Custer Died For Your Sins Read online

  The way had been prepared for this era by the attitude of Dillon Myer, a Truman appointee as Commissioner of Indian Affairs, who started the bureau on the termination trail when he had assumed office in 1950. Myer had been in charge of the Japanese internment camps during World War II and “knew” how to deal with minority rights.

  He embarked on a withdrawal program in August of 1952, before Congress had even authorized its great Domesday study. “At this point,” Myer wrote to his bureau employees, “I want to emphasize that withdrawal program formulation and effectuation is to be a cooperative effort of Indian and community groups affected, side by side, with Bureau personnel. We must lend every encouragement to Indian initiative and leadership. I realize that it will not be possible always to obtain Indian cooperation.”

  “Full understanding,” Myer went on, “by the tribal membership should be attained in any event, and agreement with affected Indian groups must be attained if possible. In the absence of such agreement, however, I want our differences to be clearly defined and understood by both the Indians and ourselves. We must proceed, even though Indian cooperation may be lacking in certain cases.”

  The policy from Commissioner to field clerk was to get rid of Indians as quickly as possible, treaties or no. When the termination hearings were later held, the bureau had much to say. It gave every possible excuse to get rid of the particular tribe which was under consideration by the committee.

  The Republicans entered the White House in the 1952 election and assumed control of Congress for the second time in two decades. Two conservatives were named to head the Indian subcommittees in the Senate and House: Arthur Watkins, a Mormon from Utah, headed the Indian Subcommittee of the Senate Interior committee and E. Y. Berry from South Dakota headed the House counterpart. Both Watkins and Berry were determined to bring Indian Affairs to a swift conclusion. They had sat too long as junior members of the subcommittees not to relish the opportunity which now presented itself. They wanted to take the helm and make policy. Together they decided to hold joint hearings on all Indian bills so that there would be no conflicts between the Senate and House versions of legislation. A decision by the Joint Subcommittee could pass both houses of Congress simultaneously, and opposition as well as public awareness could be held to a minimum.

  On June 9, 1953, the first shot of the great twentieth century Indian war was fired when Representative William Henry Harrison, a descendant of an old Indian fighter of the last century, introduced House Concurrent Resolution 108 in the Eighty-third Congress. HCR 108 declared the intention of Congress to terminate federal supervision at the “earliest possible time.” Green light for Watkins and Berry. They waited only until the following February before launching their attack. And supervision, as it turned out, meant services only.

  February, 1954, saw the beginning of a systematic attack on every tribe in the nation. Gone were the four factors which Zimmerman had used in 1947 to classify tribal readiness for termination. Watkins’ idea was to get rid of as many tribes as possible before the 1956 elections. He feared that if the Great Golfer were not re-elected the movement would be stopped by a President who might pay attention to what was happening in the world around him.

  The first termination case—concerning small bands of Paiutes in Utah—set the precedent for the Senate Interior Committee, from Arthur Watkins, conservative Republican from Utah in 1954, to Henry Jackson, pseudo-liberal Democrat from Washington in 1968. The basic approach of the Senate committee never varied for fourteen years. Unbearable pressures, lies, promises, and threats of termination were made whenever a tribe won funds from the United States because of past swindles by the federal government. Whenever a tribe needed special legislation to develop its resources, termination was often the price asked for the attention of the committee. And if a tribe compromised with the Senate committee it was on the road to termination. Quarter was asked but none given.

  In this first case, Watkins made sure that some of his Utah Indians were the first to go in order to prove he was not picking on Indians of other states. It did not matter that the Paiutes had not been mentioned either by Zimmerman or in HCR 108. Watkins was determined to demonstrate fairness, as if once he had irrationally harmed Indians from his own state he would be free to do whatever he wanted with all those elsewhere.

  He forced consent, if it can be called that, of these small bands of southern Utah by promising them recognition by the federal government of their tribal marriages. But when the legislation came out there was no mention of tribal marriages, only of removal of federal services. The Paiutes had been too poor to come to Washington for the hearings, and when they found out what Watkins had done it was too late. They were placed under a private trustee who rarely communicated with them, and in a more restrictive trusteeship than they had known when under federal supervision. Thus did Watkins “free” his Indians.

  In another case, the Klamaths had received a judgment against the United States for $2.6 million. But they needed enabling legislation to spend it. Watkins withheld approval of the Joint Subcommittee until the Klamaths agreed to his termination bill. The state of Oregon was hardly consulted at all. Thus two basic factors of the four presented by Zimmerman for ending federal supervision were lacking from the very beginning. Termination of the Klamaths had neither tribal nor state willingness.

  The Klamath bill had been so hastily written that it had to be amended to prevent a wholesale collapse of the lumber industry on the West Coast. Since it had originally called for immediate clear-cutting of eighty-million-dollars’ worth of timber, the market appeared headed for total disaster because of the great quantity of wood that would suddenly depress the market. Strangely, there was no conspiracy to cheat the Klamaths, the legislation was simply so sloppily written that no one on the Senate or House committee realized what clear-cutting a massive forest meant. The committee members’ only desire was to get the termination of the tribe over with as quickly as possible. If that meant cutting every tree in Oregon, they would have so authorized, simply to get on to another tribe.

  In another example, the Kansas Potawatomi tribe was considered to be in such a low economic status that to assist it was felt to be too expensive. Better, the bureau said, to let the Pota-watomis expire as private citizens than to have anyone find out how badly the federal government had shirked its responsibilities. Somehow they escaped the blow, although bureau assistance to them since 1954 has been nil.

  In yet another example, the Alabama-Coushattas had a small reservation in Texas. They had been spared during the Texas Ranger sweep a century earlier because they had hidden Sam Houston when the Mexican government was after him during Texas’ war with Mexico.

  The bureau, meeting with the tribal council, told them the termination bill was concerned with forest management. They stated that any more cutting of timber on tribal lands would not be allowed unless the tribe agreed to the proposal. The tribe agreed, the law was quickly passed with little consultation with the state of Texas, and the tribe was placed under state trusteeship. There is still a question whether or not the constitution of Texas was violated.

  Frantically the Joint Subcommittee searched for vulnerable and unsuspecting tribes for their termination program. Poor tribes with no means to come to Washington and protest against proposals were in greatest danger. Absolute terror spread through Indian country as the power of the committee was arbitrarily used against the helpless Indian communities.

  The Flatheads of Montana were saved only by the direct intervention of Mike Mansfield, who reminded the committee of the treaty rights of the tribe. The Florida Seminoles, 80 percent illiterate, were saved only through the intervention of the DAR’s of that state.

  Total relocation of the seven thousand Turtle Mountain Chippewas of North Dakota was considered. Watkins’ plan was simply to relocate the Indians in a large city and forget about them. But the plan was blocked when North Dakota, in a fit of Christian charity, refused to provide any services whatsoever for the
Chippewas should they be terminated.

  The tragedy of the Menominee tribe of Wisconsin illustrates the extent of termination’s failure. The tribe was one of the few paying for all its own services. The sum of $520,714.00 was budgeted by the tribe for the reservation the year before termination. The tribe invested $285,000 in construction projects, $56,745.00 for education, $47,021 for welfare, and $130,000 for health. It set aside $42,615 for law and order activities. The federal government, which was obligated to provide all of these services, actually spent only $95,000 for roads and $49,000 for education, on a matching basis with the state and tribe. The total federal cost per year for the Menominees was $144,000 or $50.85 per Indian. There was, consequently, not much to be saved by terminating them.

  But they had won a $8.5 million judgment against the United States in the Court of Claims and needed legislation to distribute it. In 1908 federal legislation was passed which had given the Forest Service responsibility for administering the Menominee resources on a sustained-yield basis. In violation of this law, local government foresters had decided to clear-cut the forest, and the income which should have come to the Menominees through the years on a sustained-yield basis was deprived them. Finally, in 1951 they had won their judgment against the United States, and the money was deposited to the tribe’s account in the U.S. Treasury.

  The Joint Subcommittee, particularly in the person of Watkins, was outraged that the tribe had been vindicated. They were determined to silence the Menominees once and for all. When a bill passed the House Interior Committee, which authorized the distribution of the judgment money, Watkins attached a provision to the bill in the Senate, requiring the tribe to submit to termination in order to get the money. The Menominees objected to the provision and Watkins held the bill until the end of the year.

  There are varying reports on the sequence of developments after that. In 1960, when the Menominees went to Congress to get an extension on the date set for final termination of federal responsibilities, Senator Frank Church, then chairman of the Indian Subcommittee of the Senate, inquired of Mr. Lee of the Bureau of Indian Affairs just how the Menominee termination had come about. The record, as of 1960, is enlightening:

  SENATOR CHURCH: Mr. Lee [from Interior] will you take me back a few years and tell me how this business got started? It is my understanding that originally the Menominee Tribe recovered a judgment against the Government which required legislation to distribute to the members of that tribe.

  MR. LEE: That is correct.

  SENATOR CHURCH: Legislation was proposed to effect a per capita distribution of this judgment fund.

  MR. LEE: That is correct, $1,500.

  SENATOR CHURCH: When it came to the Senate, the Senate amended the bill to provide that termination should take place in conjunction with the distribution of this money.

  MR. LEE: That is correct. It was an interim step. In the meantime, Congress passed Senate Joint Resolution 108, which provided for the termination of certain tribes. I believe there were 10 tribes. Specifically—

  SENATOR CHURCH: Was the Menominee Tribe one of the 10 tribes?

  MR. LEE: The Menominee Tribe was one of the tribes. As you have indicated, when H.R. 2828 was introduced in the 83rd Congress, it was passed by the House as a separate per capita bill of $1,500 per individual.

  The Senate amended it and tacked termination on it and sent it back to the House. There were a number of conferences on it and finally, they worked out a compromise. This gets into the second question as to whether or not there was approval by the Indians.

  SENATOR CHURCH: That is my second question. Did the Menominee Tribe, after this legislation was passed, then approve of termination by referendum of any kind?

  MR. LEE: No, sir. As I recall, there was no referendum. The tribal delegates can correct me on this. They had a group that was negotiating with the conferees here in Washington and they stood up in the committees and agreed to this termination, I think, on the basis that the termination was coming regardless because of the resolution requiring termination.

  SENATOR CHURCH: For this particular tribe?

  MR. LEE: For this particular tribe.

  SENATOR CHURCH: The question of termination was never taken to the Indians and put to a vote?

  MR. LEE: As near as I know, there was never a general vote on termination in the tribe. Am I correct in that?

  MR. WILKINSON: I can add one clarifying point to that. The chairman of the Indian Subcommittee of the Senate went to the reservation and met with the general council.

  SENATOR ANDERSON: Senator Watkins.

  MR. WILKINSON: That is right. There were approximately 150 people present. They voted that day to accept termination. There is one item which I thinks bears on it, which I think influenced the tribe to vote that way.

  They were told that they could not have a per capita payment unless they accepted termination. Based on that, I felt they accepted it.

  SENATOR ANDERSON: Senator Wakins did go there, he did present the matter, he did discuss it, he came back and reported to us that the tribe was enthusiastic for termination.

  Of course, the answer was they were enthusiastic for the $1,500.

  Senator Watkins had indeed gone to the Menominees and threatened the Indians. Recalling his visit, Watkins stated:

  It was a very interesting experience. I appreciated your help in introducing me to those people and giving me the opportunity to see how they lived, how they felt about it. That was one of the most interesting experiences of the whole trip.

  MR. WAUPOCHICK (a Menominee): We wish you could have stayed longer.

  SENATOR WATKINS: I had the same experience visiting Europe, the refugee camps of the Near East, (emphasis added)

  The Menominees had been so poor in comparision to other Americans that the only experience Watkins could relate his reservation visit with was his visit to refugee camps of the Near East after World War II.

  The initial plan was for the Menominee forest to be turned over to the tribe for management. This plan was predicated on the fact that the Menominee tribe had over ten million dollars in the federal treasury. But the Menominees had to agree to termination in order to get a per capita distribution of that money authorized. Therefore the termination plan was based upon money that no longer existed.

  Wisconsin strongly opposed the Menominees’ termination. It was worried about the eventual effect of the plan on the community and the state. Mr. Harder, an official representing the Wisconsin Tax Commission, expressed the attitude of the state most concisely:

  . . . I am concerned about that; because if they have to go to heavy taxation of their timberlands, that means they will have to cut on some other basis than their present sustained-yield method. And as soon as that happens, the forests will eventually deplete, and we may have a substantial welfare problem. That is a problem the State of Wisconsin now has with the Indians in the Bad River Reservation, where the lands were allotted, and the Indians sold their lands, and now they are on relief; in prosperous times as well as poor times. It is a continuing problem. And the State doesn’t want anything like that to happen in this instance.

  But Watkins, ideologically bound to traditional Republican myths, insisted that the state was more efficient than the federal government per se:

  Of course it is admitted the Federal Government moves slower than anybody else. The State government would be far more efficient. That is one reason we think federal supervision should be terminated, one among many reasons, because we can’t move as fast as we should.

  The tribal attorney, Mr. Wilkinson, appealed to the record of the Senate Civil Service Committee in which the original Zimmerman testimony was presented. Watkins callously informed him:

  If you want to comment on what he said, all right, but as far as I am personally concerned, and I think the rest of the committee, it is not going to make a lot of difference one way or another, except indicating that that far back this matter was discussed. So that there won’t be any implica
tion that certain parts of it haven’t been brought up, I think that all of it should be included in this report and that will be the Chair’s ruling.

  So a reference to the Zimmerman recommendations which included the fifty-year tax exemption for the forest proved fruitless by the defenseless Menominees.

  Their last argument was voiced by Antoine Waupochick, Chairman of the Menominee Advisory Council:

  History records that the Menominees have been loyal to this Government and have stood by their bargains when they have relinquished land to the United States. We think that your action should be governed by a desire to see that history will record that Congress was loyal to the Menominee people.

  There was, however, no appeal for the tribe, either to historic commitments made by the federal government or to common sense of the present. Even after liberal Democrats took over the subcommittee after the 1958 sweep and firmly controlled the Senate in 1960, the attitude remained the same—dogmatic and idealistic:

  MR. GRIGNON [a Menominee]: . . . I believe if we are to terminate December 31, (the tribe was seeking an extension) with our economy so low where we cannot afford this county which is the cheapest for us to take, we will go until our money runs out. It is a question of what reserve we have in the fund.

  SENATOR CHURCH: I think what Senator Anderson said was pretty wise. He suggested if you went on your own initiative, responsibility and resources, you might find a little resurgency of energy in the operation of the mill and things of that nature that might carry you along. It is the constant spoon feeding from the Federal Government that has held you back, is it not? You were getting ready for termination in 1954. Some tribes have terminated, you know, and they are getting along pretty well. But not the Menominees.

  MR. GRIGNON: I believe one thing, Senator. If we were still making the kind of money as in 1958, I believe we certainly could terminate December 31, and be successful. If the economy was up, there would be no question in my mind.