What if they had murdered my brother, Leonard Peltier?" Leonard, who has been in captivity for more than twenty-two years for a crime he did not commit. If they had taken Leonard's life, who would lead us by his courage and example? Today, good people all over the world know that Loenard is innocent, and because he still lives and breathes he will one day be free. We will yet, one day FREE LEONARD PELTIER! All of you who struggle in unity to abolish the heinous crime of state-sanctioned murder are heroines & heros. Work like hell! Agitate, propagate, educate, and remember when you save or extend the life of a single individual the true reward is from Creator to your heart. Remeber the words of Mandela: "There are victories whose glory lies only in the fact that they are known to those who win them." Let me express my profound thanks and solidarity to all of you who believe in our cause, and especially to all of you on death row throughout the land. I extend to you the left hand of my left arm which is the closest to my heart. My love and strength are with you every step of the way! IN THE SPIRIT OF CRAZY HORSE, Standing Deer Poem: If They Were to Kill My Brother...[version II] If they were going to kill my brother... by Standing Deer "If we are to vent our riotous anger let it be before they try to murder Mumia Abu-Jamal, not after." --Michael Parenti, Martin Luther King High School, Berkeley, June 25, 1995 "We are at a point beyond candle vigils that reflect little besides moral indignation." --Ray Luc Levasseur "Think of sister Assata. We don't need another martyr. We need our brother Mumia breathing, smiling, laughing, alive and well among us, talking that talk and writing those words as only he can do it." --Standing Deer ****************** If they were going to kill my brother I would raise him...rescue him steal him away from the murderous thugs of the state. They don't need his life nohow! They can't sell it for twice what it's worth 'cause there ain't that much money in the world. So what for do they want it?!? He don't mean nothin' no way 'cept to those who love him and need him and can't do without him. I always wonder why we let freedom fighters rot their lives away in some jail or go down in a murder for hire plot rigged by the state. Folks be marching and hollering and carrying signs crying his name demanding his freedom, but if signs and words could free him he woulda been free a long time ago. This is not about revolution and we don't need the masses to rise up and wrest away the means of production from the criminal class. This is about our brother's life. His LIFE! and it only takes a few of us WHO DON'T WANT HIM DEAD. So what can we do to save the life of our brother? First, we must find a way to save the lives of ourselves. There was a time when an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth seemed like the right thing to do. Perhaps, in an uncivilized world it was right and proper to tear our sinners limb from limb to poke our their eyes with hot pokers and strap them to electric chairs and cook them alive, but as the world strains to become civilized it is time to abandon the fire and brimstone of the olden days and make a choice for a better world. It is time to make a choice for LIFE! It is time to make a choice for a world where love and redemption and the Spirit of FORGIVENESS rules the day. In the wake of the Littleton, Colorado tragedy it is time to begin teaching our children by our example that it is NEVER right to kill! Let us make a choice today, for silence is consent and choosing not to choose is itself a choice... a choice to kill. We must protest the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal as well as all the state sanctioned murders to come. For every time the state kills in our name and we do not object then we, ourselves, are the killers. If the world is ever to become civilized the end of the death penalty has to start somewhere and sometime. What better place than here? What better time than now? FREE MUMIA ABU-JAMAL! STOP THE KILLING! ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY NOW ! ! ! --------- "RE: LPDC Report" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 17:38:55 -0600 From: "LPDC" Subj: LPDC report Mailing List: LPDC Dear friends, Below is a short report which we include in every issue of the LPDC bi-monthly news paper, "In the Spirit of Crazy Horse." We decided to send it out to the list serve to let Peltier supporters know what is going on with us. In case you are unaware of our newspaper, it is a 20 page bi-monthly publication that always includes a new statement from Leonard Peltier, a report from the LPDC, a campaign update, and articles reporting on current Indigenous Issues, prison issues, political prisoners and the environment. If you are interested in subscribing, click here: http://www.freepeltier.org/newspaper.htm#top In Solidarity, LPDC LPDC COLLECTIVE REPORT Dear Friends, Transitioning from the intense, fast moving clemency campaign to a time of assessment, research, and regrouping is a rather drastic change. Currently, Leonard's attorneys are researching new legal avenues while the LPDC staff brainstorm ways to broaden and strengthen our organization, taking advantage of the network of professors, students, human and civil rights groups, and native organizations who have recently become active participants in the freedom effort. We want to make sure that we can sustain ourselves while waging a relentlessly strong campaign for however long it takes to gain Leonard's release from prison. Eventually, we plan to establish working sub- committees, a larger group of campaign coordinators, and a broadened and more active advisory council. Meanwhile, many supporters are asking what they can do to help move things along, outside of urging Congress to declassify the 6000 documents being withheld by the FBI and to hold investigations into the case. It may be a number of months before a tangible avenue for Leonard's release becomes available, which gives all of us valuable time to work on expanding our network and increasing public awareness and support. We have an updated plan of action and a new informational brochure for supporters to distribute. Just send us a self-addressed envelope or download them from our web site (the new info brochure will be posted on our site this week). Now is the time for teach-ins, video showings, leafleting, and coalition building. Should we go back to court, our network must be united, strong, and ready to pounce into action. We also want to encourage supporters to call the Bureau of Prisons on an ongoing basis, to stop them from instituting the new phone restrictions April 1st. (Read more inside this issue). The curtailing of telephone privileges will hinder Leonard's ability to participate in his own defense and family affairs. The change will be devastating and this trend in prison policy must be resisted. We want to thank each of you for staying with us through this transitional phase. Know that though things may be quieter than usual, we are busy building a sturdy foundation for the next big push. Thank you for your ongoing support. In Solidarity, The Leonard Peltier Defense Committee Leonard Peltier Defense Committee PO Box 583 Lawrence, KS 66044 785-842-5774 www.freepeltier.org To subscribe, send a blank message to < lpdc-on@mail-list.com > --------- "RE: Native Prisoner" --------- Date: Mon, 19 March 2001 20:55:07 -0530 From: "Janet Smith" Subj: Native Prisoner News Tell a Native American Prisoner someone cares! -- - - - Peltier, Leonard #89637-132 Box 1000 Leavenworth, KS 66053 Birthday: 9/12/44 Ancestry: Ojibwa-Lakota -- - - - Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 12:46:46 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="JAIL PART 2" Part 2 of a series Incarcerated juveniles Child in need of Supervision - Does CHINS work for the good of the Child? By Ruth Steinberger Lakota Journal Correspondent RAPID CITY - A recent Lakota Journal survey regarding the treatment of Indian juveniles processed through the judicial systems of states with high Indian populations revealed that the treatment of Indian youth varied widely from state to state. We also found that the way in which a state handles juveniles impacts the child, their family and community in an ongoing way. When Margaret (Peggy) Gramkow went to the local police for assistance because her daughter had spent the night out and she was concerned about the girl's whereabouts, she had no idea of what the rest of her daughter's youth would be like. In order to even report her missing, Gramkow was told she would have to sign a Children in Need of Supervision (CHINS) form. When her daughter returned that night she acted just fine. However when Gramkow called the police to tell them she had come home, she found herself unable to withdraw the CHINS petition. Gramkow had no idea that one of the first things South Dakota would do would be to remove the girl from Gramkow's custody. This action would effectively remove the 14-year-old girl from school where she was making A's and B's and place her into unaccredited classes taught by uncertified teachers for a very few hours per day. Her daughter would be placed in a state facility where instead of family counseling to resolve problems that many families face, the girl would be prevented from seeing her mother for two months. In Plankinton she would wear the orange uniform that girls and their families say are issued to Indian girls, denoting them as high risk, instead of the blue ones issued to non-Indian girls, presumably a lower risk factor. By placing her in a state facility intended as punishment instead of for counseling, her daughter would be subject to humiliation including four pointing and having her clothes cut off her, being insulted and demeaned. Counseling was not a part of the services. As the child of an activist, her daughter could be targeted for reprisals like other daughters and sons of parents who had spoken out against the juvenile justice system. Aside from being denied the right to see their children, parents who have spoken out against the injustices in the juvenile system have found that their children were "recycled" back into boot camp programs, through other facilities or found themselves punished with restraints and in other more immediate ways. For the rest of the story pick up a copy of the Lakota Journal at a newsstand near you or Subscribe! Copyright c. 2001 Lakota Journal. -- - - - Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 06:23:25 EST From: zmikeyz@aol.com Subj: Prisoner Request Mailing List: Our Red Earth Greetings everyone, On behalf of the Iron Lodge Prison Ministry, let me say a few words. Some of these brothers did bad things to land where they are. Ministries Like Iron Lodge get these brothers to recognize and take accoutnability. In short, it turns their lives around and nudges them back to the type of life and spiritual existence that Ndns should all live in. It is apolitical in that the ministry doesn't go in and tell these men that nothing is their fault. I got involved at Sky's request with writing a brother who was a confused Mexica brother. I have been rewarded 100 fold for the little bit of effort. This young man is accountable for what he did, and I feel he will not get out and repeat offend. I think he will move closer to his family and become the man that is an example for everyone. These guys have needs the largest of these needs is pen pals to let these men know that Ndns out here give a damn about them. Their next need is for religious items cleared through Sky. Give up an hours time and make something, give up an hour pay and donate something to SKy for them--it is tax deductable. Send tobacco to sky for them. BOOKS! Good books, none of that Brooke Medicine Eagle shit, send them books about TRUE history, about learning their native tongue if they have lost it. Either way, please take 10 minutes today, clear your head, and think about these men. If you are sufficiently moved, get busy. If you think it is too hard to be a pen pal like I have, then donate some things...you may even have some things in your house that you can give--and what better gift than to give something that is yours to them. These guys need us. AND, Sky can't do this alone, please help. And with me ending this PSA, I might as well mention that your donations make possible quality human beings! With Respect Mikey ===== Thank you for your participation at Our Red Earth. ---- To subscribe to this group,send an email to: ndn-aim-subscribe@egroups.com Archived on line at: http://www.eScribe.com FREE LEONARD PELTIER -- - - - From: "Kay Lee" Date: Tue, 20 Mar 2001 01:31:30 -0500 Subj: IMMEDIATE RELEASE: I HEARD YOUR CRY 4 DAY BUS TOUR Mailing List: ndn-aim MARCH 19 - 22, 2001 Tallahassee to Miami 'I HEARD YOUR CRY' Bus Tour and Prison Protest IN SUPPORT OF SB 226 & HB 285. Tour Stops in TALLAHASSEE, GAINESVILLE, SANFORD, ORLANDO, FT. LAUDERDALE, MIAMI TO DRAW ATTENTION TO THE CRISIS OF PRISON RAPE For more information on the 4 day Gainesville event call Carol Mosley (352) 468-3295 The tour will kick-off in Tallahassee with a press conference at 2:00 p.m. on Monday, March 19th at the Capitol in Tallahassee and proceed to Gainesville for its first stop. The Gainesville presentation will take place at the Hurley House (big pink building at the east end of the parking lot behind St. Augustine Church on University Avenuue) at 7:30pm and is sponsored by the Florida Coalition for Peace & Justice and Pax Christi Gainesville. Featuring Cassandra Collins, who was a victim of sexual violence by a prison official while incarcerated in the Gadsden County Jail and was motivator of legislative bills to address the issue of sexual violence against inmates. Cassandra Collins, founded Freedom Alert Incarceration Rape (FAIR) after she was raped by a prison captain while incarcerated in the Gadsden County Jail. Bills have been presented in the house and senate to protect people in jails and prisons from sexual abuse at the hands of prison employees. The Florida Coalition for Peace & Justice and Pax Christi Gainesville are fortunate to be a stop on the 4-day "I HEARD YOUR CRY" bus tour. The tour will draw attention to the horrors of sexual violence in prisons. HELP PUT AN END TO SEXUAL VIOLENCE IN PRISONS AND JAILS PLEASE SUPPORT THIS BUS TOUR AND SUPPORT SB 226 & HB 285. In peace, Carol Mosley (352) 468-3295 *************************************************** Forwarded by Kevin Aplin, Dir. Fl Can flcan@vitel.tzo.com Shared by Kay Lee 2613 Larry Court Eau Gallie, Fl 32935 715-831-9071 / 321-253-3673 ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ INTRODUCING THE FAMILY SECTION http://www.angelfire.com/fl4/fci/family.html ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Of MAKING THE WALLS TRANSPARENT http://www.zyworld.com/kay~lee/garywaid.html ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Inspired by A Smuggler's Tales From Jails http://www.angelfire.com/la/kaylee/tales.html ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ All projects of the Journey for Justice http://www.journeyforjustice.org ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Petition to move the Valdes Trial - Please, please sign. http://www.angelfire.com/la/kaylee/valdespetition.html -- - - - Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 07:17:32 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="SPIRITUAL NEEDS" http://www.owlstar.com/dailyheadlines.htm http://www.dakotadaily.org/index.htm (Rapid City-AP) -- A Lakota medicine man is working with officials on how to serve the spiritual needs of American Indians in the county jail at Rapid City. Charles Fast Horse says he will help officials develop a list of religious and cultural items that inmates can have upon request. He says some items might not be allowed for security reasons while others are too sacred to have in a jail. --------------------------------- Please especially remember Leonard. Leonard Peltier #89637-132, Box 1000, Leavenworth, KS 66053 --------------------------------- Dear Janet, Eddie Hatcher was moved from Central Prison in North Carolina to a county jail. His new address is: Eddie Hatcher, Robeson County Jail,122 Legend Road, Lumberton, NC 28358. Thanks, Marsha Shaiman On Indian Land, PO Box 2104, Seattle WA 98111 --------------------------------- Standing Deer's new address: Robert H. Wilson #640539, Estelle Unit, 264 FM 3478, Huntsville, TX 77320-3322 --------- "RE: History: Carlisle Indian School" --------- Date: Sun, 04 Mar 2001 22:50:06 -0500 From: Barbara Landis Subj: History: Carlisle Indian School Newspaper - March 2, 1888 [Editorial Note: These reprints are being included in this newsletter so that you might know the mind of those who ran institutions like Carlisle.] THE INDIAN HELPER ----------------------------- ~~ FOR OUR BOYS AND GIRLS ~~ ============================= VOLUME III CARLISLE, PA. FRIDAY, MARCH 2, 1888 NO. 29 ============================= BEAUTY. --- Beautiful faces, they that wear The light of a pleasant spirit there, It matters little if dark or fair. Beautiful hands are they that do The work of the noble, good and true, Busy for them the long day through. Beautiful feet are they that go Swiftly to lighten another's woe, Through summer's heat or winter's snow. Beautiful children of rich or poor, Who walk the pathway sweet and pure, That leads to the mansion strong and sure. -[Selected. -------------------- WHAT WILL CAN DO. ----- There was a school exhibition given in a town in New England one day in May several years ago. There were recitations, declamations and music, as in exhibitions at the Carlisle school but there were no gymnastics. There would have been no room for them in the hall that day if they had been in the school course, and they were not. This was a day school, the High School of the city, so that the visitors who came to the exhibition expected the pupils to do well. The pupils, both boys and girls, did well; they had worked hard and they showed the results of it. The selections were good, and most of them were well spoken. But it was a warm day which made the audience restless. And the room was not well built for speaking it had two large wings that the pupils found difficult to fill with their voices. At last the people who could not hear grew noisy; they listened to the music, but they had made up their minds that they could not hear the recitations, and so they did not try, but began to talk. After they had begun, they went on still more. The pupils who were reciting and all the teachers were disturbed; the exercises were nearly over, however, and they made up their minds to bear the noise. All but one teacher. A pupil whom she had been studying with the best speaker in the school, was yet to come, and had a recitation to give that was full of spirit and interest. The teacher knew how well Mollie could say it, for she had seen her eyes glow and her cheeks flush and her whole face full of the thoughts that she was to utter. She had not taught her to move her hands in this way or that, she had said to her, "Mollie, think how you would feel if you were this person in the story, and if such things were coming to you." And now nobody was to be moved by it, for nobody would hear it. Yes, they should, she resolved, but how? The room was so crowded that she could not get to Mollie. She wrote a few words on a scrap of paper, twisted it, and passed it on to her. The girl opened the paper, read, turned back and gave her teacher an eager look and smile. The words on the paper were, "Make them still by your voice." She said afterward that before that she had been troubled. But then she felt stronger than all the noisy people, she had a purpose. And the people did stop talking and listen to her. First, directly about her, then wider and wider the silence grew, until over the whole room there was a hush, and only the clear, strong voice of the girl and the wonderful words she was reciting filled the ears of all. After the exhibition people crowded about her with praise, but in the midst of it she turned and gave her teacher a look, and said; "I should never have done it but for you, you showed me how to will." --------------- Extracts from the Compositions of the Smaller Scholars. "First time I did not know how to skate on ice-skates. I never saw ice-skates before at my home." "We like trees because of their nice green leaves and shade in the summer time." "Last winter we had a sliding place. One for the boys and one for the girls. The boys' sliding place was in front of the school house and the girls in front of the office, and the sleds went down toward the dining room. This winter we did not have sliding place. We just play where the hill go up little bit." ========================================== (p 2) The Indian Helper. ----------------------------- PRINTED EVERY FRIDAY, AT THE INDIAN INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL, CARLISLE, PA. BY THE INDIAN PRINTER BOYS. ----------------------------- Price: - 10 cents a year. ============================== Address INDIAN HELPER, Carlisle, Pa. Miss M. Burgess, Manager. ============================== Entered in the P.O. at Carlisle as second class mail matter. ============================== THE INDIAN HELPER is PRINTED by Indian boys, but EDITED by The-Man-on-the-band-stand, who is NOT an Indian. ============================== The INDIAN HELPER is paid for in advance, so do not hesitate to take the paper from the Post Office, for fear a bill will be presented. =============================== HIS LESSON. ---------- A boy came home red, rumpled, bruised and excited. "Come, my son," said his father, "what is the matter? You seem to have been fighting. Was the boy larger than you are?" The boy looked uneasy, and mumbled, "No, I don't know that he was." "Really! And now what did you fight for?" A long delay, then he blurted out the truth, "Cause he wouldn't give me half of his apple." "Indeed! Did not give you half of his apple! So you have set up as a highway robber, taking your neighbor's goods? And a bully and a coward, whipping a smaller boy! Go now, and get washed and dressed." "He deserved a whipping," said his sister. "Not at all. He has not lied; he told frankfully the truth." The boy, glad at getting off so well, soon returned to the tea table, wearing a smiling face. "There is no place here for you," said his father calmly. "Such principles as you act upon are not popular at this table. You will find food proper for a boy who conducts himself as you have done on a stand in the corner of the kitchen." But breakfast and supper thus arranged proved unendurable for the boy. "Can I ever come back?" asked the poor child. "Certainly, when you have made your affairs right." "But how can I do it?" "Take your own money, buy the little boy an apple, and give it to him, with an apology. Then you will be once more an honorable fellow, and we shall be glad of your company." And so they settled it. -Bright Jewels. Little Things. Straws show which way the wind blows; ripples on the pond show where the stone has been cast in, and a hundred little acts, of which we do not think, show our true character. Let us watch our every day life, and look out for the little things. We must not do a thing because somebody else has done the same. If some other fellow sticks his finger in the fire and burns it, is that any reason why we should burn ours? If we have done something wrong, it is not true or right to say, "He made me do it" The fault is always our own. No other person can answer for our faults, nor can we answer for the faults of other. ============ School. I think school is the best place to go, everybody ought to go to school and learn something. Because we can be better women and men when we grow up. In school we learn how to read and write, not only read and write but we will know how this world is and how we are and what kind of work every kind of people do. Of course every school has to have a teacher that knows all about these things. There are high schools and low schools. And there are deaf and dumb schools, blind children school and poor children school. There are great many schools. Here I am in this one kind of school where we Indians go. Here we learn how to do many kinds of work and I think this is the best kind of school I ever went to. ============= Pick up your spare minutes. Don't waste one. Dr. Prime wrote a book, a few spare minutes at a time, and the rest of his life letters kept coming to him telling about the good that book was doing. Minutes are God's gifts to be used, not idled away. =============== WILLOW GROVE, PA. Feb. 23, 1888. DEAR MAN-ON-THE-BAND-STAND:- I should like to have the INDIAN HELPER again, I like it very much because it tell us what the people are doing, I enjoy myself here also I am very well and happy with my work, I am in the hoop Drill and we have bells on the hoops. AMELIA ELSEEDAY, Apache. =============== Word Defnintions. Ingredient, Mixed: "Sometimes we get ingredients in our arithmetic." ================ "Write injuries in dust, but kindness in marble." ============================================== (p. 3.) Home letters this week. The monthly school sociable tonight. Look out for a happy time. --------- Carpenter boys turned out thirty tables last month and ten wardrobes. --------- Bishop Hare, of Dakota, was at this week's inspection of Quarters and pupils. --------- Mr. Mason Pratt spent last Sunday at home. Everybody was very glad to see him. --------- Busy as bees in the Sewing Room filling the store room with ready-made articles for summer wear. --------- Wm. Springer (Omaha) has been offered a place in Middletown, Pa. to perfect himself in harness-making. --------- Blacksmith boys are making irons for the gymnasium chest-weights and finishing up their work on the Herdic. --------- Fred Harris (Alaskan) made 38 dozen tin cups last month. Tinner boys reported improving and good. --------- Indian clubs and dumb-bells have been arranged along the side walls in the gymnsaium. Quite ornamental. --------- Magic at work in the paint shop. Boys have transformed an ugly old lamp into a new looking bronzed one. -------- Jennie Mitchell went to Liberty Grove Wednesday to take the place of Florence Red Eye. Florence comes back to the school. --------- One of the pupils says that the boys who complain are the boys that want to have their own way and run all about as they please. --------- Four morning boys in the show shop last week, made 11 pairs of shoes in four hours. The five afternoon boys made the same number in the same time. --------- The boys in the paint shop have begun on the wardrobes for the Large Boys' Quarters and finished the body of the Herdic, which looks "just as good as new." --------- Some of the examination papers were not so good as they ought to have been. The best papers were from the scholars who had good lessons during the last three months. We must work for anything that is worth having. Abe Sumners and Wilkie Sharp are the cutters in the tailor shop now. The new Apache boys in the tailor shop are making pants and vests, and making them well. --------- Mr. Standing returned from visiting boys in Bucks county last Saturday and left again on Monday to visit those in Columbia, Luzerne and the upper counties. In Bucks county he visited the public schools our boys attend. His general report of the homes and schools our boys are in is very satisfactory. ---------- Bishop Hare's talk to the school Sunday afternoon was especially wise and helpful. It was about the tree that a man planted in his vineyard. He did not plant it in a cow-yard, but in his garden where it could grow and bear fruit. The boys and girls here were like that tree. They were not planted on the wild prairie but in this good vineyard. They have the Bible, prayer, Christian teaching and influence to help them grow into strong, good men and women. They ought to bear the best kind of fruits - honesty, truth, purity, kindness, courage, industry. When they go back home they should be like strong trees that all would look at and be glad for - a real help to their people. ---------- TO THE MAN-ON-THE-BAND STAND: There is one great truth in mankind that really makes a man; it is "common sense." A man may have it if he is not educated. It comes to me very strongly whenever I think of a brother of mine who did not have any opportunity of getting an English education. On leaving him for Carlisle his last and solemn words were "Never study the Indian books under any circumstances. A man who will cut out a new road to a certain place when there is a straight, well-travelled road leading to it, is a fool and no excuse for him." I have never been able to appreciate the meaning of these few words until of late; and they are becoming clearer and clearer, and I hope it will continue so until every Indian possesses enough "common sense" to endorse it. I am about as well posted concerning the progress of the Sioux as any one, and my testimony is that among the few who are prospering are those who speak English, and they are half-breeds generally, I do not base my argument upon the half-breeds, but I do upon the English language, and English education. I think a man who would make a language for every "government blue-box" full of Indians ought to be ashamed and the sooner he repents the better off he is. FRANK JANNIES, Sioux. ======================================================== (p. 4) Letter From the Country. One of the teachers received the following letter from a pupil in the country: "I thought I would write a letter to you this evening to let you know that I am very well and happy. I am very sorry I never wrote to you since I came away, hope you will excuse me this time. I have just finished Rev. E.A. Goodnough's letter. I guess you know who he is, he was my teacher at home. He always wrote very good letters to me, and I like to hear from him. I am in the schoolroom this afternoon and am writing this letter in here I began it last night. My studies are Raub's Fifth Reader, large Mitchell's Geography, Raub's Arithmetic, Smith's Grammar, and spell in Dictionary and writing, my copy book is number 6. I will now tell you how I like my home. I like it very much I am treated like one of the family. I must tell you about my pet. I have a nice pet lamb in the house. It is four weeks old, its mamma would not own it so we had to raise it in the house. Oh! but it is greedy. It drinks almost a pint of milk at a time. I wish you could see it run up stairs just like a cat. It follows me wherever I go. It followed me half way to the school one day but I had to come back and put it in the kitchen. I just thought of Mary's Little Lamb, when it did that. I did not put it in its box one night and then in the morning it came running up to my bed room door. It is out in the wagon shed now running after the chickens. Don't you wish you had a pet lamb too? I guess not you would not know where to keep it, and besides the teachers ought not to have such things. Last year we had pet rabbits but the cats ate them all. I can not tell you any more about pets. I am making a quilt. I have forty-one squares now, I need fifty. Mrs. Z_____ wants me to have it all done till I go away from here. Please write to me and tell me all the news. I don't get my INDIAN HELPER till Tuesday. I would like to get it sooner than that. This is all. Goodbye. Your scholar, BELINDA ARCHIQUETTE. ---------- A Pueblo Boy's Composition. The cat is a small animal, my cat used to kill mice in the night and some time I help him to kill, when I kill one I also give him and he eat it up and he has long sharp claws. I used to play with the cat. It had long tail and some times I catch his tail I used to have fun with the cat, when he climb a tree. I throw at him with the stones. Once I hit him on the head I nearly killed him and my father asked me what matter with that cat and I tell him I hit with stone on his head and he tell me not to do that any more, after that I never stone the cat. Once I saw a cat with a bird in his mouth, and some times my brother and I caught the cats and we put them in box. Once we lost our cat for one week or two, and we hunt him till we found him. JOSE M. PEREZ. --------- Enigma. I am composed of 15 letters. My 12, 5, 6 is what girls do. My 9, 1, 3, 4, 13, 10, 7 is a part of the day. My 12, 2, 15 is a term in arithmetic. My 7, 14, 10 is a weapon. My 8, 11, 3, 4 is used in knitting. My 15, 1, 4, 5, 8 is what we all like to have. My whole is something that the Carlisle school is proud of. --------- ANSWER TO LAST WEEK'S ENIGMA: Patient, well doing will bring its reward. --------- Conundrums. Why is a printer like a postman? If you were going up stairs into an attic, and the stairs were away, how would you go? Why should our carpenter's shop never lack supplies? Why is the printing office like a borough without its chief officer? --------- "You wish to succeed? Then, whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might. Genius is hard work, and success brother to genius." ======================================= STANDING OFFER: - For FIVE new subscribers to the INDIAN HELPER, we will give the person sending them a photographic group of the 13 Carlisle Indian Printer boys, on a card 4 1/2 X 6 1/2 inches, worth 20 cents when sold by itself. Name and tribe of each boy given. (Persons wishing the above premium will please enclose a 1-cent stamp to pay postage.) For TEN, Two PHOTOGRAPHS, one showing a group of Pueblos as they arrived in wild dress, and another of the same pupils three years after, or, for the same number of names we give two photographs showing still more marked contrast between a Navajoe as he arrived in native dress, and as he now looks, worth 20 cents a piece. Persons wishing the above premiums will please enclose a 2-cent stamp to pay postage. For FIFTEEN, we offer a GROUP of the whole school on 9x14 inch card. Faces show distinctly, worth sixty cents. Persons wishing the above premium will please send 6 cents to pay postage. --------------- For a longer list of subscribers we have many other interesting pictures of shops, representing boys at work, schoolrooms and views of the grounds, worth from 20 to 60 cents a piece, which will be sent on request. ------------------------------ At the Carlisle Indian School is published monthly an eight-page quarto of standard size, called THE RED MAN, the mechanical part of which is done entirely by Indian boys. This paper is valuable as a summary of information on Indian matters and contains writings by Indian pupils and local incidents of the school. Terms: Fifty cents a year, in advance. SAMPLE COPIES SENT FREE. Address, THE RED MAN, Carlisle, PA. For 1, 2 and 3 subscribers for THE RED MAN we give the same premiums offered in Standing Offer for the HELPER. ======================================================================= Transcribed weekly from the newspaper collections of the US Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Carlisle, PA. For more info see http://www.carlisleindianschool.org. - Barbara Landis --------- "RE: Rustywire: Why Are We Here" --------- Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2000 07:24:33 GMT From: "rustywire" Subj: why are we here.... Newsgroup: alt.native I am tired, I have put in a long day, and sleep won't find me quite yet. I have been thinking about some things and one of them is that sometimes I get restless, I am not sure why. I find that I want to go home sometimes, to the reservation, and to stay there, but in reality I know that I can't do that. At times when I deal with people I talk with them and yet apart of me looks at the their face, their eyes, how they speak and talk to see if I can really see the person standing in front of me. Often times I find that there is a difference between my experience as an Indian and theirs. At times I find that what I talk to them is lost, that when there is some serious discussion on my part that it is superflous with them, they blow it off. At times interest in being Indian, or Navajo is to talk about some old jewelry they bought, a rug or someone they knew. At times I long for the contact I feel that is shared on a different level with Indians. I have talked about how I feel a kinship with people on the street, because they are honest in their behavior and put on no heirs. The other day I was in a KFC, and saw an Indian man, an elderly person sitting in the corner, he was dressed quite nice and walked over to a table where an indian girl sat with her baby and talked to the child. The girl's mother came from somewhere and told him to get lost. Another woman, and elderly white woman came up to the child and she was welcomed as she talked to the child. The old man went back to his seat and then finished his drink and left. I left a few minutes later to see where he had gone, a few blocks away he went into an apartment house. He wat not a street person, but for some reason, the old Indian woman figured he was. I think he was lonely for his own land in a way, and wanted some contact with some Indians, albeit total strangers. He was chased away. At times I think I am like this man and also like the woman, and wish I could reach a median where I could understand others, and thereby myself. I find that in the presence of others I don't know I am quiet and reserved. Even though I can talk a person's leg off because I am curious and ask alot of questions. I have heard that as Indians, natives, tribal members, indigenous peoples, skins, descendants of indian ancestry or what have you, we sometimes act like crabs in a five gallon bucket. When onf of succeeds we tend to reach out and pull the person back down with us, so that we basically keep them from getting ahead and lifting them up. I am quilty of this myself and find that I am looking for something that I have not found yet and I am not content. I can't judge anyone, but yet I make judgements based on experience, knowledge and the seat of my pants that make no sense. It is a human frailty. I will tell you at times I wish I could do somethings like sing Indian songs. or participate in some things that are not available to me, but most of all to have a conversation with someone of a similar background who talks from the heart with no heirs or evasion. I miss that from Indian people and find that it is a rare commodity with non-Indians, though they are good people, it is just that they are hard to really know. So as a result I live with them but don't know them very well. I miss my own people, and at times I find myself wishing I was home, far from here, but yet I am at a place where I can not go there without some serious changes to my life. I am looking for some comfort from the cold wind, a hot cup of coffee and a place to rest my feet and relax. I want to hear stories of legends, of how things were with you and your people, but yet with the pressure of time, find that I run off before the cup is half empty. It is the way of life. I hope that I can find such a spot and meet some others like myself....but then again I find myself distant in my own way of doing things....where will I find rest, where will I go, I grow tired of the city, the lights, and jabbertalking.....I wish I could find a rainbow and take it to the home of the Twin Heros and sit with them on tall grass and drink cool water and watch my children as they find happiness in all that they do and the sun would find me good place where I could rest my soul, my heart and my mind.....I am so --------- "RE: Poem: I Have Them" --------- Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2001 23:40:31 -0600 From: "John D Berry/grad/res/Okstate" Subj: New Poem from Pablo Ok all, I had to share this one - here it is word for word from bath time tonight. Words are his in order as spoken - Title & phrasing mine. Best, John B I Have Them In my tummy I have blue bones. And white bones, and yellow bones, and red bones. I have them, I am strong. Pablo L. Berry, 3yrs.5mo., Oklahoma, 2001 --------- "RE: Verse: Hawaiian Book of Days" --------- Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 06:22:44 -1000 From: Debbie Sanders Subj: Hawaiian Book of Days A HAWAIIAN BOOK OF DAYS, week of March 25-31 MALAKI (March) (Nana) 25 Each of us must aspire to the heights of our own abilities. 26 Our spirits are reborn in the land. 27 What benefits the Earth, Ke Au Nei, benefits all life. 28 Find the good in every aspect of life. 29 The wind bides for a spell in this place, then it seeks other lands to explore. 30 Stone remains when all else passes away. 31 Build to preserve, not to destroy. (c) Copyright 1991 by D. F. Sanders Me ke aloha i ka nani, ... Moe'uhanekeanuenue (With love and beauty, ... Rainbow Dream) --------- "RE: Eastern Band of Cherokee" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 09:36:12 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="EASTERN BAND CHEROKEE" Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians of North Carolina The Cherokee Indian Reservation is comprised of 56,573 acres of mountain land in five counties of Western North Carolina. Of this amount 158.8 acres have been acquired by the Federal Government for administrative and educational purposes. Of the remainder, approximately 47,915 acres are forest land and the balance is agricultural land or home and business sites. The Qualla Boundary, which encircles the main area of the reservation (approximately 45,000 acres), is situated in the heart of the Smoky Mountains and borders the eastern edge of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The rest of the reservation is made up of small tracts from 50 to 4,000 acres which are scattered throughout the area. The topography of the reservation is extremely mountainous, rising from an elevation of 2, 000 feet at agency headquarters to over 5,000 feet at Soco Bald, a difference of some 3,000 feet in a distance of 8 miles. Level and suitable land for farming is very limited and is confined to narrow strips along the main waterways. At one time, the Cherokee people possessed lands extending over a territory of 53,000 square miles These lands covered half of what we now know as Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, and some portions of Kentucky, South Carolina and North Carolina. However, in 1838, General Winifield Scott was ordered by Congress to move the Cherokees further west, to what we now know as the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, under military escort. According to historical records, the Cherokee were considered the most law-abiding and peaceful residents of the entire mountain area. However, they were herded into stockades and held for weeks before being marched nearly a thousand miles to Oklahoma. Many Cherokees died on the way. This mass forced exodus reflects one of the most dismal pages in American history. All of the present day Cherokees are descendants of one tribe. Those making the march of the Trail of Tears to Oklahoma are called Western Cherokees, and the few that were left behind, refused to go, or who went part way and then returned, are called the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians. An amendment to the Charter grants the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians the responsibility for its own Tribal Government, which is modeled after the American Constitution. The Legislative body of the Tribal Government consists of a Tribal Council, which is an elected body of 12 representatives. These elected officials serve for two years. The Executive Department consists of an elected Principal Chief, an elected Vice-Chief and an Executive Advisor. The Executive Department is elected to four year terms. The Judicial Department consists of the Tribal CFR (Code of Federal Regulations) System. Copyright c. Healthy Nations Initiative --------- "RE: Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma" --------- Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2001 09:36:12 -0600 From: Gary Smith Subj: NA News Item - - - - - - -- - - - - - - filename="CNO" Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma When the Cherokee people made the journey along the Trail of Tears more than 150 years ago, they settled in what is now northeastern Oklahoma. The land in that part of Oklahoma resembled their traditional homeland with its rolling hills, beautiful trees and abundant sources of clean water. The Cherokee people brought with them a vibrant culture that