Reflections
from the Ahnishinahbæótjibway (We, the People)
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There
is a tradition in Feudal Europe about the “King’s
Preserves.” The King held vast acreages
of land, on which he and his cronies could hunt, fish and party while
the
peasants were taxed beyond their means, and went hungry.
The
same Feudal European systems of land tenure have been
brought by European immigrants to our Indian land.
The
map which accompanies this article shows in sold black
the land which is held “by the State of Minnesota” and “by the Federal
Government.” (The land which is shaded
shows what remains of our Indian land.
On some “reservations,” for example Leech Lake, the title to
over 90% of
this land is in White hands.)
The
so-called “Government-held” land mapped on the map is, in
large part, taken from Indians through the unilateral encroachment
legislation
of the State of Minnesota after the Supreme Court ruled that the United
States
could not take Indian land for “forest reserves.” This
pattern of “State forests” next to diminished Indian
reservations exists all across the United States.
This
land is called “publicly held land.” The
White man’s title to this land is made
out to the Government, so it is not taxed.
Timber companies, mining companies, etc., lease this land for
token
payments. What amount to the Royalty of
North America are the people who hunt, fish and party on this land: the
owners
and board members of big corporations, the hereditary rich, and their
cronies. [That’s why George Yant went
to jail—the people he ran off “his” land were upper-class “royalty.”]
None
of the land colored black on the map is taxable. The
working-class people of Northern
Minnesota are subsidizing the Corporations’ use of “State land” by
paying
disproportionate taxes. This is
European Feudalism all over again. The
Corporations do not pay fair taxes, because they control the
legislature that
writes the tax laws, and because they control the paper money system.
One
of the tactics of Feudalism is “divide and conquer,” and
it has been one of their favored tactics since long before Machiavelli,
or even
Caesar. Every election, the
corporate-controlled media are full of articles about the “welfare
state,” with
not-so-subtle insinuations that Indians are responsible for the tax
burden of
the working class. This is nonsense. Indians are a convenient scapegoat for the
Corporations which are skimming the cream off of the economy of
Northern
Minnesota.
The
Ojibway Indian people did not ask Feudal Corporations to
come to Northern Minnesota with their paper money and their welfare
system. Our land was taken at gunpoint
(for example at the 1853 and 1863 Treaties), and then taken by fraud
(examples:
the 1889 “treaty,” the White Earth “experiment”), and is still being
taken by
unilateral encroachment legislation written by the State of Minnesota
and the
United States Government (which is a violation of our human and civil
rights,
as well as of International law).
The
welfare system is a White concept. More
money goes into the White
economy—through administration, enforcement, salaries of “social
workers,”
etc., than ends up in the pockets of welfare recipients.
Welfare is a scapegoat system of social
control, blaming the recipients; creating jobs for welfare
professionals—and
slave-labor through workfare; and entrenching the class system and
racism. The Corporations, and the
governments which
they control are the people who created the welfare system. They put an enormous tax burden on the
middle and lower classes. A small
fraction of these taxes go to support the welfare recipients. The Corporations blame racial minorities or
other convenient scapegoats for the system which the Corporations have
created. Traditional Indian people have
never had anything to do with any of these laws—we haven’t had any
input into
ANY of them ... yet, we are blamed. As
far as we are concerned, the Corporations can go back to Europe with
their
paper money, their Feudal system of land tenure, their class system,
and every
one of the laws that they have had written and had their “elected”
representatives
pass.
The
technical term for land exploited by the Feudal
Corporations and the cities that sustain them is “Hinterland.” In the eyes of the White man, Northern
Minnesota is a Hinterland. This affects
every skilled worker who only earns a third or a quarter of what they
are
worth, because they live in the Hinterland, as well as the Indians.
The
White Earth Settlement Act is another example of the
Feudal system’s strategy of divide and conquer. Theodore
Roosevelt’s plan of “pulverizing ... the tribal mass” is
still being used. Instead of addressing
the legitimate question of National Boundaries—does the land in
question belong
to the White Earth Nation, which signed a Treaty guaranteeing domain,
or does it
belong to the United States of America, which wrote unilateral
encroachment
legislation which could not, under International Law, affect the
internal
affairs of another Nation? Instead,
Feudal puppets are pitting individual farmers against Indians (and
pitting
Indians against each other) in a red-herring issue of individual land
titles. The farmers do not really “own”
their land—ask any farmer who can’t pay his taxes because the seven
corporations which have a hegemony over food have kept commodity prices
below
cost. (Read the United States Constitution
carefully, and you will see who it’s written for. It’s
not written for the farmers, and it’s not written for the
upper-class Indians being created, either.
These Indians are being used, and when they are no longer useful
to the
corporations which have created them, they will be discarded. Ask Machiavelli.) Under
International Law, the legal solution to the present White
Earth situation would be to recognize the eminent domain of the White
Earth
Nation over their own land.
In
violation of Treaties and International Law, Indians pay
more taxes than White people do.
Elections are coming up again, and we expect to see
blame-the-Indian
articles in the Corporate-controlled media, just like the last
election:
Warnings about arsonists, sensational articles about the Crime Capitol,
the
standard blame-the-victim welfare articles, and all the rest. Instead of believing propaganda, look at
what’s going on around you: who controls the land, who controls the
media, and
who’s paying for the campaigns of political candidates.
Mee
Gwitch.
Sho-ne-ah-wub
Francis Blake, Jr.
Redlake, MN
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