Driving today. Herron's Baga (Casco Bay) north, across the Arossagunticook (Andrascoggin), to the Wôbômkategw (Sandy River), and back via Kinibec Badabaga (Augusta) to Kskebaga (MerryMeeting Bay) and back to Herron's Baga. Thinking about azowigabi. A wigwômsiz. An odôolagw. Both. Saw dadamakwak (red ones -- beaver). Thought about the Brunswick NAS and Seavy Island, the Portsmouth Yard. "Robbin Hood was a Sagadahoc Sachem and a friend of the Colonists." That's the general run of Maine history. "Robbin Hood was a drunk who signed away land he didn't own." That's the other side of the fish. Abenaki men didn't own the corn fields or the clam beds, they couldn't alienate real property. The same underlying fact pattern as in Santa Clara Pueblo.
A Tribal Law contributor, an Abenaki away, pointed out that under Alaskan Native statutory land entitlements, Cook Inlet Region, Inc., a Native Alaskan Corporation (tribe), obtained an in lieu right that permitted it to turn unfulfilled land entitlement for rights to (among other land) federal bases being closed, and winding up with land all over the US. If either or both the Yard and the NAS are listed, and the political defense for either or both fail, in addition to Augusta and other opportunists -- either a Trump hotel-casino property made from Los Angeles class attack boats oriented semi-vertically, a pod of perpetually breaching cold war orcas, with views of the Piscataqua, or a Trump hotel-casino with high-stakes games run out of P-3 Orions orbiting the Gulf of Maine -- there will be claims by Penobscots, Passamaquoddies and even Aleutes, for Abenaki land. And everyone will think themselves clever by not talking to us.
The Ipperwash process grinds on. In 1942 the Canadian Army expropriated Stoney Point and Kettle Point (Ipperwash) and set up a temporary infantry training camp (photo), paying the displaced Chipawa band $50,000, to get lost. In 1945 the camp's command (CITC A29) was disbanded, but the Stoney Point Band couldn't trade up to the neat barracks the Canadian Army had built where their homes used to be. In 1947 the Canadian Army found a new tennent for Ipperwash, Canadian boys ages 12-17 who liked to wear pith helmets, march about, and play soldier, six weeks each summer -- the Boy Scouts, minus God, plus guns and radios (photo) and a pretty nice beach on Lake Huron (photo) .
The Stoney Point Band were kept out of their homes, or what became of them, and finally in May 1993 a group of Natives occupied what was by this time "Ipperwash Provincial Park", to the dismay of White "cottagers" (squatters), who took to vigilanteeism. A stand-off developed between Indians and Whites, and in 1995 the use of force by the Whites resulted in the killing of Dudley George (Kettle and Stony Point Indian Band), by an Ontario Provincial Police sniper, who shot the unarmed man fatally in the mid-chest. It was a BRAC exercise conducted in Ontario, where Indians simply moved back to their homes, 53 years after being evicted under the War Powers Act.
One of the benefits of having a Commission investigate the murder is that the documentation trail is bi-lingual. Nishnaabemwin and English. A few sentances from the parallel texts.
IPPERWASH INQUIRY
Commission proceedings will be divided into two phases. Part I will focus on the circumstances and events surrounding the death of Anthony O'Brien (Dudley) George.
Eko-niizhing dash maanda Gchi-ndagkenjgeng, da-gnwaabndaanaawaa gonda Commission gchi'ii ezhnoomaagemgak maanda sa gaa-zhiwebak Dudley George gii-nbot, da-dbaajmawak gewe ge-zhichgengba wii-bwaa nakaazang baashkzigan pii miinwaa maanda gegoo nikeyiing zhiwebak.
In Part II of the Inquiry, the Commission will review key policy issues raised by the events surrounding the death of Dudley George and will make recommendations directed to the avoidance of violence in similar circumstances. These issues will include the relationship between police and Aboriginal people,
Na'ii ge-dgo-gnwaabnjigaadek: enaangoondwaat dkonwewninwak miinwaa Nishnaabek, enaangoondwaat dkonwewninwak miinwaa gchi-gimaanaang Ontario naagaanzijik, gaa-zhi-gnoondiwaat Nishnaabek miinwaa gonda yaazhdendngik naaknigewin, miinwaa ge-zhichgengba wii-bwaa-nakaazang baashkzigan Nishnaabek nji ezhi-nsastamwaat
gaazhi-waawiindmawndwaa ki miinwaa/maage bkaan gegoo.
These issues will include the relationship between police and Aboriginal people, the relationship between police and government, the interaction between police and protestors, and the avoidance of violent confrontations over Aboriginal land.
We will encounter the usual defense of theft. Not being Federally Recognized means no standing, sitting, or even goofing off. The Penobscots will want to put up a casino. John Baldacci will wage stern moral war against local option sales and income taxes and Homestead-plus property tax reform, the Passamaquoddies and the Washington County delegation to Augusta and slots, a sloted racino at Bangor, and whatever fun and games the state Republicans come up with, and suggest, without too great a specificity, a cunning scheme to rescue either SoYoCo or Brunswick or both because everyone has to look re-electable or bump-up-able next year when Maine politics gets real.
Tomorrow's reading: Geoffrey D. Strommer & Craig A. Jacobson, INDIAN TRIBES AND THE BASE REALIGNMENT AND CLOSURE ACT: RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE TRUST LAND ACQUISITIONS, 75 North Dakota Law Review 509 (1999).
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Posted by EBW at May 11, 2005 07:49 PM | TrackBack
