And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Visit viewed as step toward restitution BY GORDON WINTERS Lincoln Journal Star http://www.journalstar.com/stories/top/sto1 For Gerald One Feather, Wednesday's presidential visit to the Pine Ridge Reservation had implications extending beyond the reservation's borders, or even the borders of the United States. One Feather, among a group of Lakota tribal leaders who met President Clinton as his helicopter landed on the reservation, is active in the United Nation's effort to create a statement on the rights of indigenous people worldwide. As One Feather spoke, a strong wind blew across the broad, grass-covered plain surrounding the reservation airport, whipping the bison tail tied to the staff he carried that signifies a meeting is taking place. "I think it's going to have a big impact," he said of Clinton's visit. "We will have follow-up meetings in the months to come. That's where the substance will come." One Feather said that work on the U.N. statement on indigenous rights has been under way since the early 1990s. The goal, he said, is to finish the document by 2002, then send it to the U.N. General Assembly. The issues, One Feather said, are similar on every continent. They involve territorial rights and language. "We had colonists come in and negate the aboriginal rights of people." He said representatives of more than 100 indigenous people have met several times in Geneva, Switzerland, to continue their push to win respect for the issue. Canada, One Feather said, is more advanced than the United States in its treatment of aboriginal people. He pointed to the recent referendum there creating a new province for the Inuit. Meanwhile, he said, the Lakota remain at an impasse with the U.S. government over the Black Hills. In June 1980 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the federal government had illegally confiscated the Black Hills from the Lakota. The high court's decree upheld an earlier federal claims decision that "a more ripe and rank case of dishonorable dealings will never, in all probability, be found in our history. ..." The courts awarded the Lakota $17.5 million in damages, plus interest dating from 1877 -- a sum currently amounting to more than $300 million. Among the nation's poorest people, the Lakota nonetheless have refused to accept the money and continue to press their claim for the return of their sacred lands. "We want title to the Black Hills," One Feather said. In One Feather's eyes, the president's visit was a step toward that goal, distant though it may be. Reprinted under the fair use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html doctrine of international copyright law. &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&& Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit) Unenh onhwa' Awayaton http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/ &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
