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[forwarded by Marilyn Reid. Thanks!]

Date: Tuesday, February 22, 2000 7:55 PM
Subject: re: DMGeorge-Kanentiio column: please distribute

Cayuga Decision A Call to Action
©by Doug George-Kanentiio

    When I was a teenager in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s it was a great
time to be a young Akwesasne Mohawk.
    Our community was a beehive of political , social and cultural
activities; the traditional people were on the move with the Mohawk Nation
Council overseeing the publication of the godfather of all Native news
journals “Akwesasne Notes”, sponsoring the touring group White Roots of
Peace, holding conferences to discuss aboriginal rights and being a overall
pain in the rear to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and other right wing
organizations.
    The ancient ceremonies which define our relationship with the universe,
labeled “pagan rituals” by some, attracted great support among the younger
generation and fitted well with the social activism of that era. Our dances
and songs excited our emotions while liberating us from the shackles of
Christian shame. We felt good about who we were and that alone was a threat
to many.
    Our community was a magnet for Native peoples from throughout the world.
At the offices of Akwesasne Notes, where we went to help mail the newspaper,
one could at any time meet Aborigines from Australia, Lakotas from Pine
Ridge, Mapuchis from Chile or  Mayans form the hills of Guatemala, the
grandparents of all Turtle Island indigenous people.
    We not only learned from our visitors but they took with them a
distinctly Haudenosaunee perspective on this thing called Native identity.
They were taught to be firm in their defense of the natural world, to
aggressively pursue their treaty rights and to never concede anything to the
external judicial or political entities who had no desire to see an expansion
of our aboriginal nations.  These judges and congressmen were  agents of a
system which barely tolerated our survival as distinct peoples.
    Courts and lawyers, presidents and senators, bills and appeals had no
place in our councils for our traditional leaders adhered to a different set
of values.  They took to heart their responsibilities to speak on behalf of
the natural world and those yet unborn.  They were, in the western
capitalistic sense, truly impractical leaders but their determination to
remain true to the ancestral ways ignited fires throughout the hemisphere.
    As a teenager the longhouse people won my support because they took a
strong stand against the system.  The Mohawk Nation had good reason to stand
tall as its citizens put their bodies on the line in defense of their Native
rights.  Mohawks blocked bridges, occupied offices and reclaimed land. Our
citizens led the takeover of Alcatraz, played a key role in the 1972 BIA
takeover and joined with the Lakota Nation at Wounded Knee.
    Along the way, we mastered the art of mass communications beginning with
our own publications which not only offered a pro-Native newspaper but
printed books and posters which could be found on the shelves and hanging on
the walls of Native homes and offices across America.  An Akwesasne Mohawk
was greeted with warmth and admiration for we were seen as a people who
refused to knuckle under.
    The events I witnessed were all the more amazing given the composition of
the Mohawk Nation Council of Chiefs.  The rodiyane (our traditional male
leaders), clanmothers and faithkeepers were not highly educated in the formal
sense.  They were basket weavers, ironworkers, fishermen and lacrosse stick
makers.  They thought and conversed almost entirely in the Mohawk language
and held conservative views on the sanctity of marriage, the caring of
children and the need to preserve a sharp distinction between the genders.
    The Nation Council met in the old longhouse every Sunday.  Their meetings
were dignified affairs, characterized by long silences, gentle questions and
respectful discussions; one never heard a harsh word or a loud, argumentative
voice. The passions of the day were often carried into the longhouse by the
younger crowd but after the recitation of the Ohenton Kariwahtekwen, the
words of thanksgiving which must come before all else.
    Those words, as spoken by one of the rodiyane holding a string of sacred
wampum, addressed the natural world and gave us a sense of perspective as to
who we were as Onkwehonwe, Kaiienkehaka and Haudenosaunee.
    The prayer also affirmed our place within Creation as well as
acknowledging our connection with the spiritual world.  We realized the earth
was a living entity and very conscious of the humans who walked upon her. We
saw ourselves as defenders of the natural world whenever we rallied to oppose
unwarranted intrusions into our community by Canada or the US.  Given this
powerful sense of belonging how could we lose?
    One of the goals of the Mohawk Nation was to secure additional lands as
Akwesasne had become a fairly crowded place with a dramatic population
increase after World War 2.  The longhouse people were also concerned about
the contamination of our water, air and land from a number of industrial
plants on our western borders.
    Along with the other Iroquois nations, the Mohawks initiated a formal
land claim against New York because we believed the State had violated our
treaties as well as US federal laws when it allegedly purchased Mohawk
territory.
    The Mohawks watched as the Oneidas and Cayugas won a series of legal
victories in the US courts which should have ideally stimulated serious
settlement negotiations. But there were those traditional Mohawks who were
apprehensive about taking our land claims into court.  They saw how the
Iroquois were defeated when they sought justice in the 1950’s.
    The struggles to prevent the construction of Kinzua Dam on Seneca
Territory; the building of a huge water reservoir on the Tuscarora
reservation; the ripping apart of parts of Akwesasne and Kahnawake to build
the St. Lawrence Seaway; in each instance the Iroquois had taken their
complaints into state and federal courts only to lose.  Naturally, there was
considerable apprehension by the chiefs and clanmothers.  They knew the
courts were controlled by non-Native white males who had limited
understanding of Iroquois issues and no tolerance for the Huadenosaunee’s
insistence on maintaining its independence from the US.
    Land occupations were effective but there was a high risk of
confrontation and violence, as shown in the Eagle Bay encampment of 1974. New
Yorkers were on the whole opposed to any attempt by the Haudenosaunee to
exercise its status as nations. When the Cayugas were closing in on a
$6,000,000 settlement deal in 1979 the residents of the claim area organized
an effective campaign to sabotage it which only served to confirm the fears
of the other nations.
    Despite these setbacks, the Oneidas residing in New York pressed their
claims and overcame the odds by winning their case before the US Supreme
Court.  That decision affirmed New York was in breach of US federal law when
it entered into “treaties” with ethnic Iroquois without the approval of Congress.
    Surely, some believed, that would have compelled New York to come to the
bargaining table with a serious commitment to resolve the land claims issue.
Instead, the State elected to delay any serious discussions while it designed
strategies to undermine any effort by the Haudenosaunee to present a united
front.
    Commercial gambling in the way of casino options in exchange for a
limited claims settlement was dangled in front of the Iroquois by former New
York governor Mario Cuomo then later adopted by his successor George Pataki.
Gambling was offensive to traditional Iroquois but state officials were aware
of the divisions within each Native community.  By dealing with the weakest
cultural faction New York expected to get out of its land claims dilemma
cheaply.
    The first break occurred among the Akwesasne Mohawks.  Split into three
factions as the result of the imposition of colonial “tribal” and “band”
councils, both of which were designed to undermine the traditional Mohawk
Nation Council, the Mohawks were hard pressed to sustain internal unity. In
1985 the St. Regis Tribal Council faction sanctioned a commercial bingo
operation; the next year slot machines were brought in from Las Vegas over
which there were no controls.
    The rise in illicit gambling was paced with tobacco and alcohol smuggling
into Canada, activities the Nation Council did not have the resources to
stop. The Mohawks were not the only ones moving into gambling as the
cornerstone of economic development. The Oneidas and Senecas opened bingo
halls with the Oneida operation subject to accusations of mismanagement and
graft.
    All of these actions factored into the Cayuga land claims.  Whenever the
Iroquois had acted in unity, as demonstrated throughout the 1970’s, New York
retreated.  Now that the Iroquois were infighting, the State felt no pressure
to resolve any of the claims.
    In December of 1998 the Oneida Nation of New York set off an anti-Native
firestorm when it decided to include 20,000 homeowners as defendants in its
land claim.  Previous to that action there was a small group called the
Upstate Citizens for Equality, formed to oppose the Oneida Nation’s gambling,
gas and tobacco businesses.  They were vocal but marginal.  The December
decision gave UCE an ideal opportunity to enlist thousands of homeowners and
small business operators and thereby command the attention of regional
politicians as well as the media.  Pressure was being brought to bear on the
State to resist any compromises with the Iroquois on any issue including land.
    A chapter of the UCE was formed in the Cayuga homeland region
expressively to deny the Cayugas reservation status were they to obtain land
within the 64,000 acres they lost as a result of New York’s disputed
‘treaties’ of 1795 and 1807. Since that time the Cayugas have lived on the
Cattaraugus Seneca Reservation south of Buffalo NY, on the Grand River
Reserve west of Hamilton, Ontario or as part of the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of
northeastern Oklahoma.
    As the trial date approached US District Court Judge Neal McCurn made a
number of rulings which were disturbing to the Iroquois. McCurn excluded land
as compensation for the Cayuga losses.  If they received anything it would be
money.  McCurn then decided the Cayugas would not be allowed to testify as to
their cultural losses and physical injuries stating the plaintiffs must
restrict their testimony to real estate appraisal as to the current value of
the original reservation.
    Previous to this, McCurn had encouraged negotiations as a way of securing
a settlement.  To effect that, an arbitrator had been agreed upon to bring
the different parties together.  Joining the Cayuga side were officials from
the US Justice Department, an act which enraged groups such as UCE.
Believing the negotiations would bear fruit if removed from public scrutiny a
gag order was imposed on the Cayugas and State officials effectively
preventing them from communicating to their respective constituents.
    This failure to address the more extreme charges brought by UCE against
the Cayugas placed the Native negotiators at a great disadvantage.  They
could not respond to accusations by their opponents that the Cayuga Nation
intended to open a casino or would soon sponsor gas stations and smoke shops
on whatever land they got back.
    The Akwesasne experience taught the Mohawks that public support, both
Native and non-Native, was essential if any land deal was to pass through the
State Legislature before being passed on to Congress for ratification. Prior
to the disintegration of Akwesasne unity in 1989 the Mohawk had drafted a
plan for negotiations which included an aggressive public relations campaign
which could have resolved many of the fears the non-Natives had about an
expansion of Iroquois jurisdiction. Also, the Mohawks presented the State
with a comprehensive list of its land claim objectives, all of which were
directed at restoring their aboriginal relationship with the earth.
    The Cayugas were prevented from doing any of these things which weakened
their bargaining position considerably.  Over 200 years of anguish were
reduced to dry numbers numbingly recited by real estate appraisers who knew
nothing about the Cayuga struggles to remain a people.
    The Cayugas lawyers also lacked the fighting spirit which might have made
a difference in the trial.  They did not understand the deep feelings the
Cayugas have for their homeland which prevented them from accepting New
York’s offer of $130,000,000 if only they would agree to restrict their land
purchases to 10,000 (plus another 3,000 “forever wild” section), abandon all
aboriginal claims and abide by a future trade and commerce compact.
    Missing were any references to the treaties of Canandaigua or Ft.
Stanwix, gone was the power of the words as spoken by the Haudenosaunee in
defense of their homelands.
    The Cayugas demonstrated the traditional Haudenosaunee ‘impracticality’
by turning down the State’s final offer.  US officials also wanted the
Cayugas to take the money since the federal government’s offer to pay half
the settlement amount was temporary.  Still, the Cayugas would not sell.
    The trial began in late January, 2000 in Syracuse, NY, a city which
itself sits in the middle of a land claim set to be filed by the Onondaga
Nation.  A change of venue motion by the Cayuga lawyers was denied.  Nine
jurors were selected, some of whom lived in the Onondaga claim area. The
Cayuga lawyers did not call upon any historian who might have enlightened the
jury as the situation of their clients but instead elected to follow New
York’s strategy of relying upon the appraisers.  Their “expert” fixed the
value of the Cayuga reservation at $335,100,000 in contrast to the New York
State appraiser who testified the land was worth only $51,000,000.  After two
weeks of listening to those figures the jury retired to make its decision.
    On February 17, 2000 the jury tendered its verdict.  The Cayugas would
receive $35 million based on a price of $576 per acre at current value. They
would also get $1.9 million for the “rental” fees over the past 204 years.
The Cayuga lawyer referred to the decision as “irrational” and promised an
immediate appeal, an action would may well take several years being a final
decision is reached.
    Absent from the Cayuga case were the rallies and demonstrations, the
pickets and songs which marked Iroquois struggles of the recent past.
Exhausted by years of infighting, there was little enthusiasm among the
Iroquois for taking to the streets, or to occupy land which rightfully
belongs to the Cayuga Nation.  New York was not held liable for the $36.9
million, it could conceivably move to collect that sum from the residents
within the claim area which in turn would make it much more difficult for the
Cayugas to return home.
    The words of caution from the Iroquois elders about entering a “white
man’s court”, that justice could not be secured in a system which had for so
long been used to destroy the Iroquois, were once again affirmed.
    For the Haudenosaunee the Cayuga experience should serve to ignite the
people to take direct charge of their destiny as they did at Canandaigua and
must do if they are to endure as a Confederacy.
 

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