This article was written on a very tight schedule that didn't allow me to discuss everything I felt important in Peter Matthiessen's book. Perhaps most illuminating of all was this preface to a section entitled THE REAL ENEMY. Looking through Indian eyes, the author notes that:
The authorizing legislation creating the Department of Energy allows the director of the agency to enter into a pact with the Department of Defense to seize unilaterally and hold areas of strategic mineral significance if such action is justified as being in the "national interest." For Indian nations that have enough energy resources to make a difference in the future direction of this country, such a stipulation is equivalent to a threat to call out the cavalry again . . . for Indian nations to defy the national policies of the U.S. government and multinational corporate interests is to defy the two most powerful forces on the face of the earth. To do so is to invite possible military intervention. For most Indians, it would not be the first time. During the 1973 Arab oil embargo the U.S. government made contingency plans to intervene militarily in order to secure "our" oil in the Mideast because it was in the "national interest." So if the Wasi'chu government talks about using military intervention to secure "our" oil in an area halfway around the world, what is it going to say about securing "our" coal and "our" uranium right there in Indian Country?Please remember that Leonard also looks at the world through Indian eyes. Presented by delegate to the 2010 U.S. Social Fourm in Detroit, here is his memorial statement for the 35th anniversary of that tragic and fatal shoot-out:
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
Before the appeals court, the defense contended that Peltier's extradition from Canada had been illegal, because it was based on "false affidavits . . . obtained by the government through coercion and deceit and known by the government to be false." U.S. Attorney Evan Hultman argued that "the jurisdiction of the trial court over the defendant is not affected by the manner in which his presence before the court was obtained."
JUDGE [DONALD] ROSS: But anybody who read those affidavits would know that they contradict each other. And why the FBI and Prosecutor's office continued to extract more to put into the affidavits in hope to get Mr. Peltier back to the United States is beyond my understanding.Even so, the court of appeals held that since the defense had not claimed that the Poor Bear affidavits were the only evidence that brought about the extradition, its arguments were beside the point; the fugitive warrant from Wisconsin might have sufficed. It also accepted the government's position that since the defense was unable to prove any conspiracy between Jimmy Eagle's cellmates and the FBI, "it didn't matter" whether or not those convicts had been lying (which the government now granted might have been the case). Finally, "while the more prudent course might have been to allow the defense to present the evidence," the court affirmed Judge Benson's decision to withhold the Poor Bear and Eagle testimony from the jury.
MR. HULTMAN: Yes.
JUDGE ROSS: Because you should have known, and the FBI should have known, that you were pressuring the woman to add to her statement.
MR. HULTMAN: Your Honor, I personally was not present at that stage. I read the affidavits after they had been submitted, so I want this court to know that . . .
JUDGE ROSS: The Government -
MR. HULTMAN: And I don't excuse, by my remark just now to Your Honor, I don't in any way excuse what the court has just indicated. Your Honor, I have trouble with that myself, and Your Honor, that is the exact reason which I did read these affidavits. . . . It was clear to me her story didn't check out with anything in the record by any other witness in any other way. So I concluded then, in addition to her incompetence, first, that secondly, there was no relevance of any kind that had anything to do with this case. And it was then that I personally made the decision that this witness was no witness. First of all, because she was incompetent in the utter, utter, utter ultimate sense of incompetency . . . there was not one scintilla that showed Myrtle Poor Bear was there, knew anything, did anything, et cetera. . . .
JUDGE ROSS: But can't you see, Mr. Hultman, what happened happened in such a way that it gives some credence to the claim of the -
MR. HULTMAN: I understand, yes, our Honor.
JUDGE ROSS: - the Indian People that the United States is willing to resort to any tactic in order to bring somebody back to the United States from Canada.
MR. HULTMAN: Judge -
JUDGE ROSS: And if they are willing to do that, they must be willing to fabricate other evidence. And it's no wonder that they are unhappy and disbelieve the things that happened in our courts when things like this happen.
MR. HULTMAN: Judge Ross, I in no way do anything but agree with you totally.
JUDGE ROSS: And you try to explain how they get there is not legally relevant in this case, and they don't understand that.
MR. HULTMAN: I understand, Your Honor.
JUDGE ROSS: We have an obligation to them, not only to treat them fairly, but not give the appearance of manufacturing evidence by interrogating incompetent witnesses.
MR. HULTMAN: Your Honor, I agree wholeheartedly.
However, in its conclusions the court noted that "The use of affidavits of Myrtle Poor Bear in the extradition proceedings was, to say the least, a clear abuse of the investigative process by the F.B.I." Why the defense request for a new trial was denied, under these circumstances seems mysterious, since as Judge Ross had pointed out: "If they are willing to do that, they must be willing to fabricate other evidence." - In other words, if the government is willing to present coerced or fabricated testimony, why would it hesitate to present fabricated circumstantial evidence as well? If they are willing to do that, they must be willing to fabricate other evidence. With that query in mind, the rickety ballistics evidence purporting to link Peltier to the killings becomes even more suspect than before.
The appeal attorneys had also shown that during Peltier's trial the prosecution had bludgeoned the jury with his past "crimes" - illegally, according to the defense, not only because he had never been tried or convicted of those crimes but because the Federal Rules of Evidence provide that "Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show that he acted in conformity therewith." This rule also provides, however, that such evidence is admissible for such purchases as proof of motive, and the prosecution argued that "the defendant's knowledge that he would be taken into custody and returned to Milwaukee to stand trial for attempted murder tended to show why Peltier reacted with deadly force when followed by by the FBI agents." The court of appeals agreed.
On February 11, in zero-degree temperatures a protest march demanding a Supreme Court review of Peltier's case was harassed by dozens of police, many of them in riot gear. The next day, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) refused to hear an appeal of the Fargo sentence, offering no explanation of its decision. Perhaps ironically, one month later in January 1978, prior burglary charges against Peltier were dropped in Oregon, and he was acquitted of "attempted murder" in Wisconsin, in both cases because the police witnesses involved had been discredited. Of course, with Leonard serving two consecutive life sentences, the obsolete charges once so useful in "neutralizing" an AIM leader by making him a fugitive from justice were now just cluttering up justice's books. After all, it's their court system, it's all one government," one attorney said. "There is so much FBI illegality here that they can't afford to have a new trial. They know he'd be found innocent. This is a case that's not going to go away."