Thursday, May 26, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Senators urge government apology to Indians

Sand Creek, Wounded Knee massacres among atrocities, broken treaties, mistreatment cited

WASHINGTON -- All American Indians are entitled to an apology from the U.S. government for a history filled with "broken treaties, mistreatment and dishonorable dealings," a Republican senator said Wednesday.

Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas proposed an apology acknowledging "ill-conceived federal policies ... such as extermination, termination, forced removal and relocation, the outlawing of traditional religions and the destruction of sacred places."

The apology names the forced removal of Cherokees along the Trail of Tears in 1838, as well as atrocities such as the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 and the Wounded Knee Massacre of 1890.

At Sand Creek in southeastern Colorado, 700 U.S. volunteer soldiers on Nov. 29, 1864, killed 150 Cheyenne and Arapahoe people, mostly women and children. At Wounded Knee Creek in southwestern South Dakota, U.S. soldiers killed 300 Lakota Sioux on Dec. 29, 1890.

"Before reconciliation, there must be recognition and repentance," Brownback said at a Senate Indian Affairs Committee hearing on the proposal. "Before there is a durable relationship, there must be understanding."

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he supported the apology, which Congress considered last year but never passed.

"It's painfully obvious that the government has repeatedly broken its promises and caused great harm" to American Indians, said McCain, the committee's chairman.

Tex Hall, president of the National Congress of American Indians, said an apology is long overdue. He said the United States apologized to Native Hawaiians in 1993, and Canada apologized to its native people in 1998.

Diana Buckner, chairwoman of the Ely Shoshone tribe in Nevada, said an "earnest apology" would be a first step in getting many American Indians to trust the government.

Buckner said she has a higher opinion of the federal government than other Western Shoshone members. Many remain bitter the government never kept promises from the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley that allowed mining exploration and railroad building on Western Shoshone land. Millions of acres of tribal territory eventually was lost outright.

"The government is trying to do the best it can to accommodate the Shoshone people," Buckner said. "There are a lot of people in the federal system who have worked well with the tribe."

Edward Thomas, president of the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, said at the Senate hearing he was reluctant to support the resolution.

Thomas said the government should focus on improving the living conditions of American Indians rather than apologizing for the past.

"The present relationship that this nation has established over the years with Native Americans is seriously weakened due to the impact of underfunding of social and economic programs," Thomas said.

Thomas said he feared the apology would cause the government to think its responsibilities to American Indians have been addressed.

McCain compared the proposed apology to the government's apology in 1988 for the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. He said that apology helped to educate the public about what happened.