8:15 Eastern Standard Time here in Maine, and my partner and I are watching MTV's "Rock the Vote" Democratic candidate "debate. One of the reasons this is quite poignant is that telve years ago, as the Outreach Coordinator for Clinton/Gore in Connecticut, I helped organize some of the first "Rock the Vote" concerts, including Michelle Shocked, who was absolutely amazing. I'm now watching this debate with one seven-year old tucked into her bed, three and five year olds asleep on the couch, and a 15th month old issuing forth this blood-curling scream every few minutes she doesn't get what she wants, and who claps ardently for Al Sharpton (of which I do approve.)
After the debate, some CNN talking head babbled on about Dean's Confederate flag flap as "much ado about nothing"... Over the past few months I've had many friends (and some foe) who have inquired about my outspoken dispute with Howard Dean, and just recently, a woman I much admire asked for further clarification on the issue, as I haven't written much on the issue here on Wampum, and with good reason, as I have tried to keep the Democratic circular-firing squad off the front page.
However, I've now reached a point of email and comment saturation where I feel I need to publicly clarify my comments. As a preamble to this discussion, my honest feeling is that the vast majority of Americans, Democrats included, really don't give a flying, ugh, hoot, about American Indian issues, and other than our being systematically, or maybe publicly, eradicated, only a handful will utter a peep. [Of the Presidential candidates, from their records, the candidates I think who would actually take that stand would be Senator Edwards and Congressman Gephardt.]
But we were talking about Howard Dean, weren't we?
In as dispassionate a tone as I can take, my problem, as a Wabanaki Confederacy Indian, is that Howard Dean's record in Vermont is unredeemable. Despite the fact that Indian gaming was not an option in Vermont for even federally recognized tribes under the Federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA), Dean consistently asserted that his opposition to the Swanton Band of Abenaki's petition for federal recognition was based upon his concern regarding "Indian gaming". He hired an outside firm to try and undermine the Abenaki's petition by claiming that they were "French Canadian" and not Indian, all the while, in an official position, attending the funeral of Chief Homer St. Francis, former leader of the Western Abenaki. When the Vermont Legislature sought to provide Abenakis with "state recognition", which would allow Abenakis to 1) hunt and fish without licenses, 2) allow Abenaki children to qualify for scholarships and specific benefits, and 3) protect sacred grounds, including Abenaki burials grounds. The latter resonates personally for me as I, as a tribal archaeologist, received the phone call late one night, where one of our traditonal burial ground was being desecrated by a state-ordered backhoe.
Posted by MB Williams at November 4, 2003 09:08 PM | TrackBack