McCain Instrumental in Removing Dineh-Navajo Tribe
How does history repeat itself? Let’s count some of the ways.
One.
The Indian Removal Act was signed into law by Andrew Jackson on May 28, 1830, authorizing the president to grant unsettled lands west of the Mississippi in exchange for Indian lands within existing state borders. A few tribes went peacefully, but many resisted the relocation policy. During the fall and winter of 1838 and 1839, the Cherokees were forcibly moved west by the United States government. Approximately 4,000 Cherokees died on this forced march, which became known as the "Trail of Tears."
Two.
"The Dawes Commission†by Kent Carter. p. 208.
The debate continued and shifted to the controversial subject of what to do with the valuable coal deposits in the Choctaw Nation that had been segregated from allotment. Senator Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin objected to the provision in the bill that authorized selling the deposits because he believed the railroads would gain control.
The Dineh (otherwise known as Navajo) were stripped of all land title and forced to relocate. Their land was turned over to the coal companies without making any provisions to protect the burial or sacred sites that would be destroyed by the mines. People whose lives were based in their deep spiritual and life-giving relationship with the land were relocated into cities, often without compensation, forbidden to return to the land that their families had occupied for generations. People became homeless with significant increases in alcoholism, suicide, family break up, emotional abuse and death.
And on and on, ad infinitum.
A public research website: http://www.cain2008.org has brought together diverse historical elements of factual proof that Senator John McCain's was the key "point man" introducing, enacting and enforcing law that removed Dineh-Navajo Families from their reservation on the Black Mesa in Arizona. The McCain revised law relocated them to Church's Hill, Nevada (a Nuclear Waste Superfund Site, called "the New Lands" in PL 93-531). The Dineh-Navajo, a deeply spiritual and peaceful people, engaged in only peaceful resistance to being moved off lands they'd owned since 1500 A.D. Nonetheless, the Public Press and UN depicted brutalization, rights deprivation and forcible relocation.
Perhaps everyone’s hopes and prayers for peace should be,“Please don’t let them find natural resources on our land.â€
Crossposted at Progressive Historians
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Native American Netroots
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I just want to honor you for that,
Submitted by winter rabbit on 13 February 2008 - 6:33pm.
and thankyou for sharing that.
I've kept remembering that McCain, in addition to this now, was a key person who gave us the MCA. Except now he's all wrapped up in the "maverick" image. I guess the maverick image is the best one to use after forcing people off their land and destroying the Constitution. Smoke & mirrors; I'd better stop now.
Update on the Dineh and Big Mountain
Submitted by The Anti-McCain Lobby (not verified) on 21 February 2008 - 2:04am.
Winter Rabbit,
Can you send me links or any current information on what is happening there?
I understand the situation but cannot find anything new on the injustices against
our brothers and sisters and they're fight against the government.
Everything available is 10 years old, and this issue caused McCain to drop out of
his last Presidential bid, I am hoping it may still have the same effect if presented
again.
The energy elites and Son of Cain must be stopped if possible.
Please forward anything you can.
Did you check these?
Submitted by winter rabbit on 25 February 2008 - 6:03pm.
In 1974, the mining industry played a major role in passage of the Navajo-Hopi Settlement Act of 1974. This crucial piece of legislation resulted in the largest relocation of Native American people since the 1860's. The relocation effort has been a disaster. More than 12,000 people have been relocated over the past 22 years. Some were sent to cities where, unable to speak English or relate to a non-traditional economy, they quickly lost the small sums of money they were given at the time of the relocation. The rest were sent to the "New Lands", an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Superfund site contaminated by the nation's worst nuclear spill. But many families resisted orders to relocate, and 23 years later, several thousand still remain on their traditional homesites. This relocation has cost the U.S. taxpayers over $350 million.
The people affected by the legislation were never directly informed of its adoption, never allowed to testify in any Congressional hearing and never allowed to be represented in any way through the process. All the decisions that led to partition of their land were carried out and enacted by newly created male-dominated tribal councils located 100 miles away from the directly affected people.
With assistance from the U.S. government, the mining industry has supported a new faction on the reservations consisting of businessmen who profit from mining, large-scale cattle ranching, and other non-traditional economic activities. This faction controls the tribal governments and rejects traditional religious views about the sacredness of the land. It views the traditional Dineh living on the land as obstacles to the success of its business ventures. This faction is considered to be the sole legitimate voice of all the people and has been granted sovereign powers which deprive the people of fundamental civil rights.
Response to the Environmental Crisis
In 1996, Congress passed a law endorsing a 75-year lease arrangement that would allow a few of the families to remain as tenants on the land. The law sanctions the relocation of families not eligible for these leases and forces the families who sign the leases to live without benefit of civil and religious rights exercised by other Americans. In April 1997, when all efforts to obtain justice in the U.S. judicial system failed, and in order to get the relocation laws repealed, the Dineh filed a formal request for the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to conduct an investigation of human rights violations against them by the U.S. government. Several visits to New York by Dineh helped create an Inter-faith coalition of faith-based Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs). A delegation of NGOs traveled to Black Mesa to witness the historic meeting between the traditional Dineh and Hopi people and Mr. Abdelfattah Amor, Special Rapporteur on Religious Intolerance of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. Mr. Amor traveled to Black Mesa in early February 1998 to investigate charges of human rights violations by the U.S. government. This is the first time the U.S. is being formally investigated by the United Nations for violations of the right to freedom of religion or belief. It is the hope of the Dineh people that the UN will cite the U.S. for violations of International Human Rights law.
"The forcible relocation of over 10,000 Navajo people is a tragedy of genocide and injustice that will be a blot on the conscience of this country for many generations."
-- Leon Berger, Executive Director, Navajo-Hopi Indian Relocation Commission upon resignation.
"I feel that in relocating these elderly people, we are as bad as the Nazis that ran the concentration camps in World War II."
-- Roger Lewis, federally appointed Relocation Commissioner upon resignation
"I believe that the forced relocation of Navajo and Hopi people that followed from the passage in 1974 of Public Law 93-531 is a major violation of these people's human rights. Indeed this forced relocation of over 12,000 Native Americans is one of the worst cases of involuntary community resettlement that I have studied throughout the world over the past 40 years."
-- Thayer Scudder, Professor of Anthropology, California Institute of Technology in a letter to Mr. Abdelfattah Amor, UN Special Rapporteur on Religious Intolerance
Check back here at Docudharma, the same questions came up
Interesting
Way back in my college days, a bunch of us took a road trip bringing supplies to the Navajo of Big Mountain who were resisting relocation. We drove three cars from San Diego to Big Mountain and stayed with the Navajo for a couple of days. We helped them clear some land for a Sun Dance ceremony (not usually their tradition, as I understand it, but they were doing it as a solidarity thing with other tribes I believe) and sat around with them talking in the evening. Was an interesting experience and we brought them supplies they had asked for. Have to admit I later forgot about the issue, though more recently wondered what had happened. I guess I always assumed Peabody would win in the end, though I did my little part to oppose them. Not surprising that McCain was helping them, I guess.