Author Topic: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago  (Read 12137 times)

Offline 180IQ

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Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« on: December 20, 2007, 07:43:50 pm »
Thursday, December 20, 2007

WASHINGTON —  The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States.

"We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us,'' long-time Indian rights activist Russell Means said.

A delegation of Lakota leaders has delivered a message to the State Department, and said they were unilaterally withdrawing from treaties they signed with the federal government of the U.S., some of them more than 150 years old.

The group also visited the Bolivian, Chilean, South African and Venezuelan embassies, and would continue on their diplomatic mission and take it overseas in the coming weeks and months.

Lakota country includes parts of the states of Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.

The new country would issue its own passports and driving licences, and living there would be tax-free - provided residents renounce their U.S. citizenship, Mr Means said.

The treaties signed with the U.S. were merely "worthless words on worthless paper," the Lakota freedom activists said.

Withdrawing from the treaties was entirely legal, Means said.

"This is according to the laws of the United States, specifically article six of the constitution,'' which states that treaties are the supreme law of the land, he said.

"It is also within the laws on treaties passed at the Vienna Convention and put into effect by the US and the rest of the international community in 1980. We are legally within our rights to be free and independent,'' said Means.

The Lakota relaunched their journey to freedom in 1974, when they drafted a declaration of continuing independence — an overt play on the title of the United States' Declaration of Independence from England.

Thirty-three years have elapsed since then because "it takes critical mass to combat colonialism and we wanted to make sure that all our ducks were in a row,'' Means said.

One duck moved into place in September, when the United Nations adopted a non-binding declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples — despite opposition from the United States, which said it clashed with its own laws.

"We have 33 treaties with the United States that they have not lived by. They continue to take our land, our water, our children,'' Phyllis Young, who helped organize the first international conference on indigenous rights in Geneva in 1977, told the news conference.

The U.S. "annexation'' of native American land has resulted in once proud tribes such as the Lakota becoming mere "facsimiles of white people,'' said Means.

Oppression at the hands of the U.S. government has taken its toll on the Lakota, whose men have one of the shortest life expectancies - less than 44 years - in the world.

Lakota teen suicides are 150 per cent above the norm for the U.S.; infant mortality is five times higher than the U.S. average; and unemployment is rife, according to the Lakota freedom movement's website.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,317548,00.html


Offline earthw7

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #1 on: December 21, 2007, 06:33:09 pm »
Only a small group who DO NOT SPEAK FOR OUR LAKOTA/DAKOTA/NAKOTA  NATIONS.
In Spirit

Offline 180IQ

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #2 on: January 02, 2008, 06:33:54 am »
Are you saying that the vast majority of Lakota/Dakota/Nakota agree that the U.S. did keep all of its treaty obligations with these nations?


Offline Greenwood

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #3 on: January 02, 2008, 12:28:59 pm »
http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096416315

" ....  Russell Means - for his mid-December announcement in D.C. that he is unilaterally withdrawing the Lakota Sioux from treaties with the United States. News flash to Means: treaties are made between nations; you are a person and not a nation; you are not empowered to speak for the Great Sioux Nation; as an individual, you can only withdraw yourself from coverage of your nation's treaties. (Means is the same Oglala Sioux actor who tried to beat domestic violence charges by challenging the sovereign authority of the Navajo Nation to prosecute him - he took it all the way to the Supreme Court and lost.)  ..."

Dwn-'nwj - "He who unfolds two wings": Himmiherrgotzaggramentzefixallelujamilextamarschscheissglumpfaregtz!

Offline earthw7

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #4 on: January 02, 2008, 09:39:36 pm »
No what I am syaing that this is a small group who does not speak for the Nations.
In fact most of the people on the reservation do not know this was even done.
In order for some thing like this to happen you have to have the elders and spiritual leaders backing. This is only a small group who does not speak for the nation.
In Spirit

Offline earthw7

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #5 on: January 02, 2008, 09:40:14 pm »
Are you saying that the vast majority of Lakota/Dakota/Nakota agree that the U.S. did keep all of its treaty obligations with these nations?



No I am saying as a person who live on the reservation they do not speak for us.
In Spirit

Offline 180IQ

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #6 on: January 08, 2008, 04:43:18 am »
I've done some investigating on this. Found a podcast  interview with Means on the subject. Very interesting stuff.

Leonard

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #7 on: January 09, 2008, 05:42:42 am »
Means is a professional agitator, and has probably done more harm than good to the Lakotah nation.

Like so many of the activists around, one has to wonder if the person is out for the good of the cause, or himself.

As Means doesn't appear have the support of the majority of the band, the same question arises here.

This is not my opinion, but comes from the people in the Pass Creek district. Has anyone actually asked the Lakota themselves what they think about this as people who live on the reservations ?

Some say the folks in the tribe are upset with Russell for presuming to state that he represents them.

Just ask the people.

Leonard.

Offline earthw7

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #8 on: January 09, 2008, 07:50:33 pm »
as one of the people who live on the reservation Means does not speak for me
In Spirit

Leonard

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #9 on: January 21, 2008, 04:59:05 pm »
Hello 'earthw7'. Since you are one of the real people on-site on a real reservation, have you any current information on how Means and the Lakotah Republic are doing ? I have quit trying to 'google' that one because there is so much 'stuff' out there, it is hard to tell fact from fiction.

Leonard.

Offline earthw7

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #10 on: January 22, 2008, 03:10:28 pm »
They had a meeting here on Standing Rock friday, Many people do not like Means here but I will ask how the meeting went
In Spirit

Leonard

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #11 on: January 22, 2008, 08:37:35 pm »
Thank you. It is very generous and I feel honored to receive an answer from the 'source' of where this is actually happening. (if I am saying this correctly, 'wopila')

Leonard.

Offline Bryant

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Re: Lakota Indians Withdraw Treaties Signed With U.S. 150 Years Ago
« Reply #12 on: February 12, 2008, 02:10:45 am »
I looked into Means at the suggestion of some of the people here, and he is pretty shameful. I think he is surrounded with a bunch of wannabes doing the sort of cigar store Indian caricatures that he gets paid big bucks for playing right now. He actually worked of Reagan, daddy Bush, and Oliver North in backing the genocidal Nicaraguan contras. I mean, what can you say good about a CIA public relations asset running flack for a bunch of Central American death squads? He was creamed by a wide margin in the tribal council elections and the woman who beat him should be crowned a saint! She is a remarkable woman, and it is a crying shame that people like her don't get the attention they deserve. Instead, Walt Disney's hot property - Means - gets the "role" as the all purpose goto guy for everything Indian, since his publicist is obviously a clever and resourceful guy.

Anyway, it is not my intention to stick my nose into tribal affairs, but Means is so widely denounced in Indian country - I discovered - that anyone who cares at all about Indian autonomy should have a clear understanding about Means and his publicity stunts (he is pushing a book right now - as it just so happens).