Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 29, 1990 TAG: 9006290688
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JAMES J. KILPATRICK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Why am I writing about Indian affairs? I truly don't know. An interesting case cropped up last month in the Supreme Court. I ran into Arizona's Sen. John McCain in the Capitol a few days ago, and we fell to talking about the status of Indians in contemporary society.
Their status, said McCain, is just about nil: "Nobody cares deeply about the Indians. Congress doesn't care. The White House doesn't care. The states don't care. Over the past 15 years, every part of the federal budget has increased in constant dollars - every part but one. That one is the budget for Indian affairs."
The relationship between the American people and the Indian tribes is perhaps the strangest legacy in our history. In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson charged that King George III had "endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions."
Jefferson's characterization doubtless was deserved. The bloody history of Indian massacres is not pretty reading. But neither is it edifying to read the chronicle of grand theft, brazen swindling and sheer brutality imposed upon Indian tribes by the white man.
In 1887, Congress adopted the well-intentioned General Allotment Act. It broke up large tribal holdings and distributed land to individual owners in parcels of 40 to 160 acres. The idea was to make farmers of Indians, who then would be assimilated into the larger community. The policy proved disastrous, but it was not abandoned until 1934.
Since then, not much has happened. In 1983, President Reagan established a policy of promoting strong tribal governments with broad powers of self-government. In theory the policy still exists, but a study last year by a Senate committee found that the old paternalism has not greatly diminished.
The study, released in November, provides melancholy documentation of the rule of out of sight, out of mind. I paid no attention to the study when it appeared. It wasn't until recently that I got around to reading the report.
The committee found "fraud, corruption and mismanagement pervading the institutions that are supposed to serve American Indians." Paternalistic policies had created a federal bureaucracy "ensnarled in red tape." The Bureau of Indian Affairs had done virtually nothing to expose sham companies operating as Indian-owned enterprises. Among the BIA's responsibilities is economic development, but "45 percent of all reservation Indians live below the poverty lines, almost half of all Indian adults are unemployed, and the majority of those who do work earn less than $7,000 per year."
I asked Sen. McCain if this devastating report had produced a galvanic effect at the BIA, and he just shook his head. Patricia M. Zell, chief counsel to the Senate committee on Indian affairs, is more optimistic. The BIA, she said, has been "very responsive." At the bureau, a spokesman said the problem of sham contractors is steadily diminishing as tribes make fewer contracts and do more work themselves.
So life goes on. The BIA keeps tabs on 307 separate tribes scattered across the nation. Some tribes are quite small. A few, notably the Navajo and the Sioux, are large. Some maintain strong tribal governments, but beyond the 300 reservations, most tribal organizations are loose.
The U.S. Supreme Court hears two or three Indian cases a year. On May 29, the court dealt with a murder on the Salt River Reservation in Arizona. In April 1989, the court upheld the power of Mississippi's Choctaw tribe to govern the adoption of twin children born off the reservation. Both cases were packed with human interest. The legal points involved fascinating chapters in American history.
But this was "Indian stuff." This correspondent covers the high court closely, but do I brief the Indian cases? No way. I mean, who cares? Who really cares?
Universal Press Syndicate
by CNB