Utah reconciling history with Indian Residential Schools

 

A single building stands on the grounds that once contained an Indigenous boarding school, Aug. 26, 2021, in Panguitch, Utah. There are six known boarding schools within Utah, with the largest one located near Brigham City. The school in Panguitch primarily housed Utah Paiutes and Kaibab Paiutes Native Americans and this school operated from 1904 to 1909. (Chris Caldwell/The Spectrum via AP)

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The Indian Student Placement Program was sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and was run from 1947 to 2000. This program started in 1947 but didn’t get sponsored by the church until 1954, according to the church. The program had missionaries approach Native American families and offer to have their children move in with an LDS foster family during the school year and return for the summer.

A 1976 document from the church identifies the objective of the Indian Student Placement Program as “to provide Lamanite children with educational, spiritual, social, and cultural opportunities that would contribute to their leadership development.”

Lamanite is a term from the Book of Mormon which refers to a group of people that settled in the Americas from Israel but turned their back on the Gospel and were cursed with dark skin. The church believed it had a mandate to help the Lamanites and convert them.

The president of the LDS Church at the time that document was released was Spencer W. Kimball, a staunch advocate for LDS outreach to Native Americans who described this program as an “inspiration from the Lord.”

In total, the Indian Student Placement Program placed 50,000 Native American children in homes that were in good standing within the LDS church, as reported by the Atlantic. These kids had to be baptized before entering the program with some instances of the children having wet hair from their baptism when they were introduced to their host family.

In 2018, the LDS church settled a lawsuit with members of the Navajo Nation that alleged they were sexually abused while in this program. The terms of the settlement were confidential and included no admission of wrongdoing by the church.

This was just one of many Native American assimilation efforts that were taken in the 20th century. In total there were over 489 residential schools in the U.S. and Canada, with the last residential school on the continent being shut down in 1996, according to the Union of Ontario Indians.

Assimilation programs in the 20th century didn’t just target Native American children. Another main policy was called “termination” which was a policy meant to terminate federal recognition and supervision of Native American Tribes and take more of their land.

The U.S. enacted termination policies in 1953, removing Indigenous people from their land. The land was sold and the people were relocated into urban areas and were promised good jobs. However, when Native Americans were relocated to cities the work was often less than rewarding, many felt out of place, and the housing offered was often sub-par.

Termination policy was led by Utah Sen. Arthur Watkins, who sold this policy was a way to stop Native Americans from being “wards of the government.” In a 1957 article written by Watkins, he argued that termination policies should be enacted by the government “as rapidly as possible.”

In total, termination policies enacted across the country took somewhere between 1.3 million to 2.5 million acres of land from Native Americans and more than 12,000 people lost tribal affiliation.

This termination policy worked poorly, with around 50% of relocated Native Americans deciding to return to reservations. These policies were phased out during the ’60s and during the Civil Rights Movement. In 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Indian Civil Rights Act which called for the end of termination and instead allows tribes to self-determine their futures.

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Founding Fathers attitudes about Native Americans

Many of the founding fathers believed American Indians would die out within a few generations.

Founding Fathers' attitudes toward Native Americans:

From the very beginning of US history, the founding fathers believe they are at a higher stage of Adam Smith's "four stages of history" than American Indians. George Washington favors treaties over force, writing that when forced off his land, the "savage," like the wolf, always seeks to return.


Johnson v. McIntosh determined that American Indian's land title could be extinguished "by purchase or by conquest."

February 28, 1823|  In a land dispute, the Supreme Court determines that titles purchased from tribes do not supersede titles awarded by the federal government, because the indigenous occupants lost their "right of occupancy."



Chief Justice John Marshall's opinion calls American Indians "fierce savages," stating: "Discovery is the foundation of title, in European nations, and this overlooks all proprietary rights in the natives."


Even now, this "Doctrine of Discovery" continues to creep into the policies and mindset of today.


Chief Justice John Marshall composed several early and influential opinions on the relationship between American Indians and the United States.


Chief Justice John Marshall's majority opinion states that the tribe is not an independent nation, but a "domestic dependent nation" with a relationship to the United States "like that of a ward to his guardian." This ward-guardian mindset has carried into modern-day American Indian-US relations.


Congress passes the General Allotment Act, authorizing the president to divide up tribal land and parcel it out to individual American Indians. In the process, tribes are dispossessed of 90 million acres.


Meanwhile, American Indian children are forced to assimilate at mandatory boarding schools. (And Indian Adoption Programs would also begin)


Col. Richard Pratt, founder of the first off-reservation Indian Boarding School, gives a speech in 1892 where he adovcates to "kill the Indian in him, and save the man."


(Videos: UAF Tribal Management Program)

In this video, American Indian scholar and advocate Ada Deer calls the terminations a "cultural, economic and political disaster" for American Indians.
Congress terminates tribal status for more than 100 tribes in the 1950s. When tribes lose their status, their lands become subject to taxation and members lose access to federal programs and services. The government further weakens tribes by relocating American Indians from reservations to cities and expanding state jurisdiction over reservations.

TRIBAL NATIONS - The Story of Federal Indian Law
More Info: https://www.tananachiefs.org/about/our-history/


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