June 26, 2010


Greetings,

I want to first say thank you--thank you for taking the time and
making the commitment to come to this place--but thank you mostly
for remembering. Sometimes I sit in this cage and I find myself
wondering if anyone really remembers. Many days, remembering is
all my mind allows me to do. So, again, thank you. Thank you for
bearing witness and being a part of a living memory.

But maybe the most important thing I'd like to say is don't
forget. Not ever.

You must be the historians who keep this lesson alive because
this story isn't about one day, one event, one person, or even one
lifetime. This is a story that goes all the way back to the day a
misguided fool, whose name I won't even mention, led his troops in
an attack on innocent people at the Greasy Grass, and in the process
got himself and over two hundred of his troopers killed. And while
the victors on that day had no choice but to defend themselves,
we have been the victims of a genocidal revenge that continues
until this very moment. So don't forget. Not ever.

It is vengeance that preoccupies the mind of the colonizer. It
is this fervor to show us who is boss that led to the massacre
at Wounded Knee, the theft of the Black Hills, the establishment
of boarding schools, and the criminalization of our languages
and traditional ways. It is vengeance that armed the GOON squads,
killed our leaders, and surrounded our people at Wounded Knee again
in 1973. Revenge is why they today prosecute Indian people for the
crimes they know the government committed during their murderous
campaigns of the last generation. Vengeance is what killed Joe
Stuntz, Anna Mae Aquash, Buddy Lamont and so many others. Getting
even is what keeps me in prison. So don't forget. Not ever.

All of these events are bound together, interrelated and
interdependent. And quite clearly the lesson they intend for us
to learn is don't defend yourselves. Don't stand up for what is
right. Don't think for yourselves. Don't choose to be who you
are. Don't remember your ancestors. Don't live in defense of the
Earth. Don't you do it! Don't even think about it. If you do,
this government--this mindset of control--will unleash an attack
so vast it will even seek to destroy our genetic memories. So don't
forget. Not ever.

In days past, some among our people were induced to become
"scouts". For whatever reasons, these individuals made possible
the treacherous campaigns that resulted in the deaths of countless
innocent people. These days--sadly--there are still these types
amongst us. The government preys on the weaknesses of these people,
inducing them to turn against the rest of us. The government
uses this treachery to cover up state sanctioned murder and
terrorism. They do this and then tell us that what we remember
didn't really happen at all, as though memory or truth is something
to be shaped and molded to fit a preconceived outcome. So don't
forget. Not ever.

We gather today after decades and generations of blood and trauma. We
gather in defiance.

And we remember.

We remember not just one day or one event, because remembering what
occurred on June 25 or June 26--or any particular date--is important,
but not as important as an understanding of the ongoing campaign
of colonization. This is a continuing human drama of slaughter
and uncontrollable bloodlust and we're still here, engaged in
our running defense; praying for balance, peace and justice; and
trying to make some sense of it all. Perhaps, in the face of such
a menace, the most important thing we can do is remember. So teach
your children. Pass this knowledge. Don't forget. Not ever.

Remembering is resisting and, if we remember, then we'll be free
one day. Free of their mindset. Free of their theft. Free of their
guns and their bombs. Free of their cages. Free to be who we are.

And free of their fear. That's the truest freedom of all and true
freedom is what this is really all about, not the illusion of
freedom they offer us.

So don't forget. Not ever.

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,


Leonard Peltier

Watch video

Photo by Carol Berry
Denver Police Sgt. Jason Carrigan (left) warned uranium mining opponents Shannon Francis and Nadine Padilla that they and the rest of a protest delegation would be arrested if they did not leave the Grand Hyatt Hotel area in downtown Denver and move to the sidewalk in front of the building. The delegation was attempting to address a conference hosted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the National Mining Association May 26.

Split appeals court rules against EPA and Navajo concerns

By Carol Berry, Today correspondent
Story Published: Jun 17, 2010
Story Updated: Jun 17, 2010
DENVER – Navajo residents worried about uranium mining’s impact on their northwestern New Mexico community were handed a defeat by a narrowly divided federal appeals court in an en banc ruling June 15.

Justices of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 6-5 that a tract of land owned by a uranium company surrounded by Indian lands did not constitute “Indian country,” as legally defined, and that the state, not the federal government, would enforce drinking water regulations at a leach mine that injects water and chemicals into an underlying aquifer, withdraws the solution and recovers uranium.

While the EPA said the aquifer beneath the Hydro Resources Inc. tract does not and will not serve as a drinking water supply, “tailings from uranium mines have contaminated air, groundwater, streams and soil on the Navajo reservation,” according to one dissenting judge. “The wind blew dust from the tailings piles into Navajo homes and water sources. Holding ponds on the reservation associated with the uranium mines were not well-maintained.”

Because of differences of opinion over the way in which “Indian country” was defined, one of the judges said the long-running litigation is likely to go to the Supreme Court, noting the current majority ruling “undoes decades of settled Indian law based upon sound principles.”

The tract owned by HRI east of Gallup is within the boundaries of Church Rock Chapter (a tribal unit established by the federal government in 1950) and is six miles from the chapter house and Church Rock community. EPA described the land as “completely surrounded” by lands set aside for Indian use – a dependent rural Indian community that is part of the chapter and one in which some families have used the land for generations.

Federal law defines Indian country as including reservation lands under U.S. jurisdiction, Indian allotments, and all “dependent Indian communities” in the U.S. whether in original or acquired territory.

A three-judge 10th Circuit panel in April 2009 upheld the EPA’s 2007 decision that HRI’s proposed in situ leach mine was inside “Indian country” as legally defined and therefore would be permitted and regulated by EPA and not the state, the assertion disputed by HRI and vacated June 15.

EPA’s position rested in part on a complex two-stage definition of whether surrounding lands – the “community of reference” – when further defined by social, public, and jurisdictional factors constituted Indian country and encompassed the immediate area as a dependent Indian community.

In its ruling vacating the panel’s decision, the full appellate court said that EPA argued federal, not state, criminal jurisdiction applied to the HRI tract because it is part of a dependent Indian community, but that two key requirements for that status – explicit use by Indians as Indian land, and federal superintendence – had not been met.

“Had EPA chosen to define its authority under the SDWA (Safe Drinking Water Act) in a different way, the result in this case might have been different,” the judges noted in a 116-page document.

“While groups of Indians may very well live on such lands in socially and politically discrete communities, they do not live in ‘Indian country’ because the land in question has not been explicitly set aside by Congress for use as a ‘dependent Indian community.’

“The superintendence requirement means that the federal government currently must be ‘actively controlling the lands in question, effectively acting as a guardian for the Indians,’” the court said.

But, “Over the last 20 years in this circuit, we have held that a ‘community-of-reference ‘ test must be employed to determine the appropriate community, before determining whether that community is both ‘dependent’ and ‘Indian,’” wrote Senior Judge David M. Ebel for the minority.

“By overturning decades of our precedent, the majority introduces confusion into an area of law that had been largely settled, and does so based on a case that did not even consider the issue.”

Land in Church Rock Chapter is overwhelmingly owned by or for Navajos, some 98 percent of the chapter’s residents are Navajo or married to Navajos, and the Navajo Nation provides police protection, housing, electricity, drinking water, and other utilities to the residents in what constitutes a dependent Indian community, the judges stated.

The hydrology of the HRI tract is tied into the hydrology of the entire Church Rock Chapter, where three separate aquifers run directly beneath the tract and throughout the chapter. Fourteen wells from one of the aquifers, from which most chapter residents draw drinking water, are within 20 miles of the tract, and “Any pollution into the aquifers would likely affect much of the Chapter population,” the dissent states.

The Church Rock Chapter is the appropriate community of reference and HRI’s tract is within a dependent Indian community, it states, noting that consequences of the majority ruling “are likely to be enormous, reintroducing checkerboard jurisdiction into the Southwest on a grand scale and disrupting a field of law that had been settled for decades,” which may ultimately require Supreme Court resolution.

In an additional statement, three of the dissenting justices noted “the externalities produced by a mining operation – including pollution, traffic, and the aesthetic harms by having a large mining operation nearby – also affect the surrounding community.” They cited “the largest nuclear spill in U.S. history” near Church Rock in 1979 that caused extensive damage and contamination.

Briefs in support of HRI were filed by the National Mining Association, United Nuclear Corporation, and the states of Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming, while those supporting EPA and the Navajo Nation were filed by the Pueblos of Santa Clara, Sandia, Isleta and Zia.

42nd Annual AIM Reunion, June 3-5 2010 hosted by AIM Grand Governing Council, in Minneapolis, MN.  AIM representatives came from across North America to talk about ways to jump-start communities into action; Alaska, California, Arizona, Idaho, Texas, Michigan, Utah, South Dakota, New Jersey, and Canada were there to make plans for the coming generations!  All My Relations!  Free Leonard Peltier!  AIM High!
Pictures from the 42nd Annual AIM Reunion
Mark calendars now to attend International AIM Conference, hosted by AIM-WEST of San Francisco, November 22-27, 2010!
www.aimwest.info
415-577-1490

PICTURES FROM A.I.M. CONFERENCE MINNEAPOLIS BY EAGLE EYE, AUGIE.