Promises To Indians Must Be Kept

Bipartisanship in national politics is a concept alien to most American Indian tribes, but it is a concept that has risen up of late to bite them on the tail.

Democratic and Republican candidates should all be painted with the same brush in the same color when it comes to legislation affecting the Indian nations.

When most tribal leaders jumped on the Democratic wagon in the 1992 election, believing that a new president would reverse their fortunes, they inadvertently alienated many Republican candidates.

Unfortunately for the tribes, the Republicans were swept into office in 1992 and took charge of most of the committees having a direct bearing upon the funds allocated to Indian tribes.

It is heartening to hear such tribal leaders as President Albert Hale of the Navajo Nation condemn the Republicans’ “Contract With America” by saying that America’s first contract was with the Indian people. But sound bites do not make or change political ideals.

There are powerful senators like Washington’s Slade Gorton who must have learned their Indian history at the shrine of George Armstrong Custer. And then there are supposed liberal, Democratic senators like South Dakota’s Tom Daschle who are so afraid of their own constituency - meaning white folks - that any legislation that would impact Indians and cost them votes among their majority voters - meaning white folks - can cause them to become immediately anti-Indian.

But in the year 1995, the worst senatorial enemy of the Indian people of America is Slade Gorton.

Explaining why he voted against restoring $200 million in budget cuts to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Sen. Gorton said, “To give more to the BIA would, bluntly, have required us to give less to the national parks and cultural institutions which are our national heritage for everyone.”

Excuse me?

Since when do parks and cultural institutions take precedence over human suffering, human dignity, and human rights? Since when are unfeeling, inanimate objects more important than living, breathing human beings?

Sen. Daschle, who sided with Gorton, is just as guilty.

According to the Sept. 18 issue of Time magazine, Daschle’s defection “made it easier for such key liberal colleagues as Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy and California’s Barbara Boxer to do likewise.”

In other words, when Tom Daschle, a senator known to his fellow senators as a man who knows and understands the problems facing American Indians, decides inanimate objects take precedence over human beings, he unconsciously gave the OK to his fellow Democrats to follow suit.

If Robert Kennedy knew his brother voted against the American Indians, he would roll over in his grave. And what can one say about Barbara Boxer? The oft-quoted “speaking with forked-tongue” comes to mind.

The Indian tribes of America should thank Tunkasila - Grandfather - for two Republican senators who have stood firmly and fearlessly in their corner.

Sen. Pete Dominici of New Mexico and Sen. John McCain of Arizona fought with all of their being to restore the budget cuts to the BIA. It didn’t matter to them whether it was a liberal or an conservative issue. To them it was a human issue.

These two senators went out to the Indian reservations and visited the people. They sat in hogans of the Navajo and in the lodges of the Pueblo Indians and saw firsthand that most of the Indian tribes of America were not rolling in gaming cash.

The Indian nations of America have never - and are not now - asking for charity or welfare handouts. They are asking the United States of America to read the treaties signed between two sovereign nations. They are asking the most powerful nation in the world to be true to its word.

These tribes surrendered millions of acres of land rich in resources to America by signing the treaties that guaranteed them housing, education and health benefits for their people.

Mr. Hale is right.

It was the first “Contract With America.” And now it is broken, just as the hundreds of treaties have been broken.

If America cannot keep its word to the Indigenous peoples of this continent, how can any nation expect it to honor its word on anything?

And so the Indian tribes have learned that it doesn’t matter whether the person sitting in Congress is a Democrat or a Republican. The only thing they should know is what is in the heart of the person for whom they cast their vote.

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