ONEOFMANYFEATHERS'
Where oh Where has My Heritage Gone?
Written by Terri Jean, Submitted by JT
"Our treatment of Indians . . . still affects the national consciousness... It seems a basic requirement to study the history of Indian people. Only through this study can we as a nation do what must be done if our treatment of the American Indian is not to be marked down for all time as a national disgrace." ~ John F. Kennedy ~
Finding one's long-lost Native American heritage has fast become one of America's favorite "pastimes." Books, websites, and articles instruct root-seekers, in step-by-step how-to fashion, where to look, what to look for and what they should do once the lineage is established. With an estimated 12 million people living in the United States with an ancestral Native link - even if minuscule - there is a perpetual trend of indigenous interest in reconnection and even self-identification. (According to the US 2000 census, people identifying themselves Native American increased by 26% - or 2.4 million - in just 10 years.)
So for those 12 million or so heritage-seekers with desire to know their Native roots, the path is generally long, winding and, more often than not, confusingly laid with pitfalls, obstacles and quandaries. Ancestors recorded on your family tree may not be all that easy to verify on paper; and without a clear paper trail, according to those who require such evidence, your heritage does not truly exist.
With Native people being the only US citizens requiring a pedigree, one might ask if this is an extension of cultural genocide by the American government. An actual continuous conspiracy to keep those millions of people from knowing there heritage. Here we explore such a theory and the governments role in possibly perpetrating it.
Note: Up until 1879, there was a legal question regarding whether American Indians were, in fact, human beings. On March 12th, 1880, US District Court Judge Elmer Dundy ruled that Indians were "persons within the meaning of the law" and therefore, deemed to be human. But their rights and liberties were still denied and they were not given US citizenship until 1924.
"Missing" or Incomplete Documentation
If you're looking for your long-lost relative in the US census rolls from the 1800's, you may stumble upon your first roadblock. Federal records from 1790-1840 only contain information pertaining to free, white heads of households. Information regarding minorities were not collected until 1850.
But not everyone were recorded. Many Native Americans missed the census completely during the 1800's and much of the early 1900's due to poor communication and too much of a traveling distance for both recorder and the person being recorded. Others refused to admit to their Indian heritage due to fear and/or shame, and some of those who DID make it onto the census books were recorded with misspelled names and misreported ethnic heritage's.
It is also not uncommon to be informed that census, birth, death, marriage and land records have been lost, damaged, stolen or destroyed from fires, floods, theft or employee mishandling. Whether these tales are true or not, in many circumstances, you will find that the documentation that you need the most no longer exists.
Denial of one's own Heritage
It is not uncommon to come across a census in which your great-great-grandmother was listed as `white.' Those with Anglo features who could pass as whites often did so in an attempt to either assimilate into white society, or to hide from the prejudices within it.
During most of the 1800's, the Native populations were removed from their homeland, forced to trek across the country, endured great losses of life and liberties, and were rounded up like animals and held in concentration-camp like reservations where disease, malnutrition, starvation and cruelty were abundant. Without proper food, shelter, heat, water, medicine, physicians, or sanitary facilities, death and despair were common threads binding each Nation to the other. Deemed savage, uncivilized and unworthy of citizenship, the right to own land, or to testify against a white man... it is no wonder that those who could pass themselves off as whites had done so.
"He is ignoble--base and treacherous, and hateful in every way. Not even imminent death can startle him into a spasm of virtue. The ruling trait of all savages is a greedy and consuming selfishness, and in our Noble Red Man it is found in its amplest development." ~ Mark Twain, "The Noble Red Man" (1870)
Shame, Fear, Segregation, & Prejudice
"You will... use all means to pursuade any tribe to come in for the purpose of making peace, and when you get them together kill all the grown Indians and take the children... sell them as slaves to defray the cost..." - Confederate Governor John R. Baylor, 1862
Prejudice and racial hatred canvassed most of the US soil. Newspaper editorials called for the extermination of all Native people, including a March 1863 piece from the Rocky Mountain News which stated, "They are a dissolute, vagabondish, brutal, and ungrateful race and ought to be wiped from the face of the earth."
Indians were seen as unclean, savage pagans and most Anglo-Americans refused to accept them in their schools, churches, schools, towns or even in their states. Racial groups targeted Native people and even President Theodore Roosevelt remarked "I don't go so far as to think that the only good Indians are dead Indians, but I believe nine out of ten are, and I shouldn't inquire too closely into the case of the tenth. The most vicious cowboy has more moral principle than the average Indian."
Admitting one's heritage openly was something most avoided at all costs. The fear of racist attacks and incarceration kept most Indians from signing one's name to a census record or other political documentation.
If it is the purpose of the Government to civilize the Indians, they must be compelled to desist from the savage and barbarous practices that are calculated to continue them in savagery, no matter what exterior influences are brought to bear on them. ~ Henry Teller, Secretary of the Interior, 1883 Secretary of the Interior Annual Report ~
Shame (or brainwashing)
In the 1960's a study was conducted by American officials that would investigate and report on the current condition of the Native American population. The report concluded that American Indians experienced more self-hatred than any other ethnic group. Having endured generation after generation of forced removals, anti-Indian laws, government lies, and broken treaties, the nation not only shunned the Native people, they openly ranted of their superiority and treated indigenous people as mindless children unable to tend to themselves. This is evident in most legal documentation of the late 1880's and early 1900's, including the 1869 Board of Indian Commissioners Report which stated, "The legal status of the uncivilized Indians should be that of wards of the government; the duty of the latter being to protect them, to educate them in industry, the arts of civilization, and the principles of Christianity…"
Often referred to as the "vanishing race," these so-called "conquered" people often had no choice but to submit to the whims of those who thought they had the right to dominate them. Though some adults may of held on to their Native pride, the government focused on an easier target - the children.
The Children
By 1931, over 75,000 Indian children were enrolled in white-operated educational facilities including boarding schools. Away from home and parental influence, and more often than not stolen from parents with legal decrees and threats of imprisonment (or worse), children were held for years at a time in these missionary-operated facilities where they were removed of their culture, their language, their religion, their dress and their names. Children who participated in their previous lifestyle, such as speaking their own language, were often severely punished.
On September 8, 2000, Assistant Secretary-Indian Affairs, Kevin Gover, admitted to such boarding school atrocities at the 175th anniversary of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
" After the devastation of tribal economies and the deliberate creation of tribal dependence on the services provided by this agency, this agency set out to destroy all things Indian...This agency forbade the speaking of Indian languages, prohibited the conduct of traditional religious activities, outlawed traditional government, and made Indian people ashamed of who they were. Worst of all, the Bureau of Indian Affairs committed these acts against the children entrusted to its boarding schools, brutalizing them emotionally, psychologically, physically, and spiritually. .. The trauma of shame, fear and anger has passed from one generation to the next, and manifests itself in the rampant alcoholism, drug abuse, and domestic violence that plague Indian country .Many of our people live lives of unrelenting tragedy as Indian families suffer the ruin of lives by alcoholism, suicides made of shame and despair, and violent death at the hands of one another. So many of the maladies suffered today in Indian country result from the failures of this agency. Poverty, ignorance, and disease have been the product of this agency's work...."
"The changing of the language of a barbarous people, into the speech of a more civil and potent nation that have conquered them, hath been an approved experiment, to reduce such a people unto the civility and religion of the prevailing nation." ~ Daniel Gookin, 1674 ~
The Success of Assimilation
In some respect, the United States goal of Native American assimilation has been, at least, partly achieved. Broken blood ties and untraceable relations make the task of filling in one's family tree virtually impossible. What remains is millions of Americans caught in limbo - denied their heritage, the privilege of knowing their relatives, their ancestors, and their history.
On August 24, 1978, the US government enacted a law that continued the assimilation process. The Federal Acknowledgment Program stated that one's Native lineage must meet certain stipulations and must be traceable on paper. Once evidence is presented, your Native American heritage may be, or may not be, granted.
Native people are the only group in the United States with such pedigree requirements.
Reprinting of this column is permitted as long as you republish the entire column. Be sure to include the author's byline and subscription information to The Native Truth. Also, we would appreciate notice of the articles republication. If you would like to republish SNIPPETS of this piece, contact Terri Jean at the address above.
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