“The Corps of Engineers just denied the permit half an hour ago” said my step-mother triumphantly in Sunday’s phone call. She knew I’d welcome that news even though our conversations haven’t traversed the Standing Rock Sioux’s territory or the corporate pipeline that threatens it.
The bravery of those people camping
out at the confluence of the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers in defense of their
rights to their lands has had me standing taller lately. However, to think that our government could
respond appropriately at this moment of great need – in fact, the Corps of
Engineers, which is not known for its interest in public input – has
re-instated my belief in this system.
Suddenly I feel glad to be Uncle Sam’s daughter.
It’s all about land, when it comes
right down to it, how land matters ‘way more than we think. The Standing Rock Sioux know how much land
matters, as do most Native American tribes.
Despite treaties and lands reserved for their exclusive use, their
history is peppered with losses of control over resources and their quality of
life to the kind of thinking behind the Dakota Access Pipeline.
It’s watching others stand up for
land that’s straightened my backbone, like Dave Archambault, the Standing Rock
tribal chairman, who was interviewed Friday on the PBS News Hour. Responding to the pipeline CEO’s statement
that the tribe was worried about nothing, he said “If the safeguards are all
there, why not put it (back to the original route) north of Bismark?”
“He
(the CEO) will say that it can’t go there because of the population of the
community, the environmental impacts, the sacred sites that are there, the
wetlands that it has to cross. These are all the same concerns that we have.
It’s just that we’re a lot fewer (in population.) And so, if there is no worry, if the
safeguards are there, then relocate it to that location. That’s OK.”
As he said this,
his face showed nothing: no anger, no glee at beating that kind of logic at its
own game, no snide-bordering-on-vindictive disgust like my face would have
shown had I pulled that off. He was
remarkable, sitting there in the News Hour studio in his light blue,
button-down collar shirt, no jacket, no tie, no eagle feathers in his hair or
silver jewelry draped around his neck.
He was just a man speaking truth to power who had come to Washington to
discuss his peoples’ concerns with the federal government, which Sunday’s news
confirmed was worth the effort.
The news earlier in the week that
several thousand veterans would be joining the tribes at their encampment,
intending to make a human wall between the land protectors and the
proto-military police forces who had drenched the protestors with water cannons
the week before, had confirmed the national importance of this seemingly tiny
decision. Have we not had enough of our
culture’s and our government’s ignorant, arrogant demeaning treatment of native
people? The veterans’ actions say that
we have.
I feel that the efforts of the
Standing Rock tribe and other Americans, Native and natural-born citizens both,
have been a great gift to those of us who feel compelled to question the
erosive aspects of “development.” “We
have every right to protest this pipeline,” Archambault said. “We have indigenous lands, we have ancestral
lands, we have treaty lands. The pipeline is 500 feet from our reservation
border.… (I)t’s unfortunate that this nation continues to treat our tribe and
tribal nations around this country in this manner.”
Monday morning I logged on to the
PBS News Hour website to follow up the Corps’ announcement. There, in an article by Jenni Monet, was a
photo of a 97-year-old woman standing in a gymnasium on the Cheyenne River
Sioux reservation Saturday, waiting to greet the veterans arriving in
support. First Lt. Marcela LeBeau of the
Lakota tribe had served in the U.S. Army as a nurse between 1944 and 1947. Dressed in a plum-colored, dress-length
Ultrasuede raincoat, her powder-blue snow parka lying on a folding table behind
her, her silver hair piled high on her head, Lt. LeBeau stood tall as she
waited for the volunteer troops with a placid, peaceful smile on her face, a
smile only slightly wider than the Mona Lisa’s. Did she know then that this effort was going
to work? Or did she only know that it
was the right thing to do, regardless?
When governments and corporations do
not respect the laws of the land or the people who live there, we all have
every right to protest. In fact, I
believe we have an obligation. Standing
tall at Standing Rock, the veterans of wars both foreign and domestic have
shown us how to reclaim our democracy. May we stand tall with them in support
and spirit.
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Trudy
Wischemann researches issues of land ethics, land use and land tenure from her
home in Lindsay. For more information on
the Standing Rock efforts, go to www.pbsnewshour.org. To contribute funds to these efforts, visit http://www.rop.org/rural-oregon-stands-standing-rock/. Thanks
to rural minister/songwriter John Pitney for this recommendation. See also Waddie Mitchell's lyrics to Juni Fisher's song "Still Here," described in this blog Feb. 11, 2015.
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