Native Americans

see indigenous for non-North am

see NATIVE AM 2 5/17 age of Trump

816 capt

aha based on brazil fail tip pt: indig and native Am ppl is EJ intensified; colonialism; they are the poorest, lest educated but/and thus pay largest price in terms of toxic load; hit 1st and worst by AGW, but had the least to do with causing and the MOST to do with PROTECTING (defenders killed at high rates eg berta C]. killd at high rates b/c the CAN be: racism plus greed: those ppl do not know the true value of assets; they are block progress and prosperity. who will miss a murdered defender? if police on take and courts corrupt, no justice for them, and no incentive to stop killing them.[NB missing native women around man camps, a throwback to wild west gold rush? toxic masculinity, low density of women].

719

The areas in Greater Chaco Landscape contain the threatened ruins of Chaco Canyon — what some have referred to "as close as the U.S. gets to Egypt’s pyramids and Peru’s Machu Picchu" — as well as "the remnants of great houses, kivas, ancient roads and sacred places built a millennium ago by an indigenous people who became proficient in architecture, agriculture, astronomy and the arts."1,2 Today, the Diné or Navajo people rely on the Chaco Landscape to sustain their livelihoods and traditional practices and modern New Mexican Pueblos, the descendants of Chaco culture, still consider these sites sacred.3

More than 91% of the area around Chaco Canyon has already been leased to the oil and gas industry, yet Sec. Bernhardt and his Big Oil cronies are eager to wipe out the last remaining protected sacred areas with dangerous drilling and fracking techniques. The democratically-led House or Representatives recently passed an amendment to a spending bill that included a one-year moratorium on drilling in the area, yet it's unclear whether the Republican-controlled Senate will include the provision in their version, and BLM continues to approve more fracking in the area.4 That's why pressure on the BLM is so important right now.

What the Arctic Offshore Drilling Ban Means to Native Villages Who Rely on the Ocean

BY: SABRINA SHANKMAN

Hunters worry about marine mammals and the survival of a way of life, but there are also some mixed feelings as the Trump administration goes full bore on oil and gas drilling.

uber1

https://webbrain.com/brainpage/brain/6950F840-FB80-FCB0-D505-8AB1FA685F08#-4362

https://www.ecowatch.com/native-americans-colonization-climate-change-2627721578.html

The widespread genocide of Native Americans by European colonizers between the 16th and 17th century killed so many that it helped cool the globe, according to new research.

A study published in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews calculates that the 56 million indigenous deaths across the Americas caused by disease and European-led massacres led to the overgrowth and reforesting of large tracts of agricultural land, contributing to a 0.15C degree drop in the early 1600s known as the Little Ice Age.

"For once, we've been able to balance all the boxes and realize that the only way the Little Ice Age was so intense is ... because of the genocide of millions of people," coauthor Mark Maslin told CNN.

As reported by the BBC:

"The [research] team reviewed all the population data it could find on how many people were living in the Americas prior to first contact with Europeans in 1492.

It then assessed how the numbers changed in following decades as the continents were ravaged by introduced disease (smallpox, measles, etc), warfare, slavery and societal collapse.

It's the UCL group's estimate that 60 million people were living across the Americas at the end of the 15th Century (about 10% of the world's total population), and that this was reduced to just five or six million within a hundred years.

The scientists calculated how much land previously cultivated by indigenous civilisations would have fallen into disuse, and what the impact would be if this ground was then repossessed by forest and savannah.

The area is in the order of 56 million hectares, close in size to a modern country like France.

This scale of regrowth is figured to have drawn down sufficient CO₂ that the concentration of the gas in the atmosphere eventually fell by 7-10ppm (that is 7-10 molecules of CO₂ in every one million molecules in the air).

'To put that in the modern context - we basically burn (fossil fuels) and produce about 3ppm per year. So, we're talking a large amount of carbon that's being sucked out of the atmosphere,' explained co-author Prof Mark Maslin,"

deeper dive:

CNN, The Guardian, BBC, Miami Herald, NY Daily News

For more climate change and clean energy news, you can follow Climate Nexus on Twitter and Facebook, and sign up for daily Hot News.

'Salmon People: The Risks of Genetically Engineered Fish for the Pacific Northwest' Film Premieres

In 2015, the FDA approved genetically engineered salmon, the first ever GE animal to be approved for human consumption anywhere in the world. The Muckleshoot Indian Tribe and the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians called for sufficient consultation with Tribes to assess the environmental impact of GE salmon production, a legal requirement the FDA did not honor.

http://www.globalpossibilities.org/trump-is-audaciously-trying-to-privatize-native-american-land/

http://www.globalpossibilities.org/trumps-order-silence-alaskan-native-voices/

Bering Sea Elders Group Condemns President Trump’s Revocation of Critical Bering Sea Executive Order, as Alaska Delegation Stands By

April 28, 2017 — Today President Trump, flanked by Alaska Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan and Representative Don Young, revoked a critically important Executive Order that we, 40 of Alaska’s coastal Tribes, had drafted and advocated for. Executive Order 13754: Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience, issued by President Obama on December 9, 2016, was the product of years of tireless work by local Alaskans, Tribes, and nonprofits who—when faced with the devastating effects of climate change and the dramatic increase of large scale shipping right on our front doorstep—sought to create a way for us to have a say in what happens in and to our waters. The key component of Order 13754 was the creation of the Bering Sea Intergovernmental Tribal Advisory Council. This Council gave us, local Alaskans who use the waters of the Bering Sea every day, a say in how the federal government managed those waters.

Today, the President took that away, along with all the other key components of the Order, including a provision to include traditional knowledge in federal decision-making. Now there is no seat at the table for Alaskans or our local knowledge. Alaska’s own congressional delegation stood by as local Alaskan voices were removed from decisions that affect our lives, and now we are at the mercy of federal decision-makers only. This does not benefit Alaska. Rather, it only benefits the federal government and private interests who will financially benefit from silencing our voices and taking or polluting the resources that we, as Alaskans, rely on.

It is not clear why Order 13754, created and advocated for by Alaskans, was even revoked. Order 13754 was not part of the Arctic Ocean Order that today’s Order purported to target, and there is no oil or even leases in the waters covered by Order 13754. Despite this, a special paragraph, Section 4(c), was created in today’s Order specifically to target Order 13754. There can be no other conclusion other than Alaska’s Tribes, and coastal Alaskans in particular, were targeted and silenced. The message is clear: the agendas of the “existing regulatory authorities” are more important than our way of life.

This is particularly disappointing because many of our Elder Representatives sought out both the Administration and the Alaska Delegation this past January to talk and make certain they all understood that the people of coastal Alaskan wrote the terms in Executive Order 13574. At our meetings, each member of the Alaska Delegation had the same message: they did not like process used by the previous Administration in issuing Order 13754, but were fine with at least most of the terms in it. At the request of the Elders, each member of the Alaska Delegation even agreed to notify our communities if they learned that revocation of Order 13754 was even being discussed so that we could participate in the discussions. We were never contacted.

citibank 4/17 dakota and xl pipeline, nat am ppl protest shareholder mtg

https://pando.com/2015/08/11/behind-scenes-donald-trump-roger-stone-show/

...

By this time, Trump had already started working with Roger Stone. Both were big fans of Roy Cohn; both enjoyed talking like Goodfellas characters in public and watching the normals swoon over their macho act. But more than anything, both were interested in cashing in on the booming casino business.

Sometimes this meant buying favors from politicians to get casinos opened; sometimes it meant running dirty campaigns to get rival casinos closed. This is what happened in 2000, when Trump and Stone were fined $250,000 for setting up a fake “family values” front group in New York, the Institute for Law and Society,to run a series of racist ads against a planned Indian casino in the Catskills that Trump feared would drain business from his casinos in Atlantic City.

So Trump and Stone whipped up anti-Indian racism to protect Trump’s business. The ad they ranfeatured a dark photo of a hypodermic needle and drug gear, and thetext warned:

The St. Regis Mohawk Indian Tribe proposes to open a gambling casino at the Monticello Race Track in Sullivan County.

How much do you really know about the St. Regis Mohawk Indians?

Are these the new neighbors we want? The St. Regis Mohawk Indian record of criminal activity is well documented. This proposed Monticello Indian Casino will bring increased crime and violence to Sullivan County.

That year, 2000, was a busy year for the Donald Trump-Roger Stone partnership.

Stone had been hired by the George W. Bush campaign to carry out two major black bag jobs that we know of: Sabotaging the Florida recount vote, using a mob of “angry” Cubans and Republican “preppies” to storm a Miami-Dade recount and stop it in its tracks, which Stone — hired for the job by James Baker — succeeded in doing.

...

So in the lead-up to the 2000 election, Roger Stonecleverly cajoled Pat Buchanan into taking control of Perot’s Reform Party, then used his friend Donald Trump to run a rival campaign against Buchanan for the Reform Party candidacy—only to drop out of the race, and attack Buchanan’s Reform Party as a cesspool full of Hitler lovers and racists. Stone inserted moles like William Von Raab, secretly funded by Trump, into Buchanan’s campaign, according to the Village Voice.

The operation wound up destroying the Reform Party’s brand and burying it for good, stinking it up too much for a late entry by Ross Perot. The Reform Party’s chairman, Pat Choate, called the “Trump/Stone operation” a “Republican dirty trick” meant to “disgust people and drive them away from the Reform Party. They were doing everything in their power to make a mess.”

The point, however, is that it worked: The Reform Party and Pat Buchanan caused no damage whatsoever to George W. Bush’s election bid in 2000, unlike Ralph Nader’s effect on Al Gore’s run.

After neutralizing the Reform Party and blocking the Florida recount with his hired “Brooks Brothers mob” Roger Stone was rewarded by President Bush by being put in charge of the Bush-Cheney 2000 transition team’sIndian Bureau Affairs appointments. Even in this, Trump did a solid for Stone, signing his name on a fake letter written by Stone in order to sink the nomination of the “wrong” Indian tribal leader who wasn’t Stone’s man. The fake Trump letter ensured that Stone’s man, Neal McCaleb, was given the job as head of Bush’s Indian Affairs Bureau instead. The Indian leader whose nomination was killed by the Trump-Stone letter later complained to theVillage Voice,

"I don't know why Trump did that,” says Martin, who'd never spoken to Trump. “I don't think he and I have ever been in the same city at the same time.

Dakota Access pipeline’s private security unleashed attack dogs and sprayed mace on protesters. 9/16 see Native Americans.

college 8 wiki on EJ

http://www.ic.ucsc.edu/college8core/c8wiki/index.php/Native_Americans

http://www.alternet.org/environment/utah-monument-fight-pits-native-americans-against-land-use-militants

By all accounts, the looting was terrible. Across the Southwest a century ago, thousand-year-old Native American granaries were pillaged by clay pot hunters. Grave robbers worked in the open. In the sandstone dwellings perched high in the cliffs, tourists cut souvenirs out of the ancient ceiling beams. Vandals carted off heirlooms by the wagonload.

In response, Congress acted swiftly. In the summer of 1906, the House and the Senate passed, and President Theodore Roosevelt quickly signed, a law known as the Antiquities Act, which was designed to protect America’s cultural and physical treasures. Results were immediate. Within two years, Roosevelt had invoked the new law to protect Wyoming’s Devil’s Tower (held sacred by the Cheyenne and the Lakota as “Bears Lodge”) from timber and mining interests, to provide new security to Chaco Canyon and Gila Cliff Dwellings in New Mexico, and to safeguard Arizona’s Montezuma’s Castle and the Grand Canyon.

A century later, a similar (if less intense) looting spree is once again destroying tribal artifacts in Utah’s red rock country, in an area known as Bears Ears. According to archaeologists, San Juan County, Utah, may be home to as many as 100,000 archaeological and cultural sites. Grave robbing and vandalism, always a problem in the vast and under-policed region, is on the rise. Since 2011, federal officials have reported at least 25 incidents of looting and disturbance of human remains, though citizen watchdog groups say the number is likely twice as high. In one instance, vandals dismantled a 19th-century Navajo hogan for firewood. Prehistoric petroglyphs have been found pockmarked with bullet holes—the North American equivalent of, say, using the Chartres Cathedral’s rose window for target practice.

Native Americans are in shock. “In the region here, the looting and vandalism of cultural sites is pretty rampant. It’s a serious offense, but if it gets reported, it doesn’t get dealt with,” Regina Lopez-Whiteskunk, a councilmember of the Ute Mountain Ute, told The American Prospect. “This is the final resting place of our ancestors. We feel they deserve the same respect as, say, the battlefield at Gettsyburg. … When places like that get destroyed, it’s like ripping a page out of history.”

For now, the Bears Ears, a pair of red sandstone buttes popping out of the pinyon-juniper forest—the southern one cocked in what does resemble ursine curiosity—is ground zero in the dispute about who should get to manage western lands, how they should be managed, and, to some, whether there is even such a thing as federal lands.

In response, the Ute Mountain Ute have joined with four other native nations—the Navajo, the Hopi, the Utes, and the Pueblo of Zuni—in an unprecedented tribal alliance to press for additional federal protections for southeastern Utah. The five tribes—historic enemies still riven by contemporary disputes over resource allocation—have set aside their differences to join in the common cause of calling on President Obama to establish a 1.9 million–acre Bears Ears National Monument. But GOP lawmakers and some Utahns with links to the Bundy militia are intensely opposed to any monument designation, turning this swath of high desert into the latest front in a long-running war over public lands policy in the West. For now, the Bears Ears, a pair of red sandstone buttes popping out of the pinyon-juniper forest—the southern one cocked in what does resemble ursine curiosity—is ground zero in the dispute about who should get to manage western lands, how they should be managed, and, to some, whether there is even such a thing as federal lands.

The Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition is barely a year old, but the group has an important ally in the Obama administration. On July 15 and 16, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, National Park Service Director John Jarvis, and Neil Kornze, the head of the Bureau of Land Management, traveled to Utah for public hearings over the proposed monument. Jewell, for one, was moved by what she heard from tribal members. “Everyone recognizes this is a special area,” Jewell said while standing in the middle of the Bears Ears meadow. “What I have seen on this trip, and especially here, is this incredible treasure trove of cultural resources. It’s beyond imagination. I am also shocked at the lack of protection for many of these resources.”

Utah’s congressional delegation is also aghast—at the prospect of a new national monument in their region. Representative Rob Bishop, a Republican who chairs the Natural Resources Committee, has called the Antiquities Act “the most evil act ever invented.” The San Juan County Commission, dominated by Bundy-clan sympathizers, is also vehemently opposed to the potential monument. Utah’sSenator Orrin Hatch has hinted that a monument designation by Obama could lead to violence.

For the Native American nations spearheading the Bears Ears campaign, the drive for a national monument in their ancestral lands marks a major turnabout. The relationship between tribes and the federal land-management agencies has long been marked by mistrust, the natural result of centuries of dispossession and exclusion. The Obama administration has sought to hit the reset button on federal-tribal relations; at Grand Canyon National Park, for example, deputy superintendent Brian Drapeaux, a member of the Rosebud Sioux, has increased tribal representation at the main tourist spots, while boosting Indian involvement in the lucrative sale of concessions.

But tribal leaders remain suspicious. “Historically, we haven’t been part of the [land] management process,” says Carleton Bowekaty, a Zuni tribal councilmember and the co-chair of the Bears Ears alliance. “Normally, we are consulted afterward.”

The Inter-Tribal Alliance’s proposal is as audacious as it is ambitious. The five tribes are asking the government to let the native nations co-manage Bears Ears National Monument, an arrangement without precedent. The tribes envision an oversight commission that would include the National Park Service, the Forest Service, the Bureau of Land management, state and county representatives, and the five tribes in the coalition. “Here we want to make sure the tribes have a voice from the beginning,” Bowekaty says. “And that’s important because the voice we want to include doesn’t have to do with the material, but with the spiritual, and that’s normally foreign to federal policy.”

For their part, national conservation groups such as the Sierra Club and the Wilderness Society, which normally lead campaigns to protect public lands, have deliberately stepped back, acknowledging that the tribes have the highest moral ground when it comes to Bears Ears. “This is exactly what the Antiquities Act was designed to do—protect archaeological and cultural sites,” says Matt Lee-Ashley, director of the public lands program at the Center for American Progress. “The tribes are obviously able to speak to that very well. They’ve mapped out what needs protection, and how to engage in co-management to protect it.”

The dispute has devolved into the use of dark ops. Lands-rights activists have sought to gin up resistance among area Indians by floating rumors that monument designation would put an end to the common (and lawful) practice of collecting firewood and gathering medicinal herbs and plants for spiritual ceremonies. This spring, leaflets that faked the appearance of Interior Department press releases began appearing in public places on the Navajo Nation, stating falsely that the monument would seize four million acres of tribal land. Another phony flyer announced a party celebrating the Bears Ears Monument, and provocatively blared that “everyone is excited except Utah Navajos.”But the local opposition to the monument proposal is fierce. While the Indians merely mistrust the feds, many whites in southern Utah have openly voiced hatred against them. San Juan County is a hotbed of don’t-tread-on-me Sagebrush Rebellion sentiment. In 2014, right after the armed standoff at the Bundy Ranch in Nevada, some local residents, led by County Commissioner Phil Lyman, violated federal laws by riding all-terrain vehicles into a canyon where they’d been banned after damage to archaeological sites. Many of the lawbreakers were packing guns. On his Facebook page, Lyman has described the BLM as “despotic.” He has also been quoted as saying that Native Americans have no standing on public lands issues because “they lost the war.”

Native proponents of the monument dismiss this as nothing but dishonest scaremongering, and say their monument would not ban such traditional land uses as wood and plant gathering. “There is a lot of misinformation out there, a lack of understanding about the access to resources,” Bowekaty says. “This is not exclusionary.” Nevertheless, the inaccurate rumors have misled some area natives. A video produced by the Sutherland Institute, a Utah think tank “supporting limited government and private property rights,” features a string of Indian speakers coming out against the Bears Ears proposal and asking that Obama not “take our land.”

Monument opponents’ most vocal champion on Capitol Hill is Utah’s Bishop, who has said that anyone who likes the Antiquities Act as written should “die” because he “needs stupidity out of the gene pool.” Bishop has repeatedly introduced or co-sponsored legislation that would dilute and render meaningless the Antiquities Act, and has supported calls for the transfer of federal lands to state governments to allow for more mining or oil and gas extraction.

In an effort to forestall a monument designation, Bishop and fellow Utah Representative Jason Chaffetz introduced a bill in early July called the Public Lands Initiative as an alternative to the tribal plan. Bishop’s proposal would protect 1.4 million acres in the Bears Ears region as National Conservation Areas (a designation that offers less protection than a national monument) whilegiving the state of Utah new powers to open 300,000 acres of federal land to oil and gas drilling.

Bishop has sought to sell his legislation as a “grand bargain” that could appeal to all sides. But it has left many cold. Green groups blasted it as an effort to “divest Americans of their shared public lands.” The tribal leaders pushing for Bears Ears protection were nonplussed. “Where was the state delegation, and why haven’t they approached the tribal governments earlier?” asks Lopez-Whiteskunk, of the Ute Mountain Utes. If anything, Lopez-Whiteskunk adds, Bishop has mostly been useful to the monument campaign as a political foil. “I would thank him for giving us an opposition. You always need an opposition.”

Despite such local resistance and internecine divisions, the tribal leaders and their allies in the conservation movement are cautiously optimistic that Obama will act on Bears Ears before he leaves office. They are confident that public opinion is on their side: A poll this spring reported that 71 percent of Utah residents support a national monument designation—and they have been buoyed the strong turnout at the federal hearing on July 16.

That Saturday, the population of Bluff, Utah, tripled as people poured into town for the meeting with Secretary Jewell and other federal officials. Folks started lining up at 9 a.m. for the afternoon hearing. By midmorning the community hall was full, by noon a large overflow tent was filled, and by the time the hearing began, a second overflow tent was also packed to capacity. The Bears Ears Inter-Tribal Coalition brought a thousand turquoise-colored T-shirts to hand out to supporters; there were none left over. Participants say supporters outnumbered opponents at least 3 to 1. Lyman, the San Juan county commissioner, later complained that those “who care about federal overreach were horribly outnumbered.”

For three and a half hours, Jewell listened to one emotional testimonial after another about why Bears Ears is a unique place that deserves the highest federal protections. Zuni tribal councilmember Bowekaty says he wanted to make a simple point to the federal officials who traveled to Utah: “We have been pushing the fact that we didn’t draw the reservation lines or the state lines or the country lines—we just had to adapt to them. Because we have such a deep connection to the [Bears Ears] area, this area holds great significance to the Zuni people and other peoples, even though we might not live there anymore. This time, we want to be the ones drawing the lines.”

Jason Mark is the author of Satellites in the High Country: Searching for the Wild in the Age of Man, and the editor of SIERRA magazine.

===

Dozens illegally ride ATVs into Utah canyon in lands fight rally

By Brian Maffly The Salt Lake Tribune

Published May 11,201411:51 am

Protest • Scores of ATV riders enter off-limits trail to claim temporary victory in jurisdictional dispute with the BLM over canyon access.

This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Blanding • Fed up with federal control over lands their families have used for generations, Blanding residents along with out-of-town supporters on Saturday drove all-terrain vehicles into Recapture Canyon, an area rich in prehistoric sites the Bureau of Land Management closed to motorized use seven years ago.

San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman, acting, he said, as a private citizen, organized the ride. It commenced with a rally in Blanding's Centennial Park protesting what he and more than 200 supporters call federal "overreach" into local jurisdiction. Prompting the protest was BLM's failure to process San Juan County's applications for ATV rights-of-way in Recapture, although resentment toward the federal agency here runs much deeper and wider than the canyon that parallels Blanding a few miles to the east.

BLM officials said they were disappointed protestors broke the law Saturday, adding that federal officers recorded riders whom they intend to prosecute.

"We're not proponents of breaking the law," Lyman told reporters at the park, an hour before joining dozens of riders on the closed route. "This was a supervisor's discretionary closure. It's a county road. We claim it. Just because BLM owns the property, that doesn't mean they own the right-of-way that exists."

...

Part of a broad backlash against federal land management across the West, the ATV protesthas attracted out-of-state activists eager to denounce federal authority over public lands. Some came decked in military camouflage and sidearms slung on their thighs. Militiamen approached by The Tribune declined to be interviewed.

Others protesters argued that BLM caved to special interests, like wilderness proponents and preservationists, in closing the canyon at the expense of the public, especially those who have trouble walking.

But the canyon offers a window into how ancient Native Americans thrived for centuries in an arid, rugged land, according to Jerry Spangler, of the Colorado Plateau Archaeological Alliance.

"Damage to archaeological sites is permanent and the information about our collective past is then lost forever," Spangler said. "It is sad that irreplaceable treasures of importance to all Americans would be sacrificed on the altar of anti-government fervor. It is worse that protesters would be so blinded to their own insensitivity as to what others consider to be sacred treasures of their past."

While addressing the rally, Lyman voiced second thoughts about riding the closed trail, fearing illegal action would promote conflict and undermine his cause, which "is being tried in the court of public opinion."

"For 130 years people have been using that canyon as a highway," Lyman said. "To see it become a focal point of conflict is very painful for me."

He proposed riding the canyon rim instead, but rally goers shouted that idea down.

"It's not illegal. It's the people of San Juan County's land. It's your god-given right to go down and ride through that canyon and to hell with the media," shouted an armed militia member.

Soon at least 50 ATVs carrying multiple riders, including children and andone man with an assault rifle at the ready, motored across an invisible line in the dust — beyond which the canyon is off limits — as sheriff's deputies kept watch from the backs of horses.

"We are here to keep the peace and safeguard the constitutional rights of everybody," said San Juan County Sheriff Rick Eldredge. "We don't want to see clashes between citizens, and clashes between BLM and militia. This is not going to be Bunkerville."

The sheriff was referring to BLM's recent stand-off with armed supporters of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy who has long refused to pay grazing fees. Also addressing the rally was Bundy's son Ryan, who counseled there is no such thing as federal land.

"I came here to re-open a road," he said to resounding applause.

BLM had no visible presence at the north end of the canyon where riders entered on an established road below Recapture Reservoir, but federal officers were there, according to BLM Utah director Juan Palma. He was concerned riders may have damaged artifacts and dwellings left by Ancestral Puebloans who lived in the canyon until 800 years ago.

"As always, our first and most important priority is the safety of the public and our employees, and our actions today reflect that," Palma said. "The BLM was in Recapture Canyon today collecting evidence and will continue to investigate. The BLM will pursue all available redress through the legal system to hold the lawbreakers accountable."

Fearing for their safety, many environmentalists stayed away from Blanding Saturday and there was no counter protest during the ride.

Josh Ewing, executive director of the non-profit Friends of Cedar Mesa, was in the canyon photographing riders as they passed below a cliff dwelling a mile into the closed part of the canyon. Most of the riders, including Lyman, turned around here, while a few continued south. From here the route was less a road than a meandering trail overgrown with sage and willow.

"The American tradition of civil disobedience doesn't change the fact that the rule of law needs to mean something," said Ewing, who lives in nearby Bluff. "I'll be very disappointed in my government if it doesn't follow through with upholding the law."

Lyman's two fellow commissioners had declined to endorse the ride, while former commissioners Mark Maryboy and Lynn Stevens criticized Lyman for promoting unlawful conduct. Stevens, who supports motorized use in the canyon, said driving it now is "unwise and irresponsible" and will only further delay the right-of-way application.

"Now they'll have to spend more time evaluating any damage the ride might cause. I've never seen a protest action that achieved the desired result," said Stevens, who serves on the governor's Balanced Resource Council.

State Sen Jim Dabakis, D-Salt Lake City, blamed Saturday's illegal stunt on Utah's chronic defiance of federal authority, particularly a "meaningless" new law that demands Utah take control of 30 million federal acres.

"Gov. Gary Herbert needs to be strong in defending the rule of law and protect this ancient heritage if he wants the federal government to turn more land over to the state. We do not live by mob rule," Dabakis said.

bmaffly@sltrib.com —

Public lands debate

The Salt Lake Tribune's Jennifer Napier-Pearce will moderate an Oxford-style debate on the resolution: "The state of Utah is best suited to manage public lands within its borders."

Who • House Speaker Becky Lockhart and Republican Rep. Ken Ivory will argue one side; former BLM director Pat Shea and University of Utah political science professor Dan McCool will argue the other.

===

they lost

Somebody is playing dirty tricks in San Juan County in an apparent attempt to turn American Indians against the proposed Bears Ears National Monument.

A phony news release purportedly from the Department of Interior was posted at the post office in Bluff and in several gas stations in the county, saying the Interior Department was poised to take over more than 4 million acres of the Navajo Nation Reservation.

A statement issued by Utah Dine Bikeyah (UDB), a nonprofit American Indian grass-roots organization, said the falsified Interior Department news release was accompanied by a fabricated flier supposedly from UDB that invited the public to celebrate a new Bears Ears National Monument, except Utah Navajos, who were directed to "stay away from our party."

"This is a clear attempt to turn people against a Bears Ears National Monument by spreading lies, inciting racism and impersonating federal officials," said Cynthia Wilson, UDB's community outreach coordinator. "These tactics are despicable and likely criminal."

The flier about the party, posted at locations in Mexican Hat and Bluff, said "Lots of good food will be provided by the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, the Great Old Broads for Wilderness and Friends of Cedar Mesa."

Those are environmental groups that Bears Ears opponents have tried to claim are using American Indians for their own aims to lock up more Utah land.

The flier said Interior Secretary Sally Jewell will be in attendance at the party and President Barack Obama will make the Bears Ears announcement that day, July 17.

"No Utah Navajos are invited because we in Window Rock are taking your sacred land and stopping your wood cutting and other activities on this land and you have been complaining about that," it added.

A third fraudulent letter also has been circulating in San Juan County.

It claims the Bears Ears National Monument would ban firewood gathering and American Indian access for sacred activities. In fact, monument designation would protect such activities.

The letter was purportedly signed by Albert Holiday, vice president of Navajo Nation's Oljato Chapter.

"Most members of Dine Bikeyah that are supporting the national monument, like Alfred Lomahquahu (vice chairman of the Hopi Tribe) and Eric Descheenie (executive of the Navajo Tribe) are receiving significant financial remuneration from environmental groups for their support to make the Bears Ears and Cedar Mesa their personal playground for these environmental groups," said the letter.

That is not true, either, and Holiday vehemently denies having anything to do with the letter, which means his name was forged.

"I did not write this letter," Holiday said. "I fully support President Obama designating the Bears Ears National Monument, and so does the Navajo Nation's Oljato Chapter."

The accusations in the phony news release, flier and letter are similar to claims made by some Utah legislators, county commissioners, members of the congressional delegation and others opposed to the Bears Ears National Monument.

Rep. Mike Noel, R-Kanab, has asked that the Utah attorney general's office investigate relationships between tribal members and "special interest groups" like Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. He also has suggested American Indian groups are being manipulated by special interest groups.

Some in Utah's congressional delegation have hinted that tribal leaders are receiving personal gains by supporting the monument, similar to the allegations made in the phony letter attributed to Holiday.

Gavin Noyes, executive director of UDB, sent an email in March to Casey Snider, legislative director on public lands for Rep. Rob Bishop, after listening to Snider talking about Bears Ears on the radio. Snider claimed Bishop's office received a letter from a UDB Board member who is now opposed to Bears Ears.

"Can you share this letter with me, or tell me who this person purporting to be a UDB board member is?" Noyes wrote. "Nobody has left our board over the past five years, so I presume this person must be a sitting member."

Noyes did not get an answer from Snider.

In 2015, Noyes documented incidents dating back to 2012 for a discrimination report issued by University of Utah professor Dan McCool, which was part of a lawsuit the Navajo Nation filed against San Juan County, alleging violations of the Voting Rights Act.

They included a statement by San Juan County Commissioner Phil Lyman, saying the Navajos "lost the war" and have no right to comment on public land management and ranchers in San Juan County telling American Indians to "get back on the reservation."

Andrew Jackson would be proud.

http://www.sltrib.com/home/3928251-155/rolly-bears-ears-opponents-posting-phony

http://www.sltrib.com/home/3928251-155/rolly-bears-ears-opponents-posting-phony%3Ffullpage=1

The Koch Brothers Are Behind a Plot to Open Up the Grand Canyon Watershed to Toxic Uranium Mining

Last year, Arizona Rep. Raúl Grijalva introduced a bill to protect the greater Grand Canyon as a national monument. But it has stalled.

By Marcia G. Yerman / Huffington Post August 3, 2016

http://www.alternet.org/environment/koch-brothers-are-behind-plot-open-grand-canyon-watershed-toxic-uranium-mining

Grand Canyon National Park is the United States 15th oldest national park. Named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1979, the park is located in northwestern Arizona

This summer, like all summers, one of the top spots for travel consideration is the majestic Grand Canyon.

President Teddy Roosevelt, considered the “conservationist” president, declared the Grand Canyon a monument in 1908. It was made a national park in 1919 by the National Park Service, which was established in 1916.

Roosevelt had a clear understanding of the importance of preserving America’s resources—and the actions of those who would despoil them for monetary gain. He signed the Antiquities Act of 1906. The goal was to create a tool that would allow future presidents to protect the country’s historical and natural sites.

Now, calls are out to President Obama to make the “greater” Grand Canyon a national monument. This would encompass approximately 1.7 million acres of public lands surrounding the park.

Why? It is a response to potential encroachment on the gateway to the Grand Canyon.

Unsurprisingly, the issue at hand involves revenue, big power brokers, ramifications of Citizens United, and a familiar actor in the anti-environmental space—the Koch brothers.

The debate is about mining, which has been a source of contention for over a century, when land claims were first staked. Older mines that were “validated” went forth. One of those, Canyon Mine, is located six miles south of the Grand Canyon.

Many of the original owners of mining claims shifted their land over to tourist properties. However, there are approximately 3,000 “unvalidated” claims currently on hold under a temporary 20-year ban issued by the Secretary of the Interior in 2012. The impetus was to protect lands from “imminent threat.”

Now, with Obama leaving office, the struggle to get permanent protection has intensified.

The lands of the Havasupai Tribe lands border the Grand Canyon. They are specifically concerned about water radiation and contamination. Environmentalists and Indigenous groups are pitted against various politicians, the National Mining Association, and the Arizona Chamber of Commerce Foundation. The latter all have ties to Koch brothers funding.

As a precursor of what could possibly be in store, it must be noted that there was a superfund site on the southern rim of the Grand Canyon.

Mining not only scars the earth, it disturbs the ecosystem of the canyon. It threatens the tourism industry ($700 million), releases toxic chemicals into the air (uranium dust can cause lung cancer), and puts water supplies in danger.

Those who are against a permanent ban on uranium mining at the Grand Canyon gateway make up an unsavory stew. At the state level, the same players who support suing the EPA over the Clean Power Plan, are part of the mix. The groups supporting uranium mining—and against giving the Grand Canyon and its environs full protection—use the Kochian Newspeak of “limited government” and “federal overreach.”

Greg Zimmerman, policy director at the Center for Western Priorities, co-authored an article with a very succinct drill-down on the money trail.

I asked Zimmerman for his thoughts. He wrote via e-mail:

“These efforts are being driven by wealthy, ultra-conservative industrialists who are committed to rolling back over a century of land protections across the American West, including at the Grand Canyon. Mining at the gateway of the Grand Canyon remains incredibly unpopular among Arizonans and Americans alike, but it’s not stopping these individuals from undermining our outdoor legacy.”

A poll of Arizona residents who expect to vote in November 2016 confirmed Zimmerman’s assertion of support for monument status. The numbers showed that statewide, 80 percent favored the establishment of the Greater Grand Canyon National Heritage Monument. When asked if a candidate’s stance on the issue would impact their choice, they answered in the affirmative by a “three times as likely” ratio.

David Metz, who worked on the project told me:

“Data doesn’t get much clearer than this. Survey after survey shows overwhelming support among Arizona voters for a national monument near the Grand Canyon. Arizonans understand it, want it, and they are ready to back members of Congress who will work to make it a reality.”

Rep. Raúl Grijalva, of Arizona’s 3rd District, has been on the case since 2008. In November 2015, Grijalva introduced the Greater Grand Canyon Heritage National Monument Act (H.R.3882). It is currently languishing in the Subcommittee on Federal Lands.

Roger Clark, program director of the Grand Canyon Trust, speaks with passion about how the Grand Canyon’s future hangs in the balance. On the phone he underscored the point, “The Grand Canyon has always been sought after for monetary gain. Yet, it’s inconceivable that profiteers would spend so much money to undermine one of our nation’s greatest treasures.”

The conversation ended with Clark’s observation, “Citizens everywhere must rally! The barbarians are at the gate.”

As the Koch brothers undermine protections at the Grand Canyon, let’s remember what our children are at risk of losing.

“The Grand Canyon fills me with awe. It is beyond comparison...Let this great wonder of nature remain as it now is...You cannot improve on it. But what you can do is to keep it for your children, your children’s children, and all who come after you, as the one great sight which every American should see.” ~ President Theodore Roosevelt

This story originally appeared on the website Moms Clean Air Force

alcohol sioux

http://www.alternet.org/belief/lakota-leaders-win-battle-against-liquid-genocide

see node

Winona LaDuke Native American activist. article on native rice and GMO's.2/10 talk about food and energy (video). On Green economy (video) 09. See also Native American page

cda coal to solar plant nat am

http://ecowatch.com/2016/03/31/nanticoke-solar-farm/

http://insideclimatenews.org/news/15032016/native-americans-federal-funds-isle-de-jean-charles-relocation-climate-change-sea-level-rise

Native American Tribe Gets Federal Funds to Flee Rising Seas

In a disappearing section of Louisiana coastline, the people who call Isle De Jean Charles home are moving to save their community and culture.

BY DAVID HASEMYER, INSIDECLIMATE NEWS

MAR 16, 2016

Isle De Jean Charles has been slowly disappearing under the waters of the Gulf of Mexico since the 1950s. Credit: Karen Apricot

The sacred land in coastal Louisiana that a small community of Native Americans has called home for more than a century has been all but swallowed by the rising sea, leaving residents with little dry ground and a fear they will lose their heritage.

Now a $48 million federal grant will allow the band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians of Isle de Jean Charles to move away from their vanishing home. The funding for the relocation will make the tribe one of the first—and so far the largest—populations in the United States to be resettled because of climate change.

The money, from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), is part of a program designed to make communities more disaster-resistant. For the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians, that means moving their whole community north to higher ground when a suitable site is identified in the next several years.

The slice of land that has supported the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians through trapping fishing, and agriculture for 170 years is rapidly being swallowed by the Gulf of Mexico.

Since the 1950s, the tribe has lost 98 percent of its land to rising sea levels, coastal erosion and flooding. The island, about 50 miles south of New Orleans, once covered 15,000 acres, but the land has eroded to a tiny strip measuring a quarter-mile wide by a half-mile long, according to a report by Northern Arizona University.

see Idle No More and anti coal and tar sand protests

also Indigerous env network listed by stratfor http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20131205/worst-case-scenario-oil-sands-industry-has-come-life-leaked-document-shows

berta cecedes sp and http://ecowatch.com/2016/03/17/honduras-murder-nelson-garcia/

http://www.democracynow.org/2016/3/3/honduran_indigenous_leader_berta_caceres_assassinated

Honduran indigenous and environmental organizer Berta Cáceres has been assassinated in her home. She was one of the leading organizers for indigenous land rights in Honduras.

In 1993 she co-founded the National Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH). For years the group faced a series of threats and repression.

According to Global Witness, Honduras has become the deadliest country in the world for environmentalists. Between 2010 and 2014, 101 environmental campaigners were killed in the country.

In 2015 Berta Cáceres won the Goldman Environmental Prize, the world’s leading environmental award. In awarding the prize, the Goldman Prize committee said, “In a country with growing socioeconomic inequality and human rights violations, Berta Cáceres rallied the indigenous Lenca people of Honduras and waged a grassroots campaign that successfully pressured the world’s largest dam builder to pull out of the Agua Zarca Dam.”

http://thefreethoughtproject.com/navajo-water-supply-horrific-flint-cares-native-american/

hmm

he news out of Flint, Michigan brought the issue of contaminated drinking water into sharp focus, as it was revealed that officials at every level—local, state and federal—knew about lead-poisoned water for months but did nothing to address the problem.

Under state-run systems like utilities and roads, poorer communities are the last to receive attention from government plagued by inefficiencies and corrupt politicians. Perhaps no group knows this better than Native Americans, who have been victimized by government for centuries.

In the western U.S., water contamination has been a way of life for many tribes. The advocacy group Clean Up The Mines! describes the situation in Navajo country, which is far worse than in Flint, Michigan.

Since the 1950s, their water has been poisoned by uranium mining to fuel the nuclear industry and the making of atomic bombs for the U.S. military. Coal mining and coal-fired power plants have added to the mix. The latest assault on Navajo water was carried out by the massive toxic spills into the Animas and San Juan rivers when the EPA recklessly attempted to address the abandoned Gold King mine.

“In 2015 the Gold King Mine spill was a wake-up call to address dangers of abandoned mines, but there are currently more than 15,000 toxic uranium mines that remain abandoned throughout the US,” said Charmaine White Face from the South Dakota based organization Defenders of the Black Hills. “For more than 50 years, many of these hazardous sites have been contaminating the land, air, water, and national monuments such as Mt. Rushmore and the Grand Canyon. Each one of these thousands of abandoned uranium mines is a potential Gold King mine disaster with the greater added threat of radioactive pollution. For the sake of our health, air, land, and water, we can’t let that happen.”

There is no comprehensive law requiring cleanup of abandoned uranium mines, meaning corporations and government can walk away from them after exploiting their resources. 75 percent of abandoned uranium mines are on federal and Tribal lands.

Leona Morgan of Diné No Nukes points out one example: “The United Nuclear Corporation mill tailings spill of 1979, north of Churchrock, New Mexico left an immense amount of radioactive contamination that down-streamers, today, are currently receiving in their drinking water. A mostly-Navajo community in Sanders, Arizona has been exposed to twice the legal limit allowable for uranium through their tap.”...

http://www.alternet.org/environment/look-future-how-tpp-could-create-environmental-nightmares

he air was hazy from distant wildfires on August 29 when a gift arrived on the Northern Cheyenne reservation in southeast Montana. Carvers from the Lummi Tribe in Washington state brought a totem pole as a sign of support for those fighting the Otter Creek project, a proposed strip mine and rail spur on the Northern Cheyenne Tribe’s traditional lands.

At a ceremony marking the pole’s arrival, ranchers, whose families have been on the land for generations, and tribal members, whose families go back even further, joined together to speak of the sacredness of the land and water, and of their duty to protect this inheritance for generations to come

The new mine would extract around 1.3 billion tons of coal.Arch Coaland its partners would blast a new rail spur through hills, across ranches, and along the Tongue River to connect the mine to the Burlington Northern main line. Open train cars would carry coal to a proposed export terminal to be built on the Lummi Tribe’s traditional lands. From there, the coal could be shipped to Asia; burning it would emit billions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Although some welcome the jobs associated with this project, thousands—from southeast Montana to the Pacific coast—have expressed opposition, citing concerns about pollution, noise, impacts on fisheries, and climate change.

But local leaders who resist mining, fracking, and pipelines face a gauntlet of challenges. The people of Denton, Texas, for example, overwhelmingly adopted a fracking ban, even though opponents outspent them nearly 10 to 1. But then the Texas legislature overturned their ban with a law that preempts local ordinances like Denton’s.

Even when local leaders get state and national support, corporations can still have the last word. Provisions in many trade agreements, including NAFTA, allow foreign corporations to sue governments for lost profits. According to Manuel Pérez-Rocha, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, these investor-state dispute settlement provisions are increasingly pitting governments against foreign mining or drilling companies in front of trade panels made up of three attorneys empowered to make decisions that supersede local, state, and federal law.

Here’s one example: In 2009, the Canadian-based Pacific Rim mining company (now owned by Australian-based OceanaGold) sued El Salvadorfor refusing to allow the company to mine for gold. El Salvador had banned the project due to widespread water contamination. The lawsuit demands $300 million from the small, impoverished country. Even if El Salvador prevails, it will be out millions of dollars in legal costs, according to Pérez-Rocha.

Now that the text has been officially released, we know that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) would extend this sort of investor-state provision to countries that represent 40 percent of the global economy.

How would this apply to the Otter Creek dispute? Because Arch Coal is a U.S. corporation, Pérez-Rocha told me, it could not sue under investor-state provisions, unless the company sold out to a foreign company based in one of the countries covered by one of these trade agreements. As shown by the El Salvador case, that kind of buyout is not unusual, Pérez-Rocha says.

The TPP and other global trade pacts take away the power of governments to protect the environment. As I’ve traveled across the United States, visiting reservations, hollowed-out rust belt cities, and farming towns, I’ve met people working to combat climate change and racial exclusion, and to rebuild local food systems and economies. I believe that work represents our best shot at navigating the crises now unfolding around us. Instead of making global laws that increase the power of giant corporations, our policies should support people in communities everywhere who are building a better world.

http://www.desmog.ca/2015/12/10/canada-intervenes-keep-human-and-indigenous-rights-climate-treaty-during-final-hours-paris-negotiations

whoohoo http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/obama-rejects-keystone-xl-pipeline-victory-environmental-activists

Navajo activist Leroy Jackson had been fighting against the mining and logging corporations who had wanted to exploit the resources from America’s largest Indian reservation. On October 9, 1993, Jackson was found dead under suspicious circumstances.

Today, the shocking number of environmentalists who are murdered, indigenous and non-indigenous alike, continues to rise.

Global Witness, the human rights group, reported that at least 908 environmental activists worldwide were murdered between 2002 and 2013 in retaliation for their work. According to the London-based NGO, only 10 of the killers were convicted.

In 2014, 116 environmental activists worldwide were killed, 20% more than the previous year.

40% of these 116 murdered activists belonged to indigenous communities.

The reason why so many of these environmental activists are indigenous is because corporations have been fighting to gain control of tribal lands and their rich natural resources.

http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/sep/23/indigenous-people-crisis-land-resources

Indigenous groups are now represented globally by a range of international organisations – the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues(UNPFII), the Assembly of First Nations, Survival International, the World Council of Indigenous Peoples, Indigenous Environmental Network – and by many national organisations, along with a host of declarations on indigenous issues by UN agencies and international groups.

Acceptance in Latin American nation states of a multicultural citizenship which is inclusive of indigenous groups has become standard practice on the statute books. A range of rights has been accorded by Central American governments to their indigenous populations. In most cases the recognition is only on paper. The Honduran government, for instance, sidesteps its legal obligations to indigenous populations and their communal land rights by legislating in favour of individual ownership, which directly undermines the principle of communal ownership in indigenous territories.

It is clear that indigenous peoples have been recognised; but it is also clear that legal recognition does not mean that the rights, territories, resources and cultures of indigenous peoples are respected. Governments, corporations, loggers, campesino farmers, cattle-ranching companies and many others still covet their land and resources, and continue to find ways to acquire them.

The resurgence of indigenous self-esteem which has accompanied these developments has coincided with the global financial crisis. The crisis has reinforced "a battle [that] is taking place for natural resources everywhere". As Victoria Tauli-Corpus (an indigenous Filipino and UNPFII chair) says:

"There are more and more arrests, killings and abuses. This is happening in Russia, Canada, the Philippines, Cambodia, Mongolia, Nigeria, the Amazon, all over Latin America, Papua New Guinea and Africa. It is global. We are seeing a human rights emergency ... Much of the world's natural capital – oil, gas, timber, minerals – lies on or beneath lands occupied by indigenous people."....

SPECIAL REPORT - Louisiana tribe renews fight for federal recognition in the face of sinking lands, environmental disasters

By Allie Yee

On the fifth anniversary of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the United Houma Nation (UHN) of southern Louisiana is taking yet another stand in its 30-year campaign to win recognition, launching a petition this week calling on the Obama administration to support the tribe's fight for federal recognition.

The UHN is an indigenous tribe with 17,000 members residing in a six-parish area along the Gulf Coast where the land is literally slipping away from under them. Due to coastal erosion, southern Louisiana is losing over 16 square miles of land per year, or the equivalent of one football field every hour.

"The United Houma Nation is severely affected by coastal erosion, sea-level rise, and the lack of corporate and government accountability around the pollution of their traditional lands and waters," the petition states. "A lack of federal recognition limits how the Houma people can protect the delicate marsh, swamp and bayou ecosystems to sustain their food subsistence, cultural practices and economic livelihood."

The Gulf Coast has been eroding for decades due to levee building, oil pipelines that cut through coastal marshland and sea-level rise, but the BP oil disaster of 2010 exacerbated the situation, tribal members say. When the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded and released over 3 million barrels of crude into the Gulf, the oil flowed into coastal wetlands, hurting fisheries critical to the local economy and culture and further contributing to erosion.

"The Gulf drilling disaster is an absolute threat to who we are as Houma people and our way of life," Principal Chief Thomas Dardar said in a statement. "Our homeland and the health of our people are at risk as we deal with the long-term effects of this catastrophe."...

http://org2.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=QTsdtwKUQJ3eKyDlFB%2FWbRkCmveYE8TI

inuit eskimo kivalina sued 2 doz energy co for nuisance, scotus tossed?

corp person?

Indigenous in North Dakota fights fracking 11/14.

http://www.alternet.org/guatemalas-indigenous-people-fighting-back-against-exploitation-multinational-mining-companies

http://ecowatch.com/2014/07/31/keystone-xl-dominoes-fall-arrest-tar-sands-industry/2/

Because Keystone North would cross treaty territory, its construction would blatantly violate the “bad man” clause, an arrestable offense the Great Sioux Nation will not abide. President Obama knows this because the presidents of the Oglala Sioux and Rosebud Sioux tribes declared on national television their people are “willing to die” to stop it. He also knows this because his senior counselor, John Podesta, visited the “Reject and Protect” tipi encampment on the National Mall in April where this declaration of nonviolent civil resistance was made.

many 1st nations never signed a treaty, which means land soverign?

http://www.globalpossibilities.org/first-nations-first-dibs-says-canadas-supreme-court/

http://insideclimatenews.org/news/20140623/first-nations-being-courted-back-tar-sands-refinery-projects-their-land

NV Energy has announced that it will close three of its four coal-fired units at the Reid Gardner power plant in southern Nevada by the end of this year, and the fourth by 2019. The Sierra Club has worked for years with the Moapa Band of Paiutes to retire heavily polluting Reid Gardner, which sits next door to the Moapa Paiute reservation. Soon the tribe will build a 200-megawatt solar array -- the first commercial solar project on Native American lands -- from which the city of Los Angeles will be purchasing enough energy to power over 110,000 homes.

Read about this major victory for the climate, clean air, and renewable energy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_social_statistics_of_Native_Americans

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/03/19/3416006/native-american-tribe-renewable-energy/

Twenty-one tribal energy and mineral projects just got a boost from the Department of Interior, including multiple projects to advance renewable energy on tribal land.

On Friday, the Interior Department announced the 21 tribal projects that would share in $3.2 million worth of federal grants. The projects include 13 proposals for renewable energy, including wind, hydropower and biomass. The recipients also include two oil and gas extraction projects and six projects focused on extracting limestone and other minerals.

“These grants are about strengthening self-determination and self-governance by enabling tribal nations to evaluate and promote their energy and mineral assets, negotiate the best agreements with partners or investors and develop these resources for the social and economic benefit of their communities,” Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a release

Not all of the tribes know how much money they’ll receive yet, but renewable projects accounted for the largest chunk of grant money at $1,972,350 for the 13 proposals. One of the tribes to receive grant money is the Crow Creek Sioux tribe in South Dakota, which has plans to build a billion-dollar wind farm. Crow Creek leaders hope the farm will provide free electricity to the 2,000 tribe members that live on the reservation and also generate electricity that the tribe could sell to nearby towns. If the tribe gets enough funding to build the project, leaders say it could produce enough energy to power 100,000 to 400,000 homes.

“We never hardly hear good news,” tribe Chairman Brandon Sazue told the Rapid City Journalof the tribe’s grant. “This was one of the greatest pieces of news I have heard since being chairman for Crow Creek.”...

http://insideclimatenews.org/todaysnews/20140304/aboriginal-rights-threat-canadas-oil-and-gas-mining-plans-documents-reveal

fight coal:

This ceremony aimed to ward off coal.

Celilo Indian Village, Ore., separated from the Columbia River by only a highway and some railroad tracks, is one of many tribal communities that sit in the path of what could soon become America's coal-export superhighway. If government agencies grant approval to three export terminals proposed for Oregon and Washington, up to 100 million metric tons of coal per year could soon be shuttled in open rail cars from mines in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming and Montana, along the shores of the Columbia River and the Puget Sound, and through ranches and reservations like this one. The coal would then be loaded onto ships destined for Asia's proliferating fleet of coal-fired power plants.

Many activists currently fighting the plan see the impacts of burning coal on the global climate as their primary motivation. But for the Yakama, Lummi and other tribes, as well as communities in the path of these shipments, it's the local effects that worry them most. There are the potential traffic delays and disturbances to cultural sites. Then there's the very real prospect of toxic coal dust wafting off the passing trains, fouling the air, poisoning local waterways and even contaminating key food resources -- such as the salmon on which many local tribes, including those living in the tiny Celilo Indian Village, depend.

While the U.S. has seen a steady decline in coal use in recent years thanks to tighter federal regulations and the expanded viability of natural gas and renewable energy, the rise of burgeoning, coal-hungry economies in China, India and other fast-developing nations means the Celilo tribes -- like many communities across the Pacific Northwest -- now find themselves wedged squarely between a domestic abundance of the combustible rock and its most promising international market.

The potential expansion of coal exports elicits differing opinions among tribes and communities here. What may be an environmental or public health imposition for one is seen as a desperately needed opportunity for another. The coal industry, for example, argues that exports could inject welcome economic activity into struggling Northwest towns and reservations. By itself, the Gateway Pacific Terminal proposed at Cherry Point on the Puget Sound would add approximately 1,250 permanent jobs, including induced jobs such as restaurant and healthcare workers, as well as 4,400 temporary construction jobs, according to an analysis by an industry consultant. Annual local and state tax revenues would amount to about $11 million.

The dispute over the coal trains is playing out in television advertisements, on the streets and inside boardrooms, town halls and courthouses from Washington, D.C., to Seattle. A series of hearings and protests over the last few months have attracted thousands of people -- some donning makeshift respirators, others wearing "Beyond Coal" T-shirts, and some even rappelling from a bridge over the Columbia River as a symbolic blockade to the shipments. Still, nowhere are the tensions so acute as on the hardscrabble reservations that either sit atop valuable coal -- an estimated30 percentof U.S. coal reserves west of the Mississippi are located on native lands -- or lie in the path of the trains that would haul it to port.

Just outside the walls of the longhouse where Washines and his fellow drummers were singing out in opposition to the coal shipments, a 22-foot totem pole lay on the bed of a white truck. The carving, which depicted five salmon, two kneeling men and a hungry child, was touring towns, churches and reservations across the Pacific Northwest as part of an effort to consolidate tribal opposition to the proposed coal shipments. (The totem's last stop, in late September, would be across the border in the Tsleil-Waututh Nation of British Columbia, where it now stands erected as a display of solidarity with that tribe's parallel struggle over a tar sands oil pipeline.)

"Mother Earth doesn't have a voice," said Karen Jim Whitford, a tribal elder, as she stepped shoeless into the center of the longhouse floor. A couple of her tears disappeared into the dirt. "So we must speak for her."

"I vote we stand up," exclaimed another elder, Lorintha Umtuch, referring to the totem's symbolic call for Native Americans to get off their knees and "Warrior Up!" for future generations. "Indian people need to stop this, or else corporations will trample us."

Not all tribes stand on the same side of the coal-export battle line. CJ Stewart, a senator of the Crow Nation, said in a phone interview in October that his tribe desperately needs to develop its coal reserves to improve its economic fortunes and lift its people out of poverty. In November, the Crow Nation signed a joint resolution with the Navajo Nation in support of each other's coal development. "We rely on coal just as they rely on salmon," Stewart said, referring to the Yakama and other tribes represented in Celilo. "All tribes share one common enemy, and that enemy is poverty."

Many tribes along the rail corridor, however, feel it's not just livelihoods at stake -- it's lives. Jewell Praying Wolf James, the carver of the well-traveled totem and member of the Lummi Nation, expressed sympathy with the coal-dependent tribes during a later stop on the totem's journey in Olympia, Wash. "We feel bad for the Crow Nation, the Navajo, the Hopi. That's all they got," he said. "But we want clean air, clean water. We want salmon restored and our children healthy."

ig into Native American history and you will strike coal. As far back as the 1300s, Hopi Indians in what is now the U.S. Southwest used the fossil fuel for cooking, heating and baking clay pottery. In the 1800s, Native Americans made up much of the early mining workforce that would help ignite coal's long reign as the go-to fuel source for the country's necessities and luxuries -- from transporting goods and running factories to heating homes and powering Playstations.

But King Coal's grip is slipping. The rise of hydro-fracturing technology in recent years has unleashed torrents of natural gas, a cheaper and cleaner alternative, and left coal-rich states and undiversified coal companies with a serious revenue problem. Many have responded by looking to Asia, where mining local coal, in addition to building wind farms and solar panels, has not created nearly enough energy for the rapidly growing economies there.

Asia's ready market and America's still plentiful coal could make a convenient marriage. Proving particularly attractive to Asian buyers is Powder River Basin coal, which is cheap to extract and relatively low in polluting sulfur. Yet plenty of obstacles remain in the U.S. and abroad before coal interests can successfully drive their product to northwestern ports for export. There are the vocal environmental advocates, the newly elected local leaders who've made clear their opposition to the plans, the big-money investors who've withdrawn support for port builders and, of course, the tribes.

In a July letter to the Army Corps of Engineers, the federal agency tasked with evaluating the two Washington State coal port projects, the Lummi Nation wrote of its "unconditional and unequivocal opposition" to the terminal planned for Cherry Point, near its reservation. The tribe cited among other concerns "significant and unavoidable impacts and damage" to treaty rights reserved in the 19th century to fish at its "usual and accustomed" areas.

Patricia Graesser, a spokeswoman with the Corps, acknowledged the Lummi letter and said her agency was in government-to-government discussions with the tribe. "We have a responsibility to uphold the nation's treaty with Native American tribes," she said.

The Chinese government, meanwhile, is responding to a major air pollution crisis sparked largely by rapid development centered on coal-fired power. In December, Shanghai's air quality fell to a record low and the country's smog could be seen from space. But even with leaders in China vowing to slow down the growth of coal use, experts predict global coal consumption will jump up another 25 percent by the end of the decade.

Decisions on the Northwest export terminals could significantly influence the future of coal in Asia. "Opening up this main line of cheap American coal is a pretty important signal if you are a Chinese official thinking about how much to invest in what kind of energy infrastructure," said KC Golden, senior policy adviser for the non-profit Climate Solutions, which has advocated against the proposed ports.

The effects would span the globe. According to estimates by the Sightline Institute, a nonprofit think tank based in Seattle, Pacific Northwest coal exports could create greater national and worldwide environmental impacts, including on climate change, than a Canadian company's controversial proposal to ferry Albertan tar sands to the U.S. Gulf Coast via the Keystone XL pipeline.

As Jewell Praying Wolf James put it: "Once the coal gets to China, it's pollution for all of us."

For more than 11,000 years, Celilo Falls served as the center of trade and commerce for Native Americans of the West. The upwards of 15 million salmon that passed through the mile-long span of rocky chutes in the Columbia River every year functioned as a sort of currency. "Some tribal people call it pre-contact Wall Street," said Charles Hudson, intergovernmental affairs director with the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission in Portland, Ore.

Lewis and Clark called it "the great mart."

But within a few short hours on March 10, 1957, Celilo's era of plenty came to an abrupt end. Rising floodwaters from a newly completed hydroelectric dam engulfed the rapids. Salmon runs soon shrank to a small fraction of their former numbers.

Davis Yellowash Washines, chief of enforcement for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission, was only 5 years old when the Dalles Dam opened and drowned Celilo Falls. "I can still feel its mist. I can still hear its thunder," he said over dinner the night before the September longhouse ceremony.

Warren Spencer, a Yakama elder, was serving in the military in Germany that year, but he recalled the time-lapse photos of the inundation he received by mail from his mother back home in Celilo Falls. "I sat there on my bunk and cried," he said.

Now, Spencer is deeply concerned about how this new energy project might affect the futures of his four children, 17 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren. The coal push, he said, represents the continued encroachment of the federal government and "white man's money" on Native American tribes. "It's turning brother against brother," he said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/30/northwest-coal-exports_n_4611021.html?view=print&comm_ref=false

// to wise use?]

Around the Campfire: Indian Hate Groups

Parent Category: Life Published on Tuesday, 01 November 2011 15:50 Written by Dr. Dean Chavers, © Copyright, 2011 Hits: 4487

L. Frank Baum, who became famous as the author of The Wizard of Oz, earlier had a career as a pioneering newspaperman in South Dakota. He wrote in the 1890s:

The PIONEER has before declared that our only safety depends upon the total extirmination (sic) of the Indians. Having wronged them for centuries, we had better, in order to protect our civilization, follow it up by one more wrong and wipe these untamed and untameable creatures from the face of the earth. In this lies safety for our settlers and the soldiers who are under incompetent commands. Otherwise, we may expect future years to be as full of trouble with the redskins as those have been in the past.

In the 1970s, following a decade of Indian activism that started with the fish-ins in Washington, the Mohawk land occupations in New York and Canada, the formation of the National Indian Youth Council (NIYC), and the occupation of Alcatraz, anti-Indian “white backlash” groups started to form.

In Washington State they were a reaction to the 1974 Boldt decision that stated Indians were entitled to half the runs of steelhead and salmon as guaranteed in the 1854 treaties. Whites who had bought land on reservations also protested having tribal governments exercise jurisdiction over them. In Montana, they formed around protests of tribes exercising jurisdiction over rangelands. Many of the hate groups also advocate for the complete revoking of all treaties with Indian tribes. They also resent the rights Indians reserved through treaties to hunt and fish on reservation lands and other public lands.

They maintain that the white race is superior to Indian tribes or Indian individuals. Labeling themselves as “citizen’s rights” organizations, these groups barely conceal their hate for Indians in general and their scorn and derision for tribal councils. One of their main planks is trying to assert that they are not subject to the jurisdictions of tribes—even though their property may be in the middle of an Indian reservation.

They maintain that tribes have no jurisdiction beyond the members of their own tribe. They have won some major battles on that issue in the past half-century. Tribes no longer have criminal jurisdiction over non-Indians living on reservations.

A decade later, these groups were still organized and had expanded to more states. They are now located in the states of Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.

They are made up mainly of people who own property or businesses on Indian reservations and small farmers with land on reservations. They later attracted a substantial number of right-wing professional haters as members. Some people compare the groups to the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Nations, and the Skinheads in their ideology and tactics.

The adoption by President Rutherford B. Hayes of the concept of “Manifest Destiny” led to the movement of the U.S. to claim all the land between Canada and Mexico, and from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean, for the U.S. This led to the passage in 1887 of the General Allotment Act. Senator Dawes of Massachusetts was the sponsor of the legislation, which detractors denounced as just another way to get to the last Indian land. Despite opposition, the legislation passed, and the Dawes Commission carried out the Indian land giveaway over the next five decades. Indian tribes, of course, were not consulted about the General Allotment Act.

As a result of Allotment, almost all Indian reservations today are “checkerboarded.” Indian property is next to non-Indian property, which lies next to tribal property, which lies next to Forest Service lands, and so on. The small Navajo reservation at Ramah southeast of Gallup has seven different kinds of land on it.

Under the General Allotment Act, two-thirds of the 150 million acres of Indian lands were lost to the tribes. They were left with 50 million acres, which has slowly been added to in the past 50 years. Kickingbird (1973) documented the history of this illegal selling of reservation lands.

Most of the Indian lands were in isolated areas; some of them were deserts. However, there are also Indian lands that are prime agricultural acreage. Others are prime timber acreage, and still others have petroleum, coal, oil, gas, uranium, and other minerals. It is ironic that the Indian tribes now own about 25% of all the energy producing lands in the United States, which are found mostly on poor lands.

There are now more non-Indians living on Indian lands than there are Indians. Many of them are third or fourth generation ranchers and farmers. They either own the land outright, or they have 99-year leases on it. The second-largest group is absentee landowners who use the property as vacation homes. The third-largest constituent of the groups is sport and commercial fishermen.

The leading Indian hate group these days is the Citizens Equal Rights Alliance (CERA). Dave Lundgren, an attorney, calls them the Ku Klux Klan of Indian Country. Its sister organization is the Citizens Equal Rights Foundation (CERF). In 2002 CERA held a Mother’s Day conference in Washington called “Confronting Federal Indian Policy.” CERF at about the same time filed an amicus curiae brief with the Supreme Court in U. S. v. Lara calling for the Court to find that Congress has no power to recognize the inherent powers of tribes.

Both CERA and CERF are made up of white owners of Indian reservation lands. The CERF and CERA members are the third and fourth generation descendants of the people who profited from acquiring Indian lands. What alarms them these days is that tribes are re-acquiring some of these lands in order to build an economic base for their people again. The hate groups can’t stand the idea that Indians would get some land back, no matter how it happens.

Larry Kibbey lists the following anti-Indian groups on his Web site:

U.S. Farm Bureau, National

All Citizens Equal (ACE), Montana

East Slope Taxpayers Association, Montana

People for the West, National

North Dakota Committee for Equality

Equal Rights for Everyone, Wisconsin

Citizens Rights Organization, Montana

Cheyenne River Landowners Association, South Dakota

Concerned Citizens Council, Nebraska

Equal Rights for Everyone, Wisconsin

Wisconsin Alliance for Rights and Resources (WARR)

Trout Unlimited, National

Protect Americans Rights and Resources (PARR), Wisconsin

National Wildlife Association

Citizens Equal Rights Alliance, National

International Association of Fish and Wildlife

Interstate Congress for Equal Rights and Responsibilities (ICERR) 1976 book, cf Th King

Steelhead/Salmon Protective Association and Wildlife Network (S/SPAWN)

Western States Coalition.

Rudy Ryser says the total Indian hate group list now has more than 50 organizations on it. They claim to have 500,000 members, but Ryser puts their active membership at 10,850. The number of people who give money or write support letters he puts at 34,150, which is a potential force. They are still trying to eliminate reservations, outlaw tribal governments, and declare an end to the “Indian problem.”

These hate groups will be the next wave of people who will try to terminate all Indian treaties. It has happened before, and it will happen again.

Dr. Dean Chavers is Director of Catching the Dream, a national scholarship and school improvement organization in Albuquerque. His e-mail address is CTD4DeanChavers@aol.com. The CTD website is www.catchingthedream.org. High school seniors should send him an e-mail for help finding scholarships. This column is adapted from his book “Racism in Indian Country,” published by Peter Lang.

===

:{White House called weekly about casino

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 5, 2002}:

Former Bureau of Indian Affairs deputy Wayne Smith tells all, or a good portion of it, in a Los Angeles Times investigation into a casino-related dispute that led to his firing.

The dispute involves the Buena Vista Miwuk Rancheria in California. The BIA was trying to figure out who was the legitimate leader of the tribe. The outcome determined control of a future casino.

First, Smith says a White House aide called weekly about the case, which was under review at a BIA office in California. He identified the aide as Jennifer Farley, a deputy in the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. Her boss is Ruben Barrales.

A White House spokesperson told The Times: "We dismiss these assertions. They don't accurately represent the facts."

Second, Smith says he was asked to lunch by Scott W. Reed, who managed the 1996 presidential campaign of Bob Dole. The Times says Reed is a close friend of Farley.

At the lunch, Reed said he had letters that would prove embarrassing to Secretary of Interior Gale Norton and President Bush. Smith took this as blackmail, Reed claimed he was merely offering friendly advice.

But within weeks, Smith was the target of an internal investigation and the FBI began looking into it as well. Here, he alleges Sue Ellen Wooldridge, Norton's deputy chief of staff and Smith's former colleague from the California Department of Justice, told him not to mention the White House interest.

Wooldridge denies telling Smith to do that.

Smith was fired within days.

:{:{Get the Story:}:

A Game of Casino Hardball(The Los Angeles Times 11/5)

Username: indianz, Password: indianzcom}:

wiki

Modern social statistics of Native Americans serve as defining characteristics of Native American life, and can be compared to the average United States citizens’ social statistics. Areas from their demographics and economy to health standards, drug and alcohol use, and land use and ownership all lead to a better understanding of Native American life. Health standards for Native Americans have notable disparities from that of all United States racial and ethnic groups. They have higher rates of disease, higher death rates, and a lack of medical coverage.^[1]

These health issues are matched by illegal drug abuse; abuse levels are higher than any other demographic group in the United States. Methamphetamine abuse on reservations is a particular area of concern for tribal and federal governments.^[2] Concerning their land, Native Americans lost more than 97.7 percent of their land over the course of the American conquest. The signing of treaties, relocation, and, epidemics accelerated the decrease of Native American population as well as land.^[3]

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General demographics:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

Native American population demographics are studied by the federal government in conjunction with the Native Alaskan population. According to 2008 US Census projections, those who are Native American and Alaska Natives alone number 3.08 million of the total US population of 304 million, or 1.01 percent of the nation's entire population. Those who are Native American alone or in combination with other races measure as 4.86 million individuals, or 1.60 percent of the nation's entire population.^[4] The Native population continues to grow yearly. The Census Bureau projects that American Indian and Alaska Natives will reach 5 million individuals by 2065.^[5]

At the present time there are 565 federally recognized tribes.The population of Native Americans however extends beyond those with this federal recognition.^[6] Certain tribes have much larger population bases than others. The United States Census has documented 1.93 million individuals that are purely Native American or Alaskan Native with specified tribes. The tribe with the largest population base, for 2008, was the tribe of Navajo people with 307,555 individuals. The Cherokee tribe had the second largest population, with 262,224 individuals. Follow in third and fourth are the Sioux tribe andChippewa tribe with 114,047 individuals and 107,322 individuals, respectively. The remainder of the Native American tribes have populations below one hundred thousand. This does not account for those who do not have specified tribes or are of multiple races.^[7]

The distribution of age of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives differs from the general population of the United States, according to 2008 Census data. Of those who are strictly Native American or Alaskan Native, 28.3% are below the age of 18. 64.3% are between 18 and 64 years of age, while the remaining 7.4% are 65 years of age and older.^[8] This is a notably younger population than the overall population. The median age of Native Americans and Alaskan Native is 31.2, while the male median age is 30.0 and female median age is 32.8.^[9]

Native Americans and Alaskan Natives also differ in their household composition. Of the 795,764 documented households 68.5% are family households with the remaining 31.5% non family households. The 545,403 family households are divided between married-couple families, male-headed households, and female-headed households. Over half, 58,9% specifically, are married-couple families. Male-headed households are 10.8% of family households, while female-headed households are 30.3% of family households. Alternatively, non family households are constituted of those living alone and householders living with non family. Of the 250,361 non family households, 80.0% are living alone and 20.0% are non family not living alone.^[10]

Economy and social status:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

The United States is home to 2.4 million Native Americans. In comparison to the rest of the population, this number is a very small amount (only .9%).^[11]American Indians have historically lived in extreme poverty. With the rise of Indian gaming enterprises, the problem of poverty seems to have disappeared. However, upon closer examination, we have found that this is not the case. While Native Americans have begun to take more control of their tribal economies and have begun to improve situations, poverty on Indian Reservations is still a major issue. The U.S. Census in both 1990 and 2000 indicates that poverty has prevailed on reservations: to this day, Native Americans have the highest poverty and unemployment rates in the United States of America. The poverty rate of Native Americans is 25%.^[12]

Incomes of Native Americans tend to be low, and unemployment rates are usually high. For example, the unemployment rate today on the Blackfoot Reservation in Montana is 69%. This is a shocking comparison to the national unemployment rate today, 9.8% (US Bureau of Labor) or even during the worst part of the Great Depression, 25%.^[13] According to the 2000 Census, Indians living in Indian country have incomes that are less than half of the general U.S. population.^[14] The US Census reports that the median income of households based on a three-year average from 2003-2005 was $33,627.^[12]

In 1989, the median income of Native American households was $19,900. Average income varies by tribe and can range from $29,211 (Osage) to a mere $11,402 (Tohono O’Odham).^[15] Over 20% of Native American reservation households make less than $5,000 annually while only 6% of the overall US population has an annual income of less than $5,000.^[16] The average Native American family (3.41) is larger than the national average,^[12] yet only 30% have health insurance.^[12]

However, Indian tribes are becoming more economically independent in recent years. [The impact of Indian gaming] has been monumental, but non-gaming tribes have growing economies as well. For example, the Mississippi Choctaw Indians have incorporated industry into their economy. Automobile subassembly and plastic manufacturing are only two of the sectors in which the tribe is involved. Factories seem to contradict Indian culture, but ironically, industry helps culture thrive. By embracing industry, the Choctaw have been able to build a stable enough economy to prevent people from leaving the reservation and encourage people to come back, according to Chief Phillip Martin. Life on the tribe is more appealing because it is more secure. Jobs are readily available, and the tribe has revitalized public health, housing, and education.^[17] Past federal policies have continually been detrimental to tribal economies,^[18] but self-determination has provided tribes with the independence and sovereignty to combat a history of poverty.^[17]

According to the US Census, real per capita income has grown substantially in past decades. In 1970, the average real per capita income among Reservation Indians was $4,347. This figure grew to $6,510 in 1980, dipped to $5,959 in 1990, and grew again to $7,942 in 2000. However, the overall statistic for the United States has also steadily grown over this span of time. The total US real per capita was $13,188 in 1970 and $21,587. While economy on Reservations has improved, it is still significantly lower than that of the United States.^[17]

The tribe with the lowest per capita income on a non-gaming Reservation is the Crow Creek Reservation in South Dakota with $4,043, but it also has a very low population (1,846). The tribe with the highest per capita income on a non-gaming Reservation is the St. Regis Mohawk Reservation in New York. With a population of 2,581, it averages $12,016 per year.^[17] The least successful gaming Reservation has a higher per capita income than the Crow Creek Reservation: The Texas Kickapoo Reservation, population of 423, has an average of $3,398. The most successful gaming tribe is the Viejas Reservation in California; its population is 232 and averages $28,128 per capita income.^[17] Therefore, population is insignificant when determining economic success. A better measure is geographic location.

Further breakdown of poverty rates show that Native Americans are consistently the highest among each race. Reservation Indians have a 39% poverty rate; Non-Reservations, 26%; Black, 25%, Hispanic/Latino, 23%, Pacific Islander, 18%, Asian, 13%; and White, 9%.^[17]

Location and lands:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

This is an image showing the population concentration of Native Americans and Alaskan Natives in 2008 by state, with darker shades of green indicating greater concentration.

The Native American population is not evenly spread across the nation. The majority of Native Americans live in the western regions of the United States, specifically 43%. The remainder of the Native population lives in the south, 31%, the midwest, 17%, and the northeast, 9%. This statistics demonstrates how the Native American population is concentrated into few general areas. This is further proven by the fact that over half of Native Americans live within ten states.^[19] In 2000, the states with the largest Native American populations were California, Oklahoma, Arizona, Texas and New Mexico. Twenty-one states have Native American populations which constitute less than 1% over their overall population, including states such as Pennsylvania, New Jersey and West Virginia.^[19]

Native Americans live in a variety of different locations, from reservations and rural areas to major urban centers. Reservations administered by the United States constitute about 56,200,000 acres (227,000 km²) of land. This is broken into about 326 areas, ranging greatly in size from millions of acres to slightly over 1-acre (4,000 m²⁾. In addition to these federal reservations, there are allotted lands, lands under restricted status, and state Indian reservations.^[6]

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The **Indian Reorganization Act** of June 18, 1934, sometimes known as the **Indian New Deal**, was U.S. federal legislation that secured certain rights toNative Americans (known in law as American Indians or Indians), including Alaska Natives.^[1] These include actions that contributed to the reversal of theDawes Act's privatization of communal holdings of American Indian tribes and a return to local self-government on a tribal basis. The Act also restored to Indians the management of their assets (being mainly land) and included provisions intended to create a sound economic foundation for the inhabitants ofIndian reservations.

The IRA was perhaps the most significant initiative of John Collier Sr., Commissioner of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) from 1933 to 1945. He had worked on Indian issues for ten years prior to his appointment, particularly with the American Indian Defense Association. He had intended to reverse some of the worst government policies and provide ways for American Indians to re-establish sovereignty and self-government, to reduce the losses of reservation lands, and establish ways for Indians to build economic self-sufficiency. Various other interests effected changes to the legislation that reduced protections for Indians and preserved oversight by the BIA .

The act did not require tribes to adopt a constitution. But, when a tribe chose to do so, the constitution had to:

allow the tribal council to employ legal counsel;
prohibit the tribal council from engaging in any land transactions without majority approval of the tribe; and,
authorize the tribal council to negotiate with the Federal, State, and local governments.

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At the time the Act passed, it was U.S. policy to eliminate Indian reservations, dividing their territory and distributing it to individual Indians to own like any other person, in a process called "allotment." Before allotment, reservation territory was not owned in the usual western sense, but was reserved for the benefit of entire Indian tribes, with its benefits apportioned to tribe members according to tribal law and custom. Generally, Indians held the land in a communal fashion. It was not possible for any non-Indian to own land on reservations, a fact which limited the value of the land to the Indians (It reduced the market for it).

The process of allotment started with the General Allotment Act of 1887, and by 1934, two thirds of Indian land had converted to traditional private ownership (i.e. it was owned in fee simple) and most of that had been sold by its Indian allottee.

The Indians who sold their land (most received 80 acres) often did not get much value for it, either getting a poor price or squandering the cash windfall they received. This left Indians as a class poor.

John Collier, who was appointed Commissioner of what is now called the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1933 under President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, had become convinced that federal Indian policies needed to be changed to correct injustices. He had already worked ten years at the Indian Defense Fund and become familiar with many issues.

The Act was signed into law by President Roosevelt in 1934.

Implementation and results:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

The act slowed the practice of allotting communal tribal lands to individual tribal members. It did not restore to Indians land that had already been patented to individuals, but much land at the time was still unallotted or was allotted to an individual but still held in trust for that individual by the U.S. government. Because the Act did not disturb existing private ownership of Indian reservation lands, it left reservations a checkerboard of tribal and free land, which remains the case today .

However, the Act also provided for the U.S. to purchase some of the free land and restore it to tribal status. Due to the Act and other actions of federal courts and the government, over two million acres (8,000 km²) of land were returned to various tribes in the first 20 years after passage.

In 1954, the United States Department of the Interior (DOI) began implementing the termination and relocation phases of the Act, which had been added by Congress and represented the continuing interest by some of having American Indians assimilate to the majority society. Among other effects, termination resulted in the legal dismantling of 61 tribal nations within the United States and ending their recognized relationships with the federal government. This also ended the eligibility of the tribal nations and their members for various government programs to assist American Indians.^[2]

Constitutional challenges:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

Since the late 20th century and the rise of Indian activism over sovereignty issues, as well as many tribes' establishment of casino gambling on reservations as a revenue source, the US Supreme Court has been asked repeatedly to address the IRA's constitutionality. The provision of the Act that is controversial is the one that allows the US government to acquire non-Indian land (by voluntary transfer) and convert it to Indian land ("take it into trust"). In so doing, the US government partially removes the land from the jurisdiction of the state, which makes certain activities, such as casino gambling, possible on the land that wouldn't otherwise be. It also makes the land exempt from state property taxes and some other state taxes. Consequently, many people oppose implementation of this part of the Act and, typically represented by state or local governments, they sue to prevent it.

In 1995, South Dakota challenged the authority of the Secretary of Interior, under the IRA, to take 91 acres (370,000 m²) of land into trust on behalf of theLower Brule Sioux Tribe (based on the Rosebud Indian Reservation), in South Dakota v. United States Dep't of the Interior, 69 F.3d 878, 881-85 (8th Cir. 1995). The Eighth Circuit found Section 5 of the IRA to be unconstitutional, ruling that it violated the non-delegation doctrine and that the Secretary of Interior did not have the authority to take the land into trust.^[3]

The US Department of the Interior (DOI) sought U.S. Supreme Court review. But, as DOI was implementing new regulations related to land trusts, the agency asked the Court to remand the case to the lower court, to be reconsidered with the decision to be based on the new regulations. The US Supreme Court granted Interior's petition, vacated the lower court's ruling, and remanded the case back to the lower court.^[3]

Justices Scalia, O'Connor and Thomas dissented, stating that "[t]he decision today--to grant, vacate, and remand in light of the Government's changed position--is both unprecedented and inexplicable." They went on, "[W]hat makes today's action inexplicable as well as unprecedented is the fact that the Government's change of legal position does not even purport to be applicable to the present case."^[4] Seven months after the Supreme Court's decision to grant, vacate, and remand, the DOI removed the land in question from trust.^[3]

In 1997, the Lower Brulé Sioux submitted an amended trust application to DOI, requesting that the United States take the 91 acres (370,000 m²) of land into trust on the Tribe's behalf. South Dakota challenged this in 2004 in district court, which upheld DOI's authority to take the land in trust. The state appealed to the Eighth Circuit, but when the court reexamined the constitutionality issue, it upheld the constitutionality of Section 5 in agreement with the lower court. The US Supreme Court denied the State's petition for certiorari. Since then, district and circuit courts have rejected non-delegation claims by states. The Supreme Court refused to hear the issue in 2008.^[3]

In 2008 (before the US Supreme Court heard the Carcieri case below), in MichGO v Kempthorne, Judge Janice Rogers Brown of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals wrote a dissent stating that she would have struck down key provisions of the IRA. Of the three circuit courts to address the IRA's constitutionality, Judge Brown is the only judge to dissent on the IRA's constitutionality.^[5] The U.S. Supreme Court did not accept the MichGO case for review, thus keeping the previous precedent in place. The First, Eighth and Tenth Circuits of the U.S. Court of Appeals have upheld the constitutionality of the IRA.^[6]

In 2008, Carcieri v Kempthorne was argued before the U.S. Supreme Court; the Court ruled on it in 2009, with the decision called Carcieri v. Salazar.^[7] In 1991, the Narragansett Indian tribe bought 31 acres (130,000 m²) of land. They requested that the DOI take it into trust, which the agency did in 1998, thus exempting it from many state laws. The State was concerned that the tribe would open a casino or tax-free business on the land and sued to block the transfer. The state argued that the IRA did not apply because the Narragansett did not receive federal recognition as a tribal nation until 1980, after the 1934 passage of the IRA.^[8] The US Supreme Court agreed with the State.

In a challenge to the U.S. DOI's decision to take land into trust for the Oneida Indian Nation in present-day New York state, Upstate Citizens for Equality(UCE), New York State, Oneida County, Madison County, the town of Verona, the town of Vernon, and others argue that the IRA is unconstitutional.^[9] Most recently, Judge Kahn dismissed several portions of UCE's complaint, including the failed theory that the IRA is unconstitutional, on the basis of longstanding and settled law on this issue.^[10]

Approval by tribes:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

Section 18 of the IRA required that members of the affected Indian nation or tribe vote on whether to accept it within one year of the effective date of the act (25 U.S.C. 478), and had to approve it by a majority. There was confusion about who should be allowed to vote on creating new governments, as many non-Indians lived on reservations many Indians owned no land there, and also over the effect of abstentions. Under the voting rules, abstentions were counted as yes votes, ^[11] but in Oglala Lakota culture, for example, abstention had traditionally equaled a no vote. The resulting confusion caused disputes on many reservations about the results.

Outcome:{:(style="margin-left:-0.25em;margin-right:0.25em"):}:[edit source | edit:{beta:(style="vertical-align:top;padding-left:0.5em;display:inline !important;background-image:none !important"):}::{]}:

The act has helped conserve the communal tribal land bases. But, because Congress altered the legislation proposed by Collier, reducing elements of tribal self-government and preserving BIA oversight, leasing authority and other interventions, the act has not been considered as successful in terms of tribal self-governing. On many reservations, its provisions have exacerbated longstanding differences between traditionals and those who had adopted more European-American ways. Many Native Americans believe their traditional systems of government were better for their culture.^[12]

Notes

Lakota Sioux Nation Leaves America, Russell Means Declares Although the corporate media covered secession movements by political conservatives in Texas and other states following President Obama’s November re-election, they ignored Russell Means’ declaration, in September 2012, that the Lakota Sioux Nation had left America. Speaking less than a month before his death, the long-time Native American radical leader Means declared, “We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us.” The five states identified by Means were Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.

wiki

Native American gaming refers to casinos, bingo halls, and other gambling operations on Indian reservations or other tribal land in the United States. Because these areas have tribal sovereignty, states have limited ability to forbid gambling there, as codified by the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988. As of 2011, there were 460 gambling operations run by 240 tribes,^[1] with total annual revenue of $27 billion.^[2]

[hide]

1 History

2 Industry
- 2.1 California Gaming
- 2.2 Connecticut Gaming

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Further information: Tribal sovereignty in the United States

In the early 1970s, Russell and Helen Bryan, a married Chippewa couple living in a mobile home on Indian lands in northern Minnesota, received a property tax bill from the local county, Itasca County.^[3] The Bryans had never received a property tax bill from the county before. Unwilling to pay it, they took the tax notice to local legal aid attorneys at Leech Lake Legal Services, who brought suit to challenge the tax in the state courts. The Bryans lost their case in the state district court, and they lost again on appeal in a unanimous decision by the Minnesota Supreme Court. They then sought review in the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court granted review, and in a sweeping and unanimous decision authored by Justice Brennan, the Supreme Court held not only that states do not have authority to tax Indians on Indian reservations, but that they also lack the authority to regulate Indian activities by Indians on Indian reservations.^[3] As Gaming Law Professor Kevin K. Washburn has explained, the stage was now set for Indian gaming. Within a few years, enterprising Indians and tribes began to operate Indian bingo operations in numerous different locations around the United States.

Under the leadership of Howard Tommie, the Seminole Tribe of Florida built a large high-stakes bingo building on their reservation near Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The tribe planned for the bingo hall to be open six days a week, contrary to Florida state law which only allows two days a week for bingo halls to be open, as well as going over the maximum limit of $100 jackpots.^[4] The law was enacted from the charity bingo limits set by Catholic Churches. The sheriff of Broward County, where the Indian reservation lies, made arrests the minute the bingo hall opened, and the tribe sued the county (Seminole Tribe v. Butterworth), stating that Indian tribes have sovereignty rights that are protected by the federal government from interference by state government. A District court ruled in favor of the Indians, citing Chief Justice John Marshall in Worcester v. Georgia. Here began the legal war of Indian gaming with a win for the Seminoles.

Controversy arose when Indians began putting private casinos, bingo rooms, and lotteries on reservation lands and began setting gaming prizes which were above the maximum legal limit of the state. The Indians argued for sovereignty over their reservations to make them immune from state laws such asPublic Law 280, which granted states to have criminal jurisdiction over Indian reservations.^[5] States were afraid that Indians would have a significant competitive advantage over other gambling establishments in the state which were regulated, which would thus generate a vast amount of income for tribes.

In the late 1970s and continuing into the next decade, the delicate question concerning the legality of tribal gaming and immunity from state law hovered over the Supreme Court.^[6] The Court addressed the potential gambling had for organized crime through the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970. A report by the Department of Justice presented to the Senate Select Committee on Indian Affairs on March 18, 1992 concluded that through several years of FBI investigation, that organized crime had failed to infiltrate Indian gaming and that there was no link between criminal activity in Indian gaming and organized crime ^[5]

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In the early 1960s, the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, near Indio, California, were extremely poor and did not have much land because of neglected 1850s treaties by state senators. As Stuart Banner states, the Cabazon Band and the neighboring Morongo Reservation had "some HUD buildings and a few trailers, but that was about it.^[7] There was nothing really there. The people simply didn't have a lot." The Cabazon Band turned to casino operations, opening bingo and poker halls in 1980. Shortly thereafter, the Indio police and the Riverside County Sheriff shut down the gambling halls and arrested numerous Indians while seizing any cash and merchandise held in the tribe's possession. The Cabazon Band sued in federal court (California v. Cabazon Band) and won, as did the Seminole Tribe in Florida.^[7] Although the tribe won in the lower courts, the Supreme Court reviewed the case in 1986 to reach a decision over whether Indian reservations are above state law. The Court again ruled that Indian gaming was to be regulated exclusively by Congress and the federal government, not state government; with tribal sovereignty upheld, the benefits of gaming became available to many tribes.

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Main article: Indian Gaming Regulatory Act

In 1988 Congress passed the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) (signed by President Ronald Reagan) which kept tribal sovereignty to create casino like halls, but the states and Indians must be in Tribal-State compacts and the federal government has the power to regulate the gaming.^[8] These compacts have been used by state officials to confiscate Indian casino revenue which serves as a "special" tax on Indian reservations. Essentially, the tribes still have "exclusive right" to all classes of gaming except when states do not accept that class or it clashes with federal law.^[9]

Class III Indian gaming became a large issue for the states and federal government, because of these court cases, as Congress debated over a bill for Indian gaming called the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.

There are currently a number of lawsuits pending which challenge the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act on constitutional grounds (see e.g. Warren v. United States)

When President Reagan signed the IGRA, Indian gaming revenue skyrocketed from $100 million in 1988 to $16.7 billion in 2006.^[10] Following the IGRA, the National Indian Gaming Commission was created as a federal agency in 1988 to regulate high-stakes Indian gaming.

The Commission consists of three members: a chairman who is appointed by the US President with consent of the Senate, and two associate members appointed by the Secretary of the Interior.^[11] Each member serves a three year term and must pass a detailed background check by the US Attorney General.

The NIGC withholds certain powers over Class II and Class III gaming. These include budget approval, civil fines, fees, subpoenas, and permanent orders. The NIGC monitors Class II gaming on Indian lands on a continuing basis through inspection, investigation, access to records, and contracts.^[12] As for Class III gaming, all contracts must be approved by the chairman of the NIGC. 200 of the 562 federally recognized tribes created Class III gaming of large casinos and high jackpots.^[9]

This rise of gaming not only brought great revenue, but also corruption. In January 2006, a court case involving lobbyists convicted of felonies such as conspiracy, fraud, and tax evasion. This was known as the Jack Abramoff Indian lobbying scandal. These lobbyists, Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed, Jr., Grover Norquist, and Michael Scanlon, bribed members of Congress when lobbying for Indian casinos then they over charged their Indian clients; this generated around $90 million in fees from the Indians.^[13]

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In 2006, Congress introduced legislation to protect their own casino interests from those tribes that are outside reservations. Further, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) has faced increasing pressure to tighten regulatory policy and oversight of casino approvals. In particular, the BIA has been instructed by Congress to implement new procedures after two decades of IGRA's existence. These procedures would allow local communities to have more influence in the siting of casinos in their community, and would make the process of casino approval more transparent. To many tribes, however, the proposed regulations will further encroach on tribal sovereignty.

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Statistics provided by the National Indian Gaming Commission (NIGC), indicate that there are 460 Indian gaming establishments in the US.^[14] These casinos are operated by 240 federally-recognized tribes and offer Class I, Class II and Class III gaming. Gaming is divided into 3 classes. Class I and Class II are traditional Indian gaming such as bingo halls, poker halls, and lotteries, and requires no license. Class III gambling has high jackpots and high-stake games such as casinos, jai alai, and racetracks, and states feared that organized crime would infiltrate the Class III gaming on their reservations. The revenue generated in these establishments was close to $27.1 billion in 2011 up from $12.8 billion in 2001. The states with largest revenues in 2011 were Sacramento ($6.9 billion) and Washington D. C. ($6.7 billion).^[15] The Native American gaming industry didn’t show the negative tendencies during and after economic crisis of 2007-2009, in contrast to Las Vegas and Atlantic City.

Tribal casinos in the eastern US generated roughly $3.8 billion in FY02. Those in the Central US recorded gross revenues of approximately $5.9 billion, while those in the Western US generated nearly $4.8 billion. Most of the revenues generated in the Indian gaming are from casinos located in or near large metropolitan areas. Currently, 12% of Indian gaming establishments generate 65% of Indian gaming revenues. Indian gaming operations located in the populous areas of the West Coast (primarily California) represent the fastest growing sector of the Indian gaming industry. As suggested by the above figures, the vast majority of tribal casinos are much less financially successful, particularly those in the Midwest and Great Plains. Many tribes see this limited financial success as being tempered by decreases in reservation unemployment and poverty rates, although socioeconomic deficits remain.

As of 2008 there are 562 federally recognized tribes in the United States, many of which have chosen not to game.

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The Chumash tribe in Santa Barbara County is notable in that it demonstrates interaction and collaboration between the tribe and the surrounding non-Indian population of the Santa Ynez Valley. The Chumash tribe, who has seen success as a result of their gaming operations, planned to expand its current facilities but have recently scaled back. The first structure, built in 1994, was modest and resembled a tent, but has grown to three large, albeit temporary, rooms. The casino serves 3,500 people, mostly local Hispanics, per day and employs 750, mostly non-Indian, employees. There has been pressure from the non-Indian community not to expand because the entire surrounding area feels negative effects from the gaming enterprises. The Santa Ynez Valley non-Indian community is impacted aesthetically and economically. Many do not welcome the 72,000-square-foot (6,700 m²) hotel and 155,000-square-foot (14,400 m²) casino, and many predict a strain on themselves when their community must expand emergency services. Many are aware of other problems that will arise such as increased pollution, traffic, and criminal activity. The Chumash have agreed to scale back. The project is unprecedented in that the funding for it is financed through bonds sold to mutual fund and insurance fund managers and is “the first time in California that a bank has underwritten a bond sale for an IndianThe largest casino in the state of California is the Pechanga Resort and Casino in Temecula,with 3,000+ slot machines and approximately 200,000 sq ft (19,000 m²) of gaming space.^[16] Other notable gaming operations in California include the Morongo Casino, Resort & Spa, and the Chumash Casino.

Native American tribal lands

For more details, see Coal and Native American tribal lands.

Native Americans have been called early environmental justice activists, due to their historic struggle against over-development. Native American lands of the United States are home to large coal reserves and coal mining, making them disproportionately effected by the environmental hazards of the coal industry. The common challenges of land and resource development are exacerbated by the poor economic situation of many of the tribes, which raises questions of environmental justice and indigenous sovereignty.^[23]

According to the Department of the Interior, twenty-five Native American reservations have coal reserves. Navajo, Hopi, and Crow lands all have coal mines. The Southern Ute, Uintah, Ouray, Fort Berthold, Northern Cheyenne, and Zuni have coal reserves with "potential for development."^[24]

According to a 2012 Associated Press analysis of data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, about10 percent of all U.S. power plants operate within 20 miles of reservation land.Many of the 51 energy production centers are more than a half-century old and affect roughly 48 tribes living on 50 reservations. (Fewer than 2 percent of all people in the United States identify as Native American and only a small portion live on tribal land.)^[25]

solnit; arab spring -->

You can tell the arc of the past few years as, first, the Arab Spring, then extraordinary civil society actions in Chile, Quebec, Spain, and elsewhere, followed by Occupy. But don't stop there.

After Occupy came Idle No More, the Canada-based explosion of indigenous power and resistance (to a Canadian government that has gone over to the far right and to environmental destruction on a grand scale). It was founded by four women in November of 2012 and it’s spread across North America, sparking new environmental actions and new coalitions around environmental and climate issues, with flash-mob-style powwows in shopping malls and other places, with a thousand-mile walk (and snowshoe) by seven Cree youth this winter. (There were 400 people with them by the time they arrived at Canada’s Parliament in Ottawa.)

Idle No More activists have vowed to block the construction of any pipeline that tries to transport the particularly dirty crude oil from the Alberta tar sands, whether it heads north, east, or west from northern Alberta. Each of those directions takes it over native land. This is part of the reason why tar sands supporters are pushing so hard to build the Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

http://www.propublica.org/article/land-grab-cheats-north-dakota-tribes-out-of-1-billion-suits-allege

Land Grab Cheats North Dakota Tribes Out of $1 Billion, Suits Allege

The network’s study begins in the early 1970s, when federal policies indeed shifted more power to tribes, largely through initiatives from Republican President Richard M. Nixon. Not coincidentally, anti-Indian sentiments across the nation rose with that tide.

In Montana, the report shows that the group Flathead Residents Earning Equality (FREE) surfaced in 1972 after the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes instated a $5 fee for tribal recreation permits. Charlo-area farmer Del Palmer, who is still a leader in statewide anti-Indian activities, served as the group’s first chairman. While FREE faded, a new group, Montanans Opposing Discrimination, or MOD, formed in its wake. The group’s leaders included Palmer, former Ronan City Attorney Lloyd Ingraham, and Kalispell radio broadcaster G. George Ostrom. The report states that Ostrom, a one-time executive director of MOD, later distanced himself from the organization because he considered some of its leaders to be too rabid.

“To some of them, the only good Indian was a dead Indian,” Ostrom is quoted as saying.

The network report also ties MOD, which later formed chapters in Missoula and Wolf Point, with the Interstate Congress for Equal Rights and Responsibilities, a Washington state group that’s been a primary player in national anti-sovereignty activities.

Faced with declining membership and a poor public persona in the early 1980s, MOD’s home chapter in Polson underwent another facelift and name change, this time emerging as ACE, or All Citizens Equal.

ACE, which is still closely aligned with some of the most conservative elected state and municipal officials on the Flathead Reservation, embroiled itself in a variety of new fights with the Salish and Kootenai Tribes, which at the time were exerting further control over non-Indian anglers and bird hunters, among other measures. While ACE and other Montana organizations kept the pressure on at home, the report shows that former Big Arm resident Bill Covey, CERA’s first president, and other organizers targeted national legislation that dealt with Indian sovereignty issues. The report contends Montana organizers also tied into the Wise Use movement through Libby activist Bruce Vincent, a key leader in Alliance for America, a nationally known anti-environmental coalition. Also in the mix, the report says, is the Denver-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, a conservative advocacy firm that claims former U.S. Department of Interior head James Watt as its co-founder and first president.

Copies of the report can be obtained by contacting the network at (406) 442-5506, or by writing to: P.O. Box 1222, Helena, MT 59624.http://missoulanews.bigskypress.com/missoula/going-non-native/Content?oid=1132470

Native Americans

'Salmon People: The Risks of Genetically Engineered Fish for the Pacific Northwest' Film Premieres

Around the Campfire: Indian Hate Groups

Contents

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Contents

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Notes

Contents

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Native American tribal lands

Land Grab Cheats North Dakota Tribes Out of $1 Billion, Suits Allege