There are 564 federally recognized American Indian tribes in the United. The term "federally recognized" simply means that, following the United States Constitution and decisions by the Supreme Court, the federal government has a diplomatic relationship with the domestic dependent nations. Just as Presidents meet with leaders of foreign nations, so too do Presidents meet with American Indian leaders. This week President Obama met with leaders from the federally recognized American Indian nations.
In greeting the leaders of the federally recognized Indians nations, President Obama said:
We also know our more recent history; one in which too often, Washington thought it knew what was best for you. There was too little consultation between governments. And that's a major reason why things are the way they are today. Some of your reservations face unemployment rates of up to 80 percent. Roughly a quarter of all Native Americans live in poverty. More than 14 percent of all reservation homes don't have electricity; and 12 percent don't have access to a safe water supply. In some reservations as many as 20 people live together just to get by. Without real communication and consultation, we're stuck year after year with policies that don't work on issues specific to you and on broader issues that affect all of us. And you deserve to have a voice in both.
The President continued:
In the final years of his administration, President Clinton issued an executive order establishing regular and meaningful consultation and collaboration between your nations and the federal government. But over the past nine years, only a few agencies have made an effort to implement that executive order -- and it's time for that to change. (Applause.)
The memorandum I'll sign directs every Cabinet agency to give me a detailed plan within 90 days of how -- the full implementation of that executive order and how we're going to improve tribal consultation. (Applause.) After all, there are challenges we can only solve by working together, and we face a serious set of issues right now.
Following his initial comments, President Obama took questions and comments from the assembled leaders. Mr. Keel, President of the National Congress of American Indians, was the first to speak:
In managing Indian lands for both individual Indians and for Indian tribes, the United States government has often acted contrary to the best interests of the Indians and in the best interest of corporate concerns. See thIS diary on
Indian Trust.
Bill Martin, President of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, spoke:
We ask that you strengthen and support our sovereignty for all Alaska tribes by supporting our fishing and subsistence rights; by providing equity and funding across all tribal governments; providing an infrastructure of basic services in our villages, of plumbing in town hall meetings, in roads, sewer, et cetera; provide adequate emergency response for suicide prevention and health care services. Suicide is a very high rate in Alaska. It's -- for all of Alaska, is twice the national average for natives. It's five times the average. And for young men between 15 and 27 it's 12 times the national average. And it's a serious issue and we hope that we can be able to provide more funding to combat suicide.
Theresa Two Bulls, President of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, spoke:
Our children are sacred. We want the best for them. And we ask that you help us to ensure a better education, a better life, well-being for our children, because they're going to be the future leaders.
The transcript for the meeting is found here.
Reactions to the President’s comments reported at
Censored News:
--" A real yawner ..."
--"We've heard this before ..."
--"Sad to hear Native elected leaders whining for more money for jails and neglecting what is really important ..."
--"I watched the last part, once again the white men were sitting on the stage, staring down at the Indians, or wait, who was who, everyone looked the same in their colonial suits ..."
--"The little bits and pieces I heard was a lot of 'we need to do better.' Well NO sh-t !!! that's what we've been telling you for years."
--"Disappointing -- but not unexpected"
--"Money always money & Obama writes checks, evil money. Leonard Peltier's name wasn't heard inside."
--"Oh no, we'll not forget - we'll not forget to store our deadly radioactive waste on your reservations - we'll not forget to mine our uranium on your lands then leave the tailings there to poison your people forever - we'll not forget - oh no we won't."
--"Smiley glad hands with hidden agendas."