Letters | Reviewing history
Reviewing history
Native Americans in Arizona and all states should take out their history books and review the history of when they were given citizenship in the United States and that was in 1924.
However, this right to vote was to be determined by every state legislature and in Arizona it required a lawsuit and this step had to go to the Arizona State Supreme Court. A decision to give Arizona’s Native American population was finally made in favor of Arizona’s Native population in 1948.
However, prior to 1948, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt died in 1945 while in office and Vice President Harry S. Truman assumed the presidency. He quickly introduced a law that would terminate Indian tribes. This would include terminating Indian reservations, tribal membership, tribal sovereignty, and services such as U.S. Indian Health Services.
As a Navajo living on the Arizona side of our reservation, we could do nothing as we could not vote in state elections until 1948 and this date of 1948 was also true for Navajos living in New Mexico. Navajos living on the Utah side could not vote until 1962. Thus, voting is a real first line of defense for protecting our existence as tribal members to continue tribal ceremonies and practice self-sustaining economies on our homelands.
It is with extreme luck that President Nixon in 1970, before he resigned over the pending impeachment, changed the “Termination” policy to “Self-Determination”.
This piece of information should be given to every Native American in print, video, and radio announcement in English and their tribal language and insist on 100 percent participation in the election process at the national, state, and tribal level.
Elroy Drake
Window Rock, Ariz.
Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow