The 1971 Tribal Election That Changed Federal Policy
Fifty years ago today, a tribal election on the Colville Indian Reservation helped push a change in federal policy towards American Indians/Alaska Natives
I took this photo on my the last day of my recent duty period at the IHS clinic in Nespelem. All those signs along State Highway 155 are for an upcoming tribal election for seats on the tribal council of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation.
Fifty years ago today (8 May 1971), an election for the tribal council for the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation in north central Washington state drew a line in the sand against the federal policy of termination in which the federal government terminated its treaty and trust obligations to the Native American tribes.
"Indian Termination" was the policy of the United States from the 1940s until the early 1970s, shaped by a set of laws and policies based on assimilating Native Americans into mainstream society. While the goals of assimilation were not new and part of federal policy towards the tribal communities since the 1800s, what was new to the Termination Era was a legislative urgency by the United States to end tribal sovereignty, federal recognition and the reservations with or without the consent of the tribes involved.
"If you can't change them, absorb them until they simply disappear into the mainstream culture.... In Washington's infinite wisdom, it was decided that tribes should no longer be tribes, never mind that they had been tribes for thousands of years."
-Ben Nighthorse Campbell, former US Senator from Colorado
Prior to 1940, the federal government had jurisdiction over the Native American Reservations as part of long-standing treaty obligations. That changed with the Kansas Act of 1940 that granted the State of Kansas jurisdiction over the four tribes that lived in Kansas- the Potawatomi, Kickapoo, Sac & Fox, and the Iowa tribes. While a series of similar laws in other states that followed dealt primarily with criminal jurisdiction, it had set in motion forces that would serve to further separate the federal government from its prior treaty obligations.
On the surface of it, the wording of termination laws and policies seemed benign enough. On 1 August 1953, House Resolution 108 was enacted declaring as Congressional policy as “rapidly as possible to make the Indians within the territorial limits of the United States subject to the same laws and entitled to the same privileges and responsibilities as are applicable to other citizens of the United States, and to grant them all the rights and prerogatives pertaining to American citizenship.”
However, within the termination policies came an immediate end of federal tribal recognition, federal services and benefit programs as well as an end to a tribe's reservation lands. Over 100 tribes lost recognition and their reservation lands within three years of the passing of House Resolution 108 in 1953. Relocation programs moved Native American families off reservation lands to US cities and placed them in seasonal jobs like the railroad or agriculture. But once terminated as a federally-recognized tribe, those Native Americans lost access to the Indian Health Service and those families moved to US cities to "assimilate" were only given six months of health insurance.
As many tribes lacked their own hospitals and clinics outside of the IHS, the impact on Native American health was disastrous particularly as tuberculosis was rampant in the mid-1950s. The Menominee Tribe of Wisconsin, for example, lacked its own clinical facilities and 25% of the tribe were stricken with tuberculosis and no means of treatment. Many of these health impacts persisted beyond the end of the termination policies- the Grand Ronde and Siletz tribes of Western Oregon, for example, in a health survey done in 1976 by the IHS, 75% of the members of both tribes needed dental care and 30% of the adults in both tribes needed eyeglasses. But their earlier termination affected their access to health care and like many Native American communities, poverty and lack of economic development prevented any possibility of "assimilation".
In 1956, the Colvile Tribes were put on the list for termination. The tribe was required to submit a plan to terminate federal recognition in five years. A contentious period in tribal politics ensued with pro-termination Colville members controlling the tribal council despite the fact that the vast majority of the tribe was against termination. Pro-termination Congressional representatives put bills into motion in Washington to forward the termination of the Colville Tribe's recognition and sovereignty by 1965.
But things were far from decided as President Lyndon B. Johnson indicated a willingness to end termination policies which had the effect of stalling termination of several tribes, one of which was the Colville Tribe. News stories about how termination had a negative impact on the tribes that were terminated since 1953 helped shift in the political winds in the federal government.
The tribal election of 1971 for the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation was a contentious one with the incumbent tribal officials supporting termination. Tribal chairman Narcisse Nicholson supported termination for he felt it was time to end their relationship of Washington and strike it out on their own. Anti-termination candidates for the tribal council were numerous and argued that termination policies were a new weapon in a long struggle to take Indian lands.
That tribal election was, in effect, a referendum on the federal policy of termination.
“I think that was the thing that really brought my attention to it as a child and hearing their discussions back and forth … if we terminate what would happen? If we don't terminate what would happen? … Because if we do terminate, we're going to lose all of our reservation lands. We will no longer have a home or children will no longer have the hunting and the fishing and gathering that we are enjoying here today. The end of tribal government would mean there would have been no mechanism in place for solving community problems. Well, if I can't go out hunting, and if I can't go out fishing, why would I want any amount of money? I was really happy that it was voted down, because Indian people have already lost so much."
-Rodney Cawston, current Colville chairman
“Can you imagine Henry Jackson, sponsor of the bill, walking into the offices of white businessmen in Everett, Washington, and asking them to sell him their property, with values to be determined six months after the sale? Or what happens if the land owners under the law are declared incompetent? They would then be judged too incompetent to handle their own money, but competent enough to vote to sell their reservation. Is it any wonder that Indians distrust white men?”
-Vine Deloria Jr, Colville author, on the 1971 tribal election
The vote on 8 May 1971 was not even close as candidates against termination swept the tribal council elections. Following Colville vote, not a single Native American tribe afterwards had to experience termination.
The new tribal chairman of the Colville Tribes, Mel Tonasket, was only 30 years old. The new tribal council moved swiftly to assert its tribal rights and sovereignty. The federal government was held accountable to its long time treaty obligations. The winds of change reached all the way to Washington DC where self-determination and tribal sovereignty was now the policy of the United States.
One of the most active tribal dissenters, Lucy Covington, is now memorialized by the Colville as the tribal government center is named for her. She is the granddaughter of Chief Moses, leader of the Sinkiuse-Columbia tribe, one of the twelve tribes of the Colville at the time of the Reservation's establishment in the 1870s. Much of the work done by the Colville who were against termination are thanks to her efforts.
Things didn't get better overnight for the Native Americans in 1971 because of the end of termination policies. Many tribes engaged in protracted lawsuits to regain federal recognition and get their lands back. For many of these tribes, that restoration of their lands has been partial.
To give you an idea of just how recently these court battles took place, this is a few of the many of the tribes that had termination reversed and they year they regained their status:
Klamath Tribe (Oregon, California): 1986
Coquille Tribe (Oregon): 1989
Pauite Tribe (Utah): 1980
Catawba Tribe (South Carolina): 1993
Ponca Tribe (Nebraska): 1990
These are but a few of many examples of terminated tribes that even to this day are still trying to rebuild their communities following the termination policies of the 1940s-1960s. I have learned on my duty periods on the Colville Reservation that they have a long and proud tradition of both political and judicial activism that has benefitted not just the Colville, but all American Indians and Alaska Natives.