States of America

- The deed is held by the United States government so we're just living on it, we're borrowing it.

I can't go back to where I was raised, where I was born and say that is my land, that is my piece of land.

'Cause I don't have a deed to it.

The only thing I have is permission to live on it and qualify as a member of that particular tribe.

And that's the reason that things aren't progressing as well as they need to be.

(slow upbeat music) While we were in school we were mandated to speak only English.

If we said anything in Navajo then we were punished.

How do you like that for being an American?

They tried to annihilate the native people by putting them in schools and mandating that we get rid of our values and language and all these other things.

And accept the American way through education.

And the thing that really got me was how the United States government every morning when we had class and we said justice for all and it wasn't justice for all it was just justice for people you knew.

And that's how things were done and how very disenchanted.

So that really reinforced my thinking.

What the heck's going on here.

It's oppression.

The only thing that I haven't done in the public education system is drive a bus and cook.

I started out as a science teacher.

I taught math, I taught science.

Coached football, basketball, track.

Then I became a personnel director of the public school system of close to 1,500 kids.

And even there I saw a lot of things that people were trying to do to get by rules and regulations and I being the honest guy that I was tried to make amends and make it right.

So when I stayed in education not for the money but for the fact I could make a difference in people's lives.

And how they saw things, their perspective, the value of learning and thinking that kind of thing.

I'd been working with Headstart in the early 70s, I saw a lot of birth defects in the Navajo reservation.

And so I asked this one Pediatrician why is it it's like this?

Well he said well didn't you know this here there's a big Uranium plant?

Knowing that and having a science background, I had a good idea what was going on.

And it was from all that radiation that people were exposed to it.

So many, many natives and I'm sure other people who got exposed to a lot of illnesses.

Then the more recently there have been legislation to try to remunerate some of these people.

To me that river is forever contaminated.

As I understand it in the early 60s there was a big meeting in Fort Defiance Plateau between all of the active agencies.

And the tribal counsel in its greatest wisdom said "Leave us alone we'll maintain our own we can do it."

So the Bureau of Indian Affairs, now they're saying, "Ha ha ha.

That's what we wanted to hear.

You guys are smart, you can do it."

And they just started pulling back the fund strings and now look what we've got, nothing almost.

I'm living my way in the country.

I hear the coyotes singing at night.

I sit here at 2: 00 o'clock in the morning it's very quiet and relaxing.

But I can drive down the road nine miles, I can get my gasoline, I can go to Walmart.

And then the fact that I'm able to say this is my little property right here.

If somebody goes, "Well hey, what are you doing on my property?

Get out."

Whereas on the rez they say, "Hey I'ma Navajo that ain't your property" and I can't do nothing about it.

So that's kind of what I express, I like it, and it's alright, I can live with it.

Or I can jump on my motorcycle and go through the gate, go through the other gate, wherever the sun goes down that's where I'll be is what I say.

Ha ha.

Is that America?

I don't know.

Sometimes I wonder.

(slow upbeat music)