Ruffled Feathers

For five years, despite overwhelming problems and violent criticism, the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs has been trying resolutely to "get out of the Indian business." Its twofold program: 1) a slow process of withdrawal of federal services to the Indians as tribes become self-dependent, and 2) relocating willing Indian families in the cities. In a measure, the bureau has succeeded; three tribes are now independent, and about 20,000 Indians have been moved off reservations into cities and towns. Last week in Claremore, Okla., the home of the late Will Rogers (who was part Cherokee), 205 Indians representing 62 tribes gathered to compare notes. Conclusion: things are just as bad as they always were--only worse. As usual, they blamed the Indian commissioner and his bureau.

Flying into Claremore from Washington to address the business-suited Blackfeet, Apache, Sioux, Mohawk, Chinook, Zuni, Cheyenne, Chocktaw, Kickapoo and others was Commissioner Glenn Emmons himself, onetime New Mexico banker and a longtime neighbor and friend of the Navajo. Listing such Indian advances of the recent past as better health care and improved educational facilities, Emmons declared his own "confidence in the native capacities of Indian people--in their ability to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps if they are only given a decent opportunity." But, predictably, Emmons' words of encouragement fell on ruffled feathers.

Bumped Off. The reasons were as complex--and sometimes as absurd--as the Indians themselves. Some Indians still seethe with resentment. Grumbled Arizona Apache Jesse Stevens about Hollywood's cowboy-and-Indian movies: "One white guy always managed to kill off a bunch of Indians. They should try hiring some of us sometime so we can show them how real Indians act. I was in a bit part once in an Alan Ladd picture. I got bumped off just like [finger-snap] that!"

Most of the Indians were afraid that the withdrawal and relocation programs would somehow foreshadow the end of tribal culture (and, some said darkly, permit the white man to grab Indian lands). Rather than take Indians from the reservations (30% return, mostly because of loneliness), the U.S. should spend more money on industrial and agricultural development of reservation land. Snorted Coeur d'Alene Tribesman Joseph Garry, who is president of the National Congress of American Indians and a Democratic member of the Idaho House of Representatives: "As for the bureau giving us 'freedom,' we are free from all taxes, including tax from income on Indian land, and we are free to hunt and fish. What other freedoms could we have?"

Growing Up. Inherent in Garry's statement was the fact that 70 years of "Great White Father" paternalism has served only to perpetuate the Indian's own isolation in a fast-progressing, ever-changing country. Sympathetic bureau men are aware that their charges, now 500,000 strong (an increase of 250,000 since 1900), are held back by a desire to preserve their tribal identity and traditions and their confused distrust--sometimes justified--of the outside world.

It is a dilemma that only the Indian can solve. As one top Indian Affairs official put it: "The Indians are going to have to face the fact that they will soon be 21. We are doing our damndest to give them the best possible preparation. But a lot of them don't want to face the fact, and they resent it."

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