jdmann@labrea.stanford.edu (09/21/89)
/* --------- Written 1am 9/6/89 by David Yarrow(jdmann) --------- */
/* --------- A BASIC CALL TO CONSCIOUSNESS --------- */
The Hau de no sau nee Address to the Western World
presented to the United Nations
Geneva, Switzerland, Autumn, 1977
Position Paper #3
Policies of Oppression in the Name of "Democracy"
Economic History of the Hau de no sau nee
The Hau de no sau nee, People of the Longhouse, known to many Europeans
as the Six Nations Iroquois, have inhabited their territories since time
immemorial. During the time prior to the coming of the Europeans, it is
said that ours were a happy and prosperous people. Our lands provided
abundantly for our needs. Our people lived long, healthy and productive
lives. Before the Europeans came, we were an affluent people, rich in the
gifts of our country. We were a strong people in both our minds and
bodies. Throughout most of that time, we lived in peace.
Prior to the arrival of the colonists, we were a people who lived by
hunting and gathering, and practiced a form of agriculture that was not
labor intensive. The economy of the people was an extremely healthy Way of
Life, and our peoples were very healthy - among the finest athletes in the
world. There were some, in those times, who lived to be 120 years and
more, and our runners were unexcelled for speed and endurance.
Among our people we refer to our culture as "OngweHonwekah." This
refers to a Way of Life that is peculiar to the Hau de no sau nee. It is
vitually impossible for us to recount, specifically, the history of "Hau de
no sau nee economics." As will become evident, our economy, the way in
which our people manage their resources, and the relationship of that
management to the total organization of our society, are processes
completely bound together. The distribution of goods, in our traditional
society, was accomplished through institutions which are not readily
identified as economic institutions by other societies. Hau de no sau nee
do not have specific economic institutions, nor do we have specifically
distinct political institutions. Rather, what European people identify as
institutions of one classification or another serve many different purposes
among the Hau de no sau nee.
We were a people of a great forest that was a source of great wealth.
It was a place in which was to be found huge hardwoods and an almost
unimaginable abundance and variety of nuts, berries, roots, and herbs. In
addition to these, the rivers teemed with fish and the forest and its
meadows abounded with game. It was, in fact, a kind of Utopia, a place
where no one went hungry, a place where the people were happy and healthy.
Our traditions were such that we were careful not to allow population to
rise to numbers that would overtax other forms of life. We practiced
strict forms of conservation. Our culture is based on a principle that
directs us to constantly think about the welfare of seven generations into
the future. Our belief in this principle acts as a restraint to the
development of practices which would cause suffering in the future. To
this end, our people took only as many animals as were needed to meet our
needs. Not until the arrival of the colonists did the wholesale slaughter
of animals occur.
We feel many people will be confused when we say that ours is a Way of
Life, and that our economy cannot be separated from the many aspects of our
culture. Our economy is unlike that of Western peoples. We believe all
things in the world were created by what English language calls "Spiritual
Beings," including one we call the Great Creator. All things in this world
belong to the Creator and the spirits of the world. We also believe that
we are required to honor these beings, in respect of the gift of Life.
In accordance with our ways, we are required to hold many kinds of
feasts and ceremonies which can best be described as "give-aways." It is
said that among our people, our leaders, those whom the Anglo people insist
on calling "chiefs," are the poorest of us. By the laws of our culture,
our leaders are both political and spiritual leaders. They are leaders of
many ceremonies which require the distribution of great wealth. As
spiritual/political leaders, they provide a kind of economic conduit. To
become a political leader. a person is required to be a spiritual leader,
and to become a spiritual leader a person must be extraordinarily generous
in terms of material goods.
Our leaders, in fact, are leaders of large extended families which
function as economic units in a Way of Life which has as its base the
Domestic Mode of Production. Before the colonists came, we had our own
means of production and distribution adequate to meet all the peoples'
needs. We would have been unable to exists as nations were it not so.
Our basic economic unit is the family. The means of distribution, aside
from simple trade, consists of a a kind of spiritual tradition manifested
in the functions of the religious/civic leaders in a highly complex
religious, governmental and social structure.
Hau de no sau nee have no concept of private property. This concept
would be a contradiction to a people who believe the Earth belongs to the
Creator. Property is an idea by which people can be excluded from access
to lands or other means of producing a livelihood. That idea would destroy
our culture, which requires every individual live in service to the
Spiritual Ways and the People. The idea of property would produce slavery.
Acceptance of the idea of property would produce leaders whose functions
favor excluding people from access to property, and they would cease to
function as leaders of our societies and distributors of goods.
Before the colonists came, we had no consciousness of a concept of
commodities. Everything, even things we make, belong to the Creators of
Life and are to be returned ceremonially, and in reality, to the owners.
Our people live a simple life, one unemcumbered by the needs of endless
material commodities. The fact their needs are few means all the peoples'
needs are easily met. It is also true that our means of distribution is an
eminently fair process, one in which all the people share in all the
material wealth all the time.
Our Domestic Mode of Production has a number of definitions which are
culturally specific. Our peoples' economy requires a community of people
and is not intended to define an economy based on the self-sufficient
nuclear family. Some modern economists estimate that in most parts of the
world, the isolated nuclear family cannot produce enough to survive in a
Domestic Mode of Production. In any case, that particular mode of
subsistence, by our cultural definition, is not an economy at all.
Ours was a wealthy society. No one suffered from want. All had the
right to food, clothing and shelter. All shared in the bounty of the
spiritual ceremonies and the Natural World. No one stood in any material
relationship of power over anyone else. No one could deny anyone access to
the things they needed. All in all, before the colonists came, ours was a
beautiful and rewarding Way of Life.
Colonists arrived with many institutions and strategies designed to
destroy the Way of Life of the People of the Longhouse. In 1609 Samuel de
Champlain led a French military expedition that attacked a party of Mohawk
people on the lake now named "Lake Champlain." Champlain arrived in search
of wealth and was specifically interested in generating some kind of trade
in beaver pelts with the Algonquin people of the area. He demonstrated his
firearms to them, letting them see, for the first time, the power of guns.
Champlain, accompanied by his new-found business partners, marched into
the center of Mohawk territory. This war party encountered a party of
about 200 Mohawks. The first volley of gunfire killed three men, and the
second created such confusion the Mohawks retreated, leaving twelve men who
were taken captive.
The period of warfare which followed this incident has come to be known
as the "Beaver Wars." The introduction of trade in beaver pelts inevitably
triggered a long series of colonial wars. It represented the escalation of
disputes among neighbors into a full-scale struggle for survival in the
forest of the Native people of North America.
European penetration affected every facet of the Native Way of Life from
the very moment of contact. Natural economies, cultures, politics, and
military affairs became totally affected. Nations learned that to be
without firearms meant physical annihilation. To be without access to
beaver pelts meant no means to buy firearms.
Trade in beaver pelts and the now necessary weaponry introduced factors
never before encountered by Native people. Trade meant long routes over
which goods were to be transported had to be secured. The only way that
was possible was for the entire area to be in friendly hands. Any
potential disruptor of trade routes must either be pacified or eliminated.
With introduction of firearms, war became deadly business. It was made
more deadly because the European strategy of economic penetration was to
stimulate warfare among Native nations over which would have goods for
trade. Out of necessity to protect themselves from annihilation, the
People of the Longhouse entered the beaver trade. Pelts were used to buy
firearms and goods that made it possible for more men to trap more beaver
more efficiently. The marketplaces of France, Holland and England were
eager for the "New World" merchandise.
Shortly after the encounter on Lake Champlain, the Hau de no sau nee
began trading with Holland, which had established posts along the Hudson
River. A large part of the trade involved firearms. French historians
recount that the People of the Longhouse were very skilled at strategies of
battle, and within a short time the Algonquin people were defeated. Their
defeat was aided by the fact that the French had not taken seriously their
pledges of aid to the Algonquin.
So intense became the need for European goods, especially firearms, that
by 1640 beaver were becoming scarce in the Hau de no sau nee territories.
Pressure from newly created European frontiers was steadily increasing.
Warfare was also common between various colonizers. Hau de no sau nee were
well aware of what was occurring to the East. Dutch, shortly after their
arrival, began a series of genocidal wars that ended in utter annihilation
of Native peoples of the Lower Hudson Valley. In New England, the Pequot
Nation was nearly obliterated by Puritan and English colonists there.
Knowledge of these massacres greatly influenced Hau de no sau nee
defense policy. To the East the Dutch and English presence was necessary
as a source of firearms. Yet they represented a constant potential
movement of their frontiers westward into the Longhouse. To the north the
colony of France was supplying arms to Western Native nations. France also
threatened to gain a monopoly over beaver trade which was increasingly
centered to the north and west of Lakes Erie and Ontario.
France made repeated attempts to send missionaries, especially Jesuits,
among the nations of the Hau de no sau nee. These missions were the major
tool of propaganda for European nations. Missionaries, then as today, are
expected to carry more than the message of Christianity. They serve as lay
ambassadors of their culture, splitting off individuals from families,
families from villages, villages from nations, one by one. Some priests
even served as the leaders of troops going into battle.
Missionaries made persistent attacks on the economic structures of the
People of the Longhouse. They specifically attacked spiritual ceremonies
as "pagan," and thereby sought to end the practice of give-aways and public
feasts. In addition, they sought to break the power of the clans by
causing division which would split the people into nuclear households.
European churches, especially in colonial practice, take on their feudal
roles as economic institutions. Among natural world people, they are the
most dangerous agents of destruction. They invariably seek to destroy the
spiritual/economic bonds of the people of the forests, land and animals.
They spread both ideologies and technologies which make people slaves to
the extractive system which defines colonialism.
In 1704 the first Anglican missionaries were sent by England to Mohawks
living along the Mohawk River. In 1710 a delegation of Mohawk chiefs
received an invitation to visit England. They returned bearing four
bibles, a prayer book and a communion plate for the Anglican chapel, gifts
from Queen Anne. But missionaries also brought behind them a long, long
tail. To house themselves they needed a mission, to protect the mission
they needed a fort, and to propagate the faith, they needed a school.
Missionaries spread more than the word of God. The British Empire was fast
entering Hau de no sau nee territories, and there was more to come.
Warlike Europeans were constantly fighting among themselves. There were
three wars in the 18th century just between France and England: Queen
Anne's War (1701-1713), King George's War (1744-1748) and the "French and
Indian War," known to Europeans as the "War of Spanish Succession" (1754-
1763). It's clear from records of the time the People of the Longhouse
remained neutral throughout these conflicts, although individuals on the
road to assimilation, such as Anglicized Mohawks who had been coerced into
roles as British peasants, could be counted on to aid the colonizers.
If France was unsuccessful in attempts at military penetration of the
territory of the Longhouse, England was far more successful in social and
religious colonization of eastern parts of our territories. William
Johnson was an Irish immigrant who became famous for his influence over
certain Mohawks. As agent of the British Crown, he maintained an embassy
as an operational base close to Mohawk country. He took several Native
women as concubines and had several children by them, none of which he ever
recognized as his heirs. His position was known as "British Superintendent
of Indian Affairs for the Northern Department." He is widely credited, by
European historians, as a successful manipulator of events and developments
on the frontier during his tenure. In today's context Johnson would be an
ambassador to a Third World country, executing simultaneously diplomatic,
military, intelligence, and foreign aid operations.
During his tenure he engineered establishment of a beachhead from which
immigrants could move west to broaden the colony. Mohawk lands along the
Susquehanna and Mohawk Rivers were increasingly encroached on by British
settlers, including Johnson himself. By spring 1765 the carefully managed
Longhouse environment was in trouble as ignorant and destructive peasant
settlers almost eradicated deer herds.
There was so much trouble with peasant settlers that Mohawks who had so
generously allowed them to share their lands were actually considering
moving west into Oneida territories to gain some peace. By spring 1765
many Mohawks had already been displaced and were living as refugees among
other nations.
William Johnson was a master public relations man for the King. He
would, on one hand, apologize for the behavior of frontiersmen and urge
Mohawks to be patient, and on the other hand encourage more settlers to
move into Mohawk lands. He would make a great show of protecting Hau de no
sau nee interests, and in that way encourage the People of the Longhouse to
seek a resolution at the bargaining table where they invariably ended up
trading land to gain a temporary peace.
Throughout this period many other Native peoples had been moving into
our territories to gain some respite from the colonial onslaught. Far to
the south, in the colonized area known as the Carolinas, Tuscaroras were
faced with imminent destruction. In their drive to gain more land and
economic advantage, English colonizers used the same techniques which were
employed in the Northeast. In 1713 dispossessed Tuscaroras withdrew from
their homelands and sought protection in the territories of the Hau de no
sau nee. They were not the only people displaced. Delawares, Tuteloes,
Shawnees, and others fled to Hau de no sau nee lands seeking peace.
Peace, however, was not to be. At the approach of the American
Revolution, Hau de no sau nee did everything possible to remain neutral.
With the decline of France and the increasing decline in the importance of
trade, the settler bourgeoisie of Anglo colonies cast increasingly envious
eyes on lands of the Longhouse. Still, our military power was formidable,
and our resolve was to remain neutral.
The policy of England, however, was to involve Hau de no sau nee in war.
To accomplish this, they resorted to bribery, trickery, false propaganda,
and emotional appeal. Hau de no sau nee continued its policy of neutrality
throughout. Both colonists and "Loyalists" entered our territories in
search of mercenaries. Loyalist strategy was more successful. They were
able to draw some of our people into battle with revolting colonists.
The Treaty of Ghent, which ended the war, made no provision, at least in
writing, for Native nations, which the British Crown had solemnly promised
to protect. Thus representatives of the People of the Longhouse held an
international treaty meeting with the new federation called the United
States of America in September 1784. The U.S. demanded huge cessions of
territory, especially from Senecas. Warriors who had been delegated to the
meeting eventually signed the treaty. However, they had not been
authorized to commit the Hau de no sau nee without consulting them. For a
time, the terms of the treaty were not known, as the U.S. would not provide
Hau de no sau nee with a copy of the document. As many Native people know,
to their regrets, signing a treaty and ratification of a treaty are two
separate acts, each necessary before a treaty becomes valid. Although the
U.S. Congress ratified the treaty, the legislative council of the Hau de no
sau nee met at Buffalo Creek and renounced the agreement.
Somehow the U.S. takes the position that the Hau de no sau nee ceased to
exist by the year 1784, although the Longhouse has continued to this day.
There is ample evidence that all the nations continued to participate in
matters of the Great Council, legislative body of the Confederacy. None of
the nations of the League has ever declared themselves separate from the
Confederation. Oneidas, whose reputed allegiance to the U.S. was based on
the existence of Oneida mercenaries, continued to send their delegates to
the Council, and Tuscarora remain firmly attached to the League.
Although Hau de no sau nee have been severely disrupted by the westward
expansion of the United States, the subsequent surrounding of their lands
and attempts to devour its people, the Six Nations Confederacy continues to
function. Indeed, today its strength continues to be increasing.
By pretending Hau de no sau nee government no longer exists, both the
U.S. and Britain illegally took Hau de no sau nee territories by simply
saying the territories belong to them. To this day Canada, the former
colony of England, has never made a treaty for lands in the St. Lawrence
River Valley. But the truth continues to remain and plague officials yet
today. Hau de no sau nee territories are not and have never been part of
the U.S. or Canada. Citizens of Hau de no sau nee are a separate people,
distinct from either Canada or the U.S. Because of this, Hau de no sau nee
refuses to recognize a border drawn by a foreign people through our lands.
The policy of the dispossession of North American Native peoples, first
by European kingdoms, and later by settler regimes, began with the first
contact. Dispossession took a number of approaches: so-called "just
warfare" was a strategy by which Native nations were deemed to have
offended the Crown and their elimination by fire and sword was justified.
That was followed by the Treaty Period in which Native nations were
"induced" to sell their lands and move westward. The Treaty Period was in
full swing at the beginning of the 19th Century. By 1815 the governor of
New York was agitating for removal of all Native people from the state for
"their own good."
While the infamous Trail of Tears was removing Native peoples from the
Southeast to Oklahoma, New York State was lobbying for a treaty in 1838
intended to remove Hau de no sau nee, who were on lands the state wanted,
away to an area of Kansas. The principal victims were to be the Senecas.
Like the Termination Policy a century later, the Removal Policy was
eventually abandoned due in part to the bad press received during the
Cherokee Removal in 1832. During the process of the Cherokee Removal,
thousands of Cherokee men, women, children, and elders were subjected to
conditions which caused them to die of exposure, starvation and neglect.
In 1871 U.S. Congress passed an Act which included a clause that
treaties would no longer be made with "Indian Nations." It was at this
time that official U.S. policy towards Native people began to shift to a
new strategy. Reports to Congress began to urge that Native poeple be
assimilated into U.S. society as quickly as possible. The policy of fire
and sword simply began to become less popular among an increasingly
significant percentage of the U.S. population. The principal hindrance to
assimilation of the Native people, according to its most vocal adherents,
was the Indian land base. Native land was held in common and this was
perceived as an uncivilized and un-American practice. Assimilationists
urged that if every Indian family owned its own farmstead they could more
readily acquire "civilized" traits. Thus the Dawes Act of 1886 ordered
Native nations stripped of their land base, resulting in the transfer of
millions of acres to European hands.
There was consistent pressure in the New York Legislature to "civilize"
Hau de no sau nee. To accomplish this, all vestiges of Hau de no sau nee
nationality needed to be destroyed. This is the 19th Century origin of the
policy to "educate" Indians to be culturally European. It was thought when
the Indian was successfully Europeanized he would no longer be distinct and
separate, and there would no longer be indigenous people with their own
customs and economy. At that point Indians could be simply declared to be
assimilated into U.S. or Canadian society. The net effect would dispense
with the entire concept of Native nations, and would extinguish claims of
those nations to their lands. The report of the Whipple Committee to the
New York Legislature in 1888 was clear: "Exterminate the Tribe."
In 1924 Canadian government "abolished" Hau de no sau nee government at
the Grand River territory. Oneida and Akewesasne territories were invaded
and occupied by Canadian troops to establish neo-colonial "elective
systems" in the name of democracy. Also in 1924 U.S. government passed
legislation declaring all American Indians to be U.S. citizens. The 1924
Citizenship Act was an attempt to deny the existence of Native nations, and
the rights of Native nations to their lands. The denial of the existence
of Native nations is a way to legitimize colonists' claims to the lands.
This concept is furthered by imposition of non-Native forms of government.
This also serves to fulfill the colonizer's need to destroy any semblance
of sovereignty. The actual process for taking lands can be accomplished
when the Native nation no longer exists in its original context - when it
is less of a nation.
With all semblance of a Native nation's original context destroyed,
Canada and the U.S. can rationalize that integration has occurred. With
this rationale in hand, both governments have set out to enact their final
solutions to the "Indian Problem."
Hau de no sau nee vigorously objected to the Citizenship Act and
maintain to this day that the People of the Longhouse are not citizens of
Canada or the U.S., but are citizens of their own nations of the League.
The Termination Acts of the 1950s were efforts to simply declare Native
nations no longer exist and to appropriate their lands. The acts were so
disasterous they caused something of a national scandal. "St. Regis," the
European name for Akwesasne, was one of our territories targeted by the
Bureau of Indian Affairs as "ready for integration."
The Bureau of Indian Affiars based its recommendation on the fact many
Mohawks had acquired at least some of the material conditions which made
their community outwardly indistinguishable from the white communities. In
fact, however, Akwesasne was, and is, very different from the small towns
in the area surrounding it.
Termination submerged as official policy in the late 1960s. But
Termination is simply a means to an end. The objective is the economic
exploitation of a people and their lands. Taking of lands and denial and
destruction of Native nations are concrete and undeniable elements in the
colonization process as it is applied to Native people surrounded by a
settler state. Tools to accomplish their end include guns, disease,
revised histories, repressive missionaries, indoctrinating teachers, and
these things are often cloaked in codes of law. In the 20th Century the
taking of land and destruction of the culture and Native economy serve to
force Native people into roles as industrial workers, just as in the 19th
Century the same processes forced Native people in the U.S. and Canada into
roles as landless peasants.
Hau de no sau nee has, over a period of 375 years, met every definition
of an oppressed nation. It has been subjected to raids of extermination
from France, England and the United States. Its people have been driven
from their ancestral lands, impoverished and persecuted for their Hau de no
sau nee customs. It has been the victim of fraudulent dealings from three
European governments which openly expressed the goal of the extermination
of Hau de no sau nee. Our children have been taught to despise their
ancestors, their culture, their religion, and their traditional economy.
Recently, it has been a government-sponsored fad to have bi-lingual/bi-
cultural programs in schools. These programs are not a sincere effort to
revitalize Hau de no sau nee, but exist as an integrationists' ploy to
imply "acceptance" from the dominating culture.
Revisionist U.S. and British historians have cloaked the past in a veil
of lies. National and local governments of the Hau de no sau nee have been
suppressed and usurped by colonial authorities, and their neo-colonial
Indian helpers, to carry out policies of repression in the name of
"democracy." Generation after generation has seen the Hau de no sau nee
land base, and therefore its economic base, shrink under the expanionist
policies of the United States, Great Britain and Canada.
The world is told by colonial government propaganda machines that Hau de
no sau nee are simply "victims of civilization and progress." The truth is
they are victims of conscious and persistent effort of destruction directed
at them by European governments and their heirs in North America. Hau de
no sau nee do not suffer terminal illness of natural causes - it is being
deliberately strangled to death by those who would benefit from its death.
Although treaties may often have been bad deals for Native nations, the
U.S. and Canada chose not to honor those which exist because to do so would
require return of much of the economic base and sovereignty to Hau de no
sau nee. Treaties contain the potential for independent survival of Native
people. Dishonoring of treaties is essential to the goal of the U.S. and
Canadian vested interests which are organized to remove any and all
obstacles to their exploitation of the Earth and her peoples.
European nations of the Western Hemisphere continue to wage war against
Hau de no sau nee. Weapons have changed somewhat - Indian Education
programs and social workers, neo-colonial Indian officials and racist laws
are used first. If these methods fail, the guns are still ready, as recent
history at Akwesasne and South Dakota have shown.
The effect of all these policies has been destruction of the culture and
therefore the economy of the People of the Longhouse. Traditional economy
has been largely replaced by colonial economy which serves multinational
corporate interests. Colonial economy extracts labor and materials from
the people of the Hau de no sau nee for the benefit of colonizers. The
Christian religions, school systems, neo-colonial elective systems, all
work toward these goals.
We are an economically poor people today. Few of us can afford to
support the spiritual ceremonies which form the foundations of our
traditional economies. Money economy is not adaptable to the real economy
of our people. Few of our peoples participate in the Domestic Mode of
Production which defines traditional economy. This is largely because the
colonizer's education system, and also more systematic and brutal attempts
at acculturation, have placed neo-colonial governments on our territories.
On some Hau de no sau nee lands, Canadian and U.S. government moneys employ
one-third of all employable workers, creating economic dependence among
potential leaders of Hau de no sau nee, and actively recruiting people away
from the Domestic Mode of Production. Traditional economy is under heavy
attack from many directions, and all else is an economy of exploitation.
Political oppression, social oppression, economic oppression, all have the
same face. These are the tools of Genocide in North America.
Genocide is alive and well in the territory of Hau de no sau nee. Its
technicians are in Washington, Ottawa and Albany, and its agents control
schools, churches and neo-colonial "elective system" offices found in our
territories. Oppression of Hau de no sau nee has taken its toll - but Hau
de no sau nee continues to meet in council and its members are on the rise.
Hau de no sau nee, the People of the Longhouse, still have a long history
ahead. We have developed strategies to resist economic effects as we
revitalize our social and political institutions. This can be accomplished
only on sufficient lands within the ancient boundaries of our territories.
We are living in a period of time in which we expect to see great
changes in the economy of the colonizers. Imperial powers of the world
appear to be facing successful resistance to expansion in Africa, Asia and
other parts of the world. We will soon see the end of an economy based on
the supply of cheap oil, natural gas and other resources, and that will
greatly change the face of the world.
For the moment, there is more wealth, more goods and services, more
automation than has ever existed in the history of mankind. The world is
living in an age of manufactured affluence. But the people of the world
have rarely been told the costs in terms of peoples' lives and suffering
that this affluence has extracted from each of us. Even people in North
America who seemingly benefit from all these "advances" seem unaware of the
destruction they are experiencing. The "Modern Age," and its consumer
values, has altered, in very basic ways, the very structure of human
society, and the basic conditions of the Natural World.
The modern family is an institution which is presently under a great
deal of stress. The family in Western society has undergone great changes
over the last century. As the Westernization of the world continues, all
peoples will be faced with similar stresses and turmoils.
We, the Hau de no sau nee, have clear choices about the future. One of
these choices which we have faced is whether to become Westernized, or to
remain true to the Way of Life our forefathers devised for us. We have
stated our understanding of the history of those changes that have created
present conditions. We have chosen to remain Hau de no sau nee, and within
the context of our Way of Life, to set a course of liberation for ourselves
and future generations.
Our liberation process is not one that is exclusive to us as Humans, but
also includes other life forms that coexist and are as oppressed as we.
Liberation of the Natural World is a process which is being undertaken in a
most difficult environment. The people surrounding us seem to be intent on
destroying themselves and every living thing.
Throughout the past 400 years Hau de no sau nee have exerted a great
influence on the lives of millions of people. Theories of democracy and
classless society have been developed from inadequate interpretations of
the true nature of those ideals. This conference may be the time which
begins a process which moves toward more real definition of these concepts.
In our homelands our people are still struggling and developing
strategies for survival. In Mohawk country our people have reoccupied
lands for the purpose of revitalizing our culture and economy. This
settlement, known as Ganienkeh, has been successfully held for more than
three years. Oneidas have been waging a court battle for several years to
regain 265,000 acres illegally taken in the 1700s. Cayugas have also been
engaged in an effort to regain 100,000 acres taken during the same period
as the theft from the Oneidas. Onondagas and Tuscaroras have been carrying
unceasing battle to gain control of the education their children receive.
Senecas have been forced into a long struggle to protect the last of their
land still under traditional government, lands at Tonawanda territory.
Every day of our lives finds us defending ourselves from some form of
intrusion by the State of New York or the U.S. or Canadian governments.
If we are to continue to survive, we need the help of the international
community. We need external presence to bring some sort of stability to
the situation of our people. We have learned, too frequently, that what is
good law today can rapidly be changed into bad law. Both Canada and the
U.S. have taught us that their legal systems are part of the political
machinery which effects the oppression of our peoples.
We are nations in every definition of the term. We have been unable to
obtain any semblance of justice in the court systems of the U.S. or Canada,
and we suffer horrible legal injustices which have terrible economic and
social consequences for our people. Many of our legal problems involve
land and sovereignty over land, and land is the basis of our economy. We
are seeking our rights in those areas under International Law.
Lastly, we require economic assistance in the forms of economic aid and
technical assistance. We are aware there exist various international
figures who have technical expertise and are conscious of development in
the context of specific cultures. Our case is appropriate to the
deliberations of the United Nations Decolonization Committee. We are
engaged in a struggle to decolonize our lands and our lives, but we cannot
accomplish this goal alone and unaided.
For centuries we have known that each individual's action creates
conditions and situations that affect the world. For centuries we have
been careful to avoid any action unless it carried a long-range prospect of
promoting harmony and peace in the world. In that context, with our
brothers and sisters of the Western Hemisphere, we have journeyed here to
discuss these important matters with other members of the Family of Man.
=============================================================
-*+*- David Yarrow, the turtle, for SOLSTICE magazine (igc!jdmann).
***** SOLSTICE Perspectives on Health and Environment, is a bimonthly
printed at 200 E. Main St Suite H, Charlottesville, VA 22901; 804-979-4427
---
Patt Haring | United Nations | FAX: 212-787-1726
patth@sci.ccny.cuny.edu | Information | BBS: 201-795-0733
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-=- Every child smiles in the same language. -=-