A Commentary from Kansas
by Jane Siebert
Ninnescah Valley News, Prairie, Kansas
While the instruction is simple,
“Love your neighbor as yourself,”
the living of it is one of the hardest
things we are called to do, whether
in foreign countries or right here at
home.
Historically we know how
poorly our ancestors treated the
Native Americans when they ex-
plored these vast plains and the
“White Man” claimed the land we
now live on as tl~eir own. They
were following the accepted prac-
tices of the time, simply called
“homesteading.” To make this
possible the Native Americans
were driven out of their homes,
away from their cherished land
and secluded on reservations, of-
ten located on the poorest land
around.
Right here in Pretty Prairie there
is still evidence of the way the
Native Americans were treated.
Boundary Road one mile south of
Pretty Prairie marks a trail called
the Indian Strip. This strip of land,
10 rods or 160 ft. wide, running
from Dodge City to Fredonia, was
the only conitection between
Western and Eastern Kansas that
the Native Americans could use
without trespassing. They were
relegated to travel on a thin strip of
land, half the width of a football
field, across the land where they
had lived, worshiped, buried their
loved ones and hunted buffalo.
I remember studying this part of
American history and feeling
shame and sadness at what the
“White Man” had done in the
rlarne of progress and squatter’s
rights. I also remember feeling
reiief as I read about the Indian
Trust Fund that had been set up in
an attempt to financially rectify
some of the injustices done to our
brothers and sisters, the true Na-
tive Americans.
I thought this injustice was all in
the past, but it isn’t. Evidence
shows that billions of dollars are
unaccounted for in the Indian
Trust Fund. The Trust holds ap-
proximately $450 million at any
given time. This money is not from
government handouts. The Trust
contains money that belongs to
individual Native Americans who
have earned it from a variety of
sources such as oil and gas pro-
duction, grazing leases, coal pro-
duction and timber sales on their
allotted lands.
For years behind-the-scenes in-
vestigations have been going on
to figure out what is happening to
the money, but just like the travel-
ing restrictions that were put on
Native Americans back in the
1800s, so today Native Americans
are being restricted in their ability
to look at the records. Records
that in many cases are just lost,
conveniently misplaced and obvi-
ously inappropriately stored.
And yet, we wonder, where is
the outcry from the American pub-
lic? Why the silence? These are
our brothers and sisters and their
livelihood is being stolen. Why
isn’t the American government
doing something? And where is
the voice of the Church?
We are all one. When the faith
and trust of our Native American
brothers and sisters is compro-
mised it affects us all. We must
pause and ask, “What does this
say about us?” The trust of Native
Americans was broken over a hun-
dred years ago and yet even today.
we have not restored that trust.
How long do we have’?
….We are all connected and com-
promising faith and trust reverber-
ates to us all.
More information about the In-
dian Trust Fund can be found at
www.indiantrust.com.
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