HOW IS FEDERAL RECOGNITION AFFECTING NATIVE AMERICANS ?
Here's An Update From Native American Advocate Elouise Cobell Explaining The Latest In A Lawsuit Against The US Department Of Interior
My fellow trust beneficiaries,
As you know, with the urging of our friends in Congress, we entered into mediation with the U.S. government to resolve the individual Indian trust litigation. I am writing you today to give you an update on the status of the mediation process and the challenges we face in this six-month-old process.
I wish I could report that we have made progress in our negotiations with the government. Unfortunately, the government has, so far, acted with the same bad faith in mediation that they have shown in administering the trust and litigating the Cobell case. It is self-evident that to have any chance of success, mediation must have two participants who want to resolve the conflict. In this mediation, it has become obvious the government wants to resolve nothing.
The truth is that the government likes using our money. Their own expert has estimated that up to $40 billion is owed. With a sweetheart deal like this, why would they want to voluntarily resolve the issue?
The truth is that the government leases our land and assets far below market to Fortune 500 energy companies. The truth is that fraud, graft and corruption have pervaded the management of our trust assets for over 100 years. The truth is that the current trustee-delegates have proven themselves incompetent and dishonest, like their predecessors. These are not mere allegations—they are facts established in a court of law.
Many call me naïve for hoping that the government would finally agree to a just resolution through mediation for the over 500,000 individual Indian trust beneficiaries. Well, I’d rather be naïve than wrong. Every day more of our beneficiary-friends die without seeing justice or a complete and accurate accounting of their trust assets. If there is a chance that mediation may bring a fair and just resolution of this case to Indian Country faster than the court system, I owe it to you to try.
What is a “fair and just resolution?” The government would try and resolve this case for a couple billion dollars. And why not, from their perspective, when we are owed so much more? But a token settlement like this would be an insult to our people and a continuation of decades of injustice.
We know what is fair. We have retained the most sophisticated resources and financial experts to tell us what a “fair and just resolution” would be. Here’s what they tell me:
• At one time more than 50 million acres of land was allotted and held in trust for you. That equals land mass could swallow the states of Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland and Washington, D.C. with room to spare. • Today, there’s less than 11 million acres held in trust for you and the government can’t explain where 39 million acres went. • Much of the 50 million acres was and is among the most fertile and mineral rich lands west of the Mississippi (and that is why it is gone today). • In the early-1900’s almost the entire state of Oklahoma (the then-oil capital of the world) was made up of individual Indian trust allotments.
Remember this: the government is not doing us any favors by resolving this case. They have taken our property and our money and mismanaged it for more than a century. We are not asking for an entitlement, for reparations or for special treatment. We only want what is ours – money generated from our land. The U.S. government doesn't need to appropriate the funds to pay us. They already have the money. They took it from us.
What is a “fair and just resolution,” you ask? A complete and accurate accounting of our trust assets—nothing more and nothing less. If the government wants us to give up our rights to that complete and accurate accounting, it must compensate each of the individual Indian beneficiaries. It is that simple.
I want to make a pledge to you, my fellow beneficiaries. I will not sell our trust – the legacy of our ancestors – down the river for even a few billion dollars in settlement. To do so would make me no better than them--and I will not breach the trust you have shown in me.
I will continue the fight in the courts and wherever else until justice is done. And, I will continue to mediate as long as there is a chance for a fair and just resolution there, too.
It is our money and it is our right.
Sincerely,
Elouise Cobell
