American Indians open D.C. embassy of their own
By Krista J. Kapralos
Herald Writer
Dozens of countries have embassies in Washington, D.C. Beginning next week, that number will increase by about 560, when an embassy representing American Indian tribes opens its doors.
The National Congress of American Indians, a longtime advocate for tribes, is moving this weekend from its rented space to an $8 million mansion near the capital’s Embassy Row, said Adam McMullin, a spokesman for the group. The new building will be called the Hall of Indian Nations.
The embassy signals a new era for tribes, said Ron Allen, NCAI secretary and chairman of the Jamestown S’Klallam tribe on the Olympic Peninsula.
“We’re stepping into that international arena now,” he said. “We have so many domestic needs and challenges, but the international forum will become a higher priority.”
Tribal leaders in recent years have connected with indigenous groups in other countries to discuss economic development and self-governance. Tribes in the Pacific Northwest and Canada in 2007 signed the United League of Indigenous Nations treaty, pledging to honor one another’s sovereignty and seek out opportunities for trade and commerce across international lines. Indigenous groups in Australia and other areas are involved in the effort.
That type of treaty will likely be more common among indigenous groups worldwide in the future, Allen said. With more than 500 federally recognized tribes, American Indians can share experience and expertise on self-governance, he said.
“We can share our systems and structures with indigenous people of other countries and other areas throughout the world and show them, ‘Here’s what you can do,’ ” Allen said.
The embassy will also draw together experts on all of the issues in Indian Country. Many tribes have become politically powerful, but many others don’t have advocates in D.C., Allen said. The embassy will help ensure that those tribes aren’t forgotten.
Tribes nationwide contributed to a $3 million down payment on the embassy building, Allen said. The Tulalip and Stillaguamish Tribes support the project, but haven’t pledged any money, he said. Allen expects that more tribes will give as NCAI pays down the remaining $5 million on the building.
Krista J. Kapralos: 425-339-3422, kkapralos@heraldnet.com.
Tags: American Indian, Big Thunder, Black Elk, book, Crazy horse, Crowfoot, Eagle Chief, Flat Iron, Forks WA, George Copway, ghosts, Great, Lone Man, Luther Standing Bear, Morning Dove, new mexico legislature, novel, Sarah, Shooter, Tecumseh
Louis Gray: John Echohawk for the Supreme Court
Monday, May 25, 2009
Filed Under: Opinion
“The federal government should live up to its promises, its treaties, its commitments to native people.” — John E. Echohawk
Many of you have heard the debate on who will be the next U.S. Supreme Court justice. As you may know, no Native American currently sits on the federal bench anywhere. President Barack Obama said he is looking for someone who shows empathy for people and has demonstrated a history of working for the defenseless. Many of us believe no one can fill those criteria better than John Echohawk, the executive director of the Native American Rights Fund. But, now is the time to act. If you have a mailing list of tribal leaders please consider using it to encourage your fellow leaders to please consider John Echohawk. This is not a mass mailing to all my Native friends. I’ve already done that and the effort has been picked up by Native Times, The Tulsa World, Indianz.com. the Nation and Pechanga.net to name a few, but this is an historic moment in a year full of historic moments. . You have valuable list, send this out to your people. We can let people know that the change everyone voted for applied to Indians as well. If you believe what I believe — that John Echohawk deserves to be the next Supreme Court Justice — then you have a chance to do something about it. You can email the White House and say you support John Echohawk for the U.S. Supreme Court Or you can call the White House and leave a message saying you support John Echohawk to be the next U.S. Supreme Court Justice. Better yet; do both. Louis Gray, the former publisher of The Native American Times, is a member of the Osage Nation of Oklahoma.
interesting…..
http://64.38.12.138/News/2009/014698.asp
Tags: government, history, Hoh, Indian, Indians, member, nation, Native, Native American, Obama, people, promise, sage, story, supreme court justice, treaties, Tribal, Tribe, world
EchoHawk confirmed to lead BIA
By Rob Capriccioso
Story Published: May 23, 2009
Story Updated: May 22, 2009
Photo: Larry EchoHawk ????
WASHINGTON – The full Senate voted May 19 to confirm Larry EchoHawk, 60, as assistant secretary of Indian affairs at the Department of the Interior.
In the job he will lead an agency that serves approximately 1.7 million American Indians and Alaska Natives and manages millions of acres in tribal trusts. It is viewed by many as a difficult position – one that has long been rife with challenges involving the balance of federal and tribal interests.
The post has been vacant for more than half of the last eight years.
The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs previously approved President Barack Obama’s nomination of EchoHawk by a substantial margin. Obama’s nod came in April.
Few senators took umbrage with EchoHawk’s abilities. In committee, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., voted against him for reasons he did not explain, while Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., expressed concerns regarding his positions on Indian gaming. Still, McCain did not vote against the nominee.
EchoHawk’s previous Indian gaming stances had also raised alarm bells for some in Indian country.
Detractors noted that when EchoHawk served as Idaho’s attorney general from 1991 to 1995 – the first American Indian in U.S. history elected as a state attorney general – he called on the governor to change the language of state legislation so the state no longer would have a legal obligation under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act to negotiate for Class III gaming with Idaho’s tribes.
The criticism did not gain steam in Congress.
Some tribal leaders have said they are confident that EchoHawk, a member of the Pawnee Tribe of Oklahoma, will be supportive of tribal interests.
Alonzo Coby, chairman of the Fort Hall Business Council for the Shoshone Bannock Tribes, has exemplified the hope that many tribal leaders have for EchoHawk.
Coby testified during the confirmation hearing that he believed EchoHawk would advance tribal sovereignty and economic self-sufficiency. EchoHawk previously worked in a legal capacity for the tribe.
EchoHawk’s boss at the Interior now becomes Secretary Ken Salazar. The two have long been friends.
Salazar was quick to offer praise for the Senate’s confirmation. “I want to thank the Senate for expeditiously approving Larry EchoHawk’s confirmation,” he said in a statement issued May 20.
“He is a seasoned executive with an extensive background in government, Indian law and public policy. As Interior’s assistant secretary for Indian affairs, he will help the department meet its goals of empowering American Indian and Alaska Native communities and supporting the nation’s economic recovery.”
Prior to his new role, EchoHawk had been a law professor at Brigham Young University where he completed his undergraduate studies in 1970.
He received a law degree in 1973 from the University of Utah law school, and he and members of his family have long been viewed as strong advocates for Indian country.
“The challenges facing American Indians and Alaska Natives are great,” EchoHawk testified during his confirmation hearing. “I remember the many times that I have been in Indian reservation communities. In my mind’s eye, I can see the faces of people; people that I love and care for that suffered the affects of poverty. I would see it as my responsibility to do everything I can to see that every American Indian and Alaska Native receive an opportunity for a quality education and a good job and economic prosperity.”
Interior officials said a swearing-in ceremony for EchoHawk is yet to be scheduled, but is expected in short order.
http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/home/content/45849182.html
Billions Missing From U.S. Indian Trust Fund
John Echohawk, director of Native American Rights Fund
| The U.S. has lost not millions, but billions of dollars belonging to native Americans |
 In his testimony before Congress, John Echohawk, director of Native American Rights Fund, called it “yet another serious and continuing breach in a long history of dishonorable treatment of Indian tribes and individual Indians by the United States government.”Arizona Senator John McCain, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, bluntly called it “theft from Indian people.”
These men were describing the single largest and longest-lasting financial scandal in history involving the federal government of the United States.
With no other recourse left at their disposal, NARF, along with other attorneys, filed a class action lawsuit in federal district court on June 10 on behalf of more than 300,000 American Indians. The suit charges Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt, Assistant Interior Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs Ada Deer and Secretary of the Treasury Robert Rubin with illegal conduct in regard to the management of Indian money held in trust accounts and managed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
If the lawsuit’s claims are correct, and there’s an overwhelming body of evidence that suggests they are, then the federal government has lost, misappropriated or, in some cases, stolen billions of dollars from some of its poorest citizens. |
| “The BIA has spent more than 100 years mismanaging, diverting and losing money that belongs to Indians.” |
The trust accounts in question — which hold approximately $450 million at any given time — aren’t filled with government handouts. They contain money that belongs to individual Indians who have earned it from a variety of sources such as oil and gas production, grazing leases, coal production and timber sales on their allotted lands.
Revenues from such sources are held in more than 387,000 Individual Indian Money (IIM) accounts managed — or according to detractors, “mismanaged” — by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). “The BIA has spent more than 100 years mismanaging, diverting and losing money that belongs to Indians,” Echohawk says. “They have no idea how much has been collected from the companies that use our land and are unable to provide even a basic, regular statement to Indian account holders.”
Echohawk is quick to point out that the lawsuit was the very last resort. Native Americans have long been hopeful that a governmental remedy to the BIA’s mismanagement could be found. Finally in 1994, after years of pressure by both Indians and legislators, Congress enacted the Indian Trust Fund Management Reform Act and appointed Paul Homan as the special trustee charged with straightening out the century-old mess.
Once again there was hope. But the legislative solution proved to be just another in a long line of toothless piles of paper generated by government bureaucrats. Although Homan was ready and willing to repair the system, Congress failed to provide funds to make the changes a reality. With no other path before them, the Indians took their fight to the courts. |
| In many instances it provides the only life-line for Indian families who often make up the most impoverished sector of our society |
Echohawk’s claim that the BIA is completely out of touch with the amount of revenues it collects or should be collecting has been confirmed by countless congressional oversight hearings covering decades.
As an example, during one such hearing — a 1987 Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on uncollected royalties — then director of the Minerals Management Service William Bettenberg told the committee he was aware that hundreds of millions of dollars that belonged to Indians was going uncollected from oil royalties each year. This is in spite of the fact that MMS, a branch of the Department of the Interior, had been made aware of the annual lost revenue six years earlier. Bettenberg’s revelation is typical of BIA behavior.
Adding still more credence to Echohawk’s claims of government incompetence pertaining to the IIM accounts is the recent example provided by the long overdue audit of the tribal trust funds. These tribal funds, which are also managed by the BIA, are a collection of approximately 2,000 tribal accounts owned by some 200 tribes. These accounts hold about $2.3 billion at any given time and are primarily used to finance essential tribal government services.
Several years ago, after a decade of extensive pressure from the House Committee on Government Operations, the BIA agreed to contract with Arthur Anderson & Co. to audit and reconcile both the tribal accounts and a random sampling of some 17,000 IIM accounts. The sampling of the IIM accounts was to be a precursor to a complete reconciliation of all IIM trust accounts — the first in history.
What happened next is truly astounding. After years of work and millions of dollars in fees, Arthur Anderson was only able to reconcile the 2,000 tribal accounts — not the 17,000 IIMs — and only then for the relatively short period of some 20 years from 1973 to 1992.
For this 20-year period alone, the auditor noted that at least $2.4 billion in the tribal trust accounts was unaccounted for and billions of dollars more were virtually untraceable because of the questionable nature of the government’s records.
As for the IIMs, Arthur Anderson told the feds that its trust fund system for individuals was so screwed up that it wouldn’t even try to reconcile the accounts and estimated that it would cost $108 million to $281 million just to attempt the monumental task. The accounting firm claimed that the government had destroyed, never created or otherwise did not maintain the records necessary to conduct a reconciliation. Even if the full IIM audit were performed, the firm said the costly information would be of little or no value when it came to providing IIM account holders with any real assurance that their balances are correct.
While the missing billions from the tribal accounts aren’t part of the NARF lawsuit, the reconciliation process for these accounts does illustrate how badly the BIA’s accounting system, or lack thereof, actually works. In June of this year, Special Trustee Homan told the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs that the IIM account system was “as bad or worse” than the tribal accounts. For now, NARF lawyers are concentrating on the mismanagement of money in the IIM accounts because in many instances it provides the only life-line for Indian families who often make up the most impoverished sector of our society. Echohawk told Congress that most of the IIM account holders are so poor that they need their money just for basic subsistence. |
BIA’s fiscally irresponsible behavior may prove more sinister than mere incompetence
|
So how did the BIA’s financial house get into such disarray and why has it been allowed to stay that way? The truth is it has never been in order, and the reasons behind the seemingly never-ending tolerance of the BIA’s fiscally irresponsible behavior may prove more sinister than mere incompetence. Critics of the bureau point out that the United States has a long history of trying to separate Native Americans from their lands and way of life.
 You can choose almost any year since the BIA’s predecessor, the Indian Department, was created in 1824 and find governments reports describing poor management, no accounting system, missing money, no attempt to fulfill the fiduciary duty to the Indians as promised and required by law.
Congress has verbally demanded accountability and drastic change in the BIA’s behavior for more than 100 years. Yet as of 1996 little if anything has actually changed. A 1992 report titled “Misplaced Trust: The Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Mismanagement of the Indian Trust Fund” was prepared by the Committee on Government Operations. The 66-page report contained a scathing review of the BIA and hundreds of examples of the bureau’s blundering over the years.
Among other things, the report surmised that “one hundred sixty three years later, Schoolcraft’s assessment of the BIA’s financial management still rings true. BIA’s administration of the Indian trust fund continues to make the accounts look as though they had been handled with a pitchfork.
“Undoubtedly there is a screw loose in the public machinery at the Bureau. Indeed, while mismanagement of the Indian trust fund has been reported for more than a century, there is no evidence that either the Bureau or the Department of the Interior has undertaken any sustained or comprehensive effort to resolve glaring deficiencies.”
Unfortunately, most of what was contained in the Misplaced Trust report was old news. Essentially the exact same findings were embodied in the GAO’s 1928, 1952 and 1955 audits of the Indian trust fund. In fact, just since 1982, more than 30 audits have been performed on the BIA’s records. Every single one of the 30 reports generated have noted serious accounting and financial management problems and weak internal controls throughout the BIA.
In a tone not often heard these days in Washington, Senator McCain cut to the chase during a June 11, 1996 oversight hearing when he stated that “Trustees receive and disburse funds all the time for other Americans, and if they blow it they pay. In this case it’s the Native Americans who are rightfully owed the money and the federal government who will be forced to compensate for their loss.” |
| Taxpayers who will have to cough up the money lost by the BIA |
McCain makes a good point. But in typical politician style he forgets to tell us that when he says it’s “the federal government” that will be forced to pay for the mishandling of the Indian trusts, what he’s really saying is it will be taxpayers who will have to cough up the money lost by the BIA.
Every day that the BIA procrastinates on fulfilling its trust responsibilities, the price tag to repair the damage goes up. The 1992 Misplaced Trust report clarifies the vulnerability of taxpayers.
The report states that “Continuing mismanagement and incompetence in the supervision and control of Indian trust funds present a clear danger to the American taxpayer, who must bear the financial burden of compensating trust fund account holders for BIA’s breach of fiduciary duties.”
Other sections of the report contain testimony that reads like the vision from a crystal ball. Speakers from six and 10 years ago offer warning after warning about the potential for costly litigation at the taxpayer’s expense. The NARF lawsuit stands as harsh evidence that the warnings fell on deaf ears at the bureau.
Guarding our pocketbooks gives everyone a reason to get involved with the struggle to correct the injustices being perpetrated by the BIA. But at some point we must confront the reality that there is something more at work here than bureaucratic ineptitude. |
| “If this happened in Social Security, I tell you there would be a war” |
When obvious and admitted abuses of a small minority of people by a government are allowed to continue unchecked for over a century — with little or no outcry from the citizenry — it most likely means that the majority of the citizens condone the government’s behavior.
What other explanation can there be for the BIA’s belligerent lack of concern for its fiscal responsibilities to Native Americans? It isn’t that the task of properly handling the revenue is just too daunting. Other departments of the government deal with larger and more complicated accounting systems with comparable ease everyday.
A similar observation was made by then-Representative from Texas Albert G. Bustamante during oversight hearings in 1990.
“We have 300,000 accounts. We have about 350 tribes in the United States. It is really sad that these people have been misrepresented by the BIA … They have no real representation in Congress.
“I have a tribe that I represent in my district, but throughout the years, most of these people have been abused by many, and you in the BIA ought to be the ones that really look after them.
“If this happened in Social Security, I tell you there would be a war. If we can manage Social Security, we ought to be able to manage this.”
NARF’s Echohawk speculates that the reason for the government’s seemingly eternal incompetence is darker than accidental mismanagement. “I think it comes down to race. Our people have historically suffered abuse after abuse. We have continuous problems with unemployment, health care and education. It just goes on and on. We don’t have any political power to change it, so the government just continues to ignore us.”
REF: http://www.monitor.net/monitor/free/biatrustfund.html |
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Action Alert and Upcoming Hearing!
On June 2nd at 3:00 pm the Meade County Commissioners will be meeting regarding the issuance of new liquor licenses, renewals and transfers for Sturgis Rally Venues. Please attend to oppose in person, if you are able!
New License – The new owners of Glencoe Campground and Rock’N the Rally have applied for a new malt beverage license and a transfer of the existing retail on-sale Liquor license.
Transfer – A transfer of Retail on-sale Liquor from Sawtooth Campground to Monkey Rock USA, for the Thunderdome Venue.
Renewals – Other large venues surrounding Bear Butte, also up for renewal are Broken Spoke Campground, Buffalo Chip and Full Throttle.
Please send an opposition letter to the Meade County Commissioners asking them to deny the new licenses, transfers and renewals for all venues surrounding Bear Butte.
Please keep in mind that the only basis the Commissioners will consider for denying a license include, “location” and “character.” When sending your letters, please use one or both of these basis to support your opposition letter. Otherwise it may not be considered. Please be respectful in your letters! We do not want to reinforce their negative attitudes and behavior towards Native people and this issue. We always stay professional and respectful in our letter writing campaigns; remember this is fighting for the protection of a sacred site.
Suggested headings for your letters:
The application should be denied on the basis that the applicants are not suitable characters to hold a beer and/or liquor license as proposed.
The new Malt Beverage license application, transfers and renewals should be denied because the locations are not suitable.
Also, please remember to clearly state that you oppose the licenses, include the date, your full name and address. If you need a sample letter, please visit our website www.protectbearbutte.com and blog www.bearbutte.blogspot.com for sample letters from previous years.
Letters are due by June 1st at 3:00 pm.
You can email, snail mail or fax letters to
Meade County Commissioners
1425 W. Sherman St.
Sturgis S.D. 57785
(605) 347-2360 (Phone)
(605) 347-5925 (Fax)
Email the letters directly to meade@meadecounty.org
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me directly at Tamra@protectsacredsites.org
Thank you for your continued support for the efforts to Protect Bear Butte!
Protect Sacred Sites Indigenous People, One Nation is a grass roots organization, working towards the protection of sacred sites across the country. Our organization has been actively involved with the ongoing struggle to Protect Bear Butte for many years. Our organization is currently leading the campaign regarding opposing the new developments and further expansions at Bear Butte.
Visit our main website at www.protectsacredsites.org and our dedicated website for the Bear Butte struggle at www.protectbearbutte.com
ref: http://www.ndnnews.com/
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Yakamas say development is damaging sacred cultural sites
by Philip Ferolito
Yakima Herald-Republic
ANDY SAWYER/Yakima Herald-Republic
Casey Barney, a culture specialist with the Yakama Nation, looks at one of several culturally significant sites near a road constructed on the Windy Flat wind farm near Goldendale Tuesday, May 5, 2009. The Yakama Nation is concerned about development in the area due to the cultural sites around the development.
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Petition Requesting Apology for Abuses at US Indain Schools
This petition calls upon the President of the United States to issue a formal apology for what the US government allowed to happen to Native American children at the schools and for the effects it continues to have on Native American individuals, families, and communities to this day.
Tags: American Indian, art, assimilate, Country, customs, educate, education, genocide, government, heal, healing, historical, human rights, indian nation, Indians, journey, lake, law, National, Nations, Native, Native American, oppression, organizations, peace, people, petition, policy, public, river, schools, social, state, target, United States, University, war, Washington, youth
Bad medicine
Suit challenges that Native Americans are still waiting for the health care they’ve been promised
Joseph Steward of Detroit is part of the class-action lawsuit.
Cancer is waiting to attack Tonya Passage.
Photos by George Waldman
Sisters Fay Givens (left) and Kay McGowan say Indians are owed health care.
Illustration by Helen Griffin
| SEE ALSO |
| More Law Stories |
|
Home rules (4/22/2009)
As economy slides, state legislatures eye curbs on illegal immigrants
Recantation redux (4/8/2009)
Victim changes his testimony … again
No freedom for Freeman (4/8/2009)
Governor denies clemency for man in closely followed case |
| More from Tom Schram |
|
Bush push (4/5/2006)
President seeks to eliminate funding for urban Indian health clinics
Day by day (4/5/2006)
An ailing man’s uncertain future
Tonya’s ticking bomb (4/5/2006)
Health hopes pinned on lawsuit |
By Tom Schram
In the summer of 2004, Native American activist Kay McGowan spotted David Santacroce at a cocktail party. Santacroce directs the University of Michigan Clinical Law Program that gives students hands-on training with clients who otherwise could not afford legal representation. McGowan, a cultural anthropologist, author and university instructor who is a member of the National Urban Indian Coalition, told Santacroce she had a great potential case for him — suing the federal government to provide promised health care to Native Americans.
“If I had a dollar for every person who has come up to me with a glass of wine in their hand and told me, ‘I have a great case for you,’ I would be a rich man,” Santacroce says.
But Santacroce listened. And later he and his students researched the issue. What they found was a repeatedly recognized legal obligation based on treaties, codified in legislation, and reaffirmed by Congress and court decisions for the federal government to provide health insurance to all Native Americans.
On April 6, the U-M Clinical Law Program plans to file a class action suit in Federal District Court in Detroit on behalf of Native Americans living in this area. If successful, the suit would force the government to provide health care for them and set a legal precedent that could have ramifications for every Native American in the United States.
The statistics on the state of health care for American Indians are staggering.
According to the 2004 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report “Broken Promises,” compared to the general population Native Americans are more than seven times as likely to die from alcoholism, more than six times as likely to die from tuberculosis, four times as likely to die from diabetes, nearly three times as likely to die from accidents, and 52 percent more likely to die from pneumonia or influenza. They have the poorest cancer survival rates of any racial group. The American Indian poverty rate is three times the national average and their life expectancy is 71, nearly five years less than the rest of the U.S. population.
As a result of federal assimilation initiatives, nearly two-thirds of the 4.1 million Native Americans now live in urban areas. In metropolitan Detroit, there are more than 38,000 Native Americans, as many as 27,000 without health insurance. Despite this, by far the largest proportion of the budget of the federal Indian Health Services is spent on Indian reservations. These inequities exist in the face of the government’s promises to provide health care to all Native Americans.
There is one federal government-funded health care clinic to care for the 38,000 Native Americans in southeast Michigan. It provides basic medical care and outpatient programs for such health issues as substance abuse. But by the admission of its own director, it’s not comprehensive. And it’s not free. Patients pay according to a sliding scale based on income.
“Really, nothing is free,” says Lucy Harrison, Director of the American Indian Health and Family Services of Southeast Michigan on Lawndale, near Michigan and Lonyo. “There is no longer a free clinic. The Indians who come here are the sickest and the poorest in southeast Michigan. Those people who don’t have a dime in their pocket, of course, we have to write that off.”
Those who need more than basic services are referred to specialists where they often are faced with costs they have no way to meet.
“They’re in a boat with no oars — absolutely,” Harrison says. “You can make referrals all you want, but if there’s no money — that’s what the problem is. Yet the law said that we would provide health and education.”
American Indians are adamant that they do not want charity. They want justice. Indians ceded or were forcibly removed from more than 400 million acres of their land.
“This is our land; this is our home,” says Fay Givens, executive director of American Indian Services Inc., an Indian support group based in Lincoln Park.
“We gave up 95 percent of our land with guns at our heads. In return there were very few things the government was obligated to do, most of which they have never done. They have never honored their treaties. We do not feel that they want us to live.”
Harrison says that this concept is especially relevant in the Detroit area.
“We were the first people in the nation here,” she adds. “When Cadillac rowed that boat up, this was our territory.”
There are also social and cultural barriers in place that contribute to health care disparities. Indians were actively at war with the United States for most of the 19th century and efforts to wipe out Native Americans and their traditions, beliefs and culture were very nearly successful. Is it really surprising that they remain wary of the government and its programs?
In the late 1940s, the federal government began what is called the Bureau of Indian Affairs Relocation Program, moving Indians off reservations and into urban settings. In the early 1950s, Congress increased funding and enhanced the program. Participants received two years of benefits for either on-the-job or vocational training. The program continued through the 1970s.
While some argued that the program put Indians on the road to independence, others argued that it forced Indians from their homes and did not improve their living conditions.
“They moved half the Indian people in America into the cities,” says Givens. “It was a social experiment to assimilate us and clearly it hasn’t worked.”
McGowan is Givens’ sister. She serves as a staff anthropologist for the National Urban Indian Coalition. She represents American Indians at the United Nations through the National Indian Youth Council and is a member of the National Indian Health Care Advisory Board.
She and Givens were born in Mississippi and are members of the Choctaw Mississippi Band. They grew up in Detroit. McGowan says that Indians don’t want to be assimilated.
“We don’t want in,” she says. “We don’t want to adopt what the mainstream sees as priorities. We have our own priorities — our families, religion, generosity. We cling tenaciously to our own values. We are who we are and we do not want to become part of the mainstream. It’s insulting to us to become part of the melting pot.”
What Indians have encountered is a continuing cycle of poverty and racism. According to the Commission on Civil Rights report:
“Persistent discrimination and neglect continue to deprive Native Americans of a health system sufficient to provide health care equivalent to that provided to the vast majority of Americans. … Unfortunately, in this country, race matters when it comes to medical treatment. … Studies show that people of color are less likely to receive certain medical procedures. Much of the unfair treatment and mistreatment stems from deeply rooted social inequities.”
Those inequities in southeast Michigan would be largely addressed if the U-M Clinical Law Program lawsuit is successful. The suit would require the federal government to provide comprehensive health care for Detroit-area Indians without cutting funds for reservation-based health clinics. A successful ruling could no doubt set a precedent that would lead to increased funding for urban Indians across the United States.
The U-M Clinical Law Program is bringing the suit on behalf of the class and four named plaintiffs, three Native Americans and American Indian Services.
“The federal government made promises and, as their very own document says, they broke those promises,” Santacroce says. “The government made a pact with these communities, in exchange for the surrender of their lands, to take care of them. And they are not doing it.”
The Commission on Civil Rights, established by Congress in 1957, does, in fact say that. In “Broken Promises” the commission wrote:
“The federal government has a special relationship with Native Americans, commonly referred to as a ‘trust’ relationship, requiring the government to protect tribal lands, assets, resources, treaty rights, and health care, among other obligations. … This health care obligation requires the government to provide medical treatment to all Native Americans living in the United States.”
Indian Health Services, the federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services that is charged with providing health care to American Indians, would not disagree either. While the agency’s Web site states that health care is not an entitlement, an IHS official says there is both a moral and legal obligation to provide it.
“I think there’s definitely a moral obligation,” says Diane Dawson, public affairs specialist at IHS in Washington. “I know what you’re asking and certainly our answer is that there is a legal obligation.”
Dawson says that the reason health care for American Indians is inadequate is simple: It is not well enough funded.
“No, not to meet the needs,” she says. “I think it’s pretty well understood that it’s not, but we do the best we can with what we’ve got and we appreciate everything we get.”
But a good effort is not good enough, Santacroce says.
“I don’t doubt that any individuals within IHS and in the government are doing their best to deliver medical services,” he says. “The point is that their best is legally insufficient and that sits at their doorstep. When the law requires the government to do something, they have to do something. ‘We don’t have the money’ is not a defense. It’s as simple as that.”
Santacroce says that while there have been a handful of cases on the subject of Native Americans’ health care brought in the United States and that the government has raised the issue of limited resources as a defense, the issues raised in those cases were different from this one. He says that no one has ever filed a lawsuit matching the scope, reach or specific grounds of the one being filed in Detroit.
In a back-lot building at American Indian Services on Southfield Road in Lincoln Park, washers and driers, a couple of stoves and a television set sit waiting for pickup by those in need of them. Just after midday, a generous baker arrives with a donation: Dozens of loaves of bread and cartloads of assorted baked goods. According to McGowan, everything will be distributed to those in need before the end of the day.
“Urban Indian Centers are really the end of the line for Indian people,” she says. “When you’re homeless and you’ve lost your job and your house, you would come into an organization like ours and we would link you up with the organizations that can help you.”
Givens says that health care for American Indians is poor across the board, but it is better on reservations. That provides a limited opportunity for some.
“We have a lot of cases where individuals have severe health problems and our Indian health clinic in Detroit has a limited array of services,” she says. “We would have to send these folks back to their home reserves. Some of them have to wait six months, a year, two years — every tribe is different — to re-establish their residency before they get health care. Some of them die before they establish their residency.
“The federal government moved us to these cities. They moved us here and now they’re not providing for us. We gave up our land. In return, this was one of the things they were supposed to do. We were supposed to be their wards — their children that they take care of. They don’t take care of us.”
For Native Americans, it is both an issue of discrimination and of survival.
“We’re living in a hostile environment,” Givens says. “It never, never ends. You see people wearing Chief Wahoo T-shirts. The sports teams with Indian nicknames. We are the last people who still have that ax to grind.”
“Most people don’t get up in the morning and think about extinction,” McGowan says. “The Iowa tribe has 119 people. The happiest event in their lives is when a baby is born, because that means they might survive. There is nobody else in America that gets up in the morning and thinks about extinction. We think about will we be here four generations or five generations from now. Will we and can we exist? Our survival may be riding on this ability to get health care. That’s the way we’re looking at this.”
For Santacroce, it is an issue of making the federal government do what he believes it is obligated to do.
“You can’t give someone a peanut and say you’re feeding him,” he says. “The fact is that for many people in this community, there is no health care. There is no peanut. And the government has an obligation. And maybe they prefer that it go away. Well, most people who make promises and then break them feel that way. It doesn’t mean the promise goes away.”
http://www.metrotimes.com/culture/story.asp?id=9067
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