The Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868
This is Mother's Day. I planned to write about my three mothers. However, that would be too emotionally exhausting for today. I will write instead about the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, why it is so crucial, and why my summer will be spent attempting, with many of my Native sisters and brothers, to get a small bit of it enforced.
I published Section 2 of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. For those of you without extensive knowledge of geography, this treaty gives to ten bands of Lakota/Dakota/Nakota people and to Arapaho people, the land East of the Missouri River, North of the Nebraska state line, West of the Little Big Horn Mountains (which run North and South through Wyoming and Montana), and South of the lattitude that cuts across then-territory, now-state of South Dakota North about half way across. In other words, this Treaty, still in effect, but not enforced, grants to Native peoples our Sacred Black Hills, including our Sacred Bear Butte. The latter, Bear Butte, is sacred to people across what we call Turtle Island (the American continent). It is the place where we go to pray and hold sacred, solemn, silent Ceremonies. The best equivalents I can think of are the Holy Lands of Christians and Jews, and Mecca for Muslims. While our ability to pray and hold Ceremonies has already been disrupted by campers and bikers walking the trails, and playing music, and drinking alcohol (forbidden to us), a new "development" threaten to destroy it further. Despite over 1,000 people - Elders, Headmen and Headswomen and Chiefs of Tribes, Medicine Men and Medicine Women - even bikers from the annual Stugis Bike Rally in the area - who showed up to protest this "development" the County Commissioners approved it. Now the bulldozers and steam shovels bring tears to our eyes as they dig into our sacred land, and prepare for the noise and alcohol consumption that will destroy our prayers and Ceremonies. So, leaders of the protest against this money-making endeavor have called for Natives across Turtle Island to come to Bear Butte this summer, from July 4 through August 14 (the end of the Sturgis Bike Rally) to prevent this "construction"/destruction of our sacred way of life, as we have practiced it for tens of thousands of years. Please join us if you can. The center of communications is DefendBearButte@yahoo.com. The leader is none other than the brave leader of many crucial protests, Carter Camp. I hope to see you there, whatever your ethnic identity or religious orientation. This is, after all, about freedom of religion. Marx said that the only freedoms under Capitalism would be freedoms for Capitalists. We see the truth in this statement. But we shall protest. We shall resist. We shall overcome. Mitakuye Oyasin, Cedar Elk Woman
I published Section 2 of the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. For those of you without extensive knowledge of geography, this treaty gives to ten bands of Lakota/Dakota/Nakota people and to Arapaho people, the land East of the Missouri River, North of the Nebraska state line, West of the Little Big Horn Mountains (which run North and South through Wyoming and Montana), and South of the lattitude that cuts across then-territory, now-state of South Dakota North about half way across. In other words, this Treaty, still in effect, but not enforced, grants to Native peoples our Sacred Black Hills, including our Sacred Bear Butte. The latter, Bear Butte, is sacred to people across what we call Turtle Island (the American continent). It is the place where we go to pray and hold sacred, solemn, silent Ceremonies. The best equivalents I can think of are the Holy Lands of Christians and Jews, and Mecca for Muslims. While our ability to pray and hold Ceremonies has already been disrupted by campers and bikers walking the trails, and playing music, and drinking alcohol (forbidden to us), a new "development" threaten to destroy it further. Despite over 1,000 people - Elders, Headmen and Headswomen and Chiefs of Tribes, Medicine Men and Medicine Women - even bikers from the annual Stugis Bike Rally in the area - who showed up to protest this "development" the County Commissioners approved it. Now the bulldozers and steam shovels bring tears to our eyes as they dig into our sacred land, and prepare for the noise and alcohol consumption that will destroy our prayers and Ceremonies. So, leaders of the protest against this money-making endeavor have called for Natives across Turtle Island to come to Bear Butte this summer, from July 4 through August 14 (the end of the Sturgis Bike Rally) to prevent this "construction"/destruction of our sacred way of life, as we have practiced it for tens of thousands of years. Please join us if you can. The center of communications is DefendBearButte@yahoo.com. The leader is none other than the brave leader of many crucial protests, Carter Camp. I hope to see you there, whatever your ethnic identity or religious orientation. This is, after all, about freedom of religion. Marx said that the only freedoms under Capitalism would be freedoms for Capitalists. We see the truth in this statement. But we shall protest. We shall resist. We shall overcome. Mitakuye Oyasin, Cedar Elk Woman
posted by CedarElkWoman at
3:49 PM
1 Comments:
The last legal Treaty of the Nakota (Nakota, DaNakota,Dakota, and Lakota) Nation is the 1851 Treaty of Long Meadows, a.k.a. 1851 Treaty of Fort Laramie, which was developed over four years and agreed upon by each and every band - including the adult female - which represented the purest and truest form of actual democracy of the Nakota called "Oyate Omniciye" which is endangered and near extinction today.
1851Treaty.com
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