Sharing Our Stories of Survival: Native Women Surviving Violence (4 page)

They tell us in this camp the people were running out of food. And they decided that they would send two men out to hunt for food. And they went all over the canyon and up and down hills, looking for game. And they came upon this high hill and when they got on top of the hill they saw from the west this cloud was coming. And as the cloud got closer to them, in this cloud was a woman. And as the cloud got closer, one of the young scouts had unhealthy thoughts about her. And they tell us that she didn’t speak our language. And so she signed to the man in the universal language and challenged the young man to come forward. The young scout being foolish went towards her. And the elements came together and protected this woman. When they all quieted down all that was left of this man was his bones and maggots. So one of the first teachings she brought to us as a people was that even in thought women are to be respected . . . Probably, the biggest teaching of all she brought to us, that is still with us today, was as a nation we pray because if we are spiritual beings on a human journey, everything we do on this journey is a prayer. We teach this to our children, we teach this to our grandchildren, so that those generations to come will know what is expected of them and will know how to treat each other as relatives.
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European government officials and settlers did not understand these spiritual beliefs and lifeways as the operational basis of Indian nations. Deloria and Lytle note:

Given the absence of formally structured institutions within the Indian tribes they encountered, it appeared to the earliest settlers that the tribes existed without any forms of government. The Indians were generally viewed as living almost in a state of anarchy and some early political writers, seeking to conceive a “state of nature” upon which they could build the philosophical framework for their natural law—social contract theories of government, frequently referred to Indians as “children of nature” and applauded their apparent ability to live without the confining and complex rules that had been devised within the European system of government. Tribal governments of enormous complexity did exist but they differed so radically from the forms used by the Europeans that few non-Indian observers could understand them.
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The complexity of tribal governance was misunderstood in part due to the essential multifaceted roles of Native women within their respective nations. The social organization of many Indian nations dramatically differed from European societies. Many Indian nations held the mother’s role as culturally and structurally central to their societies. In addition, many Indian nations had woman-centered economic systems. Women had authority over the home, production of foods, and oftentimes activities associated with trade. Although women headed many European monarchies, colonial governments could not conceive of a nation following descent through one’s mother. The reality that many Indian nations were organized as matrilineal
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societies seemed incomprehensible to the foreign observer. The Native customary practice of daughters taking their husbands or men to live at their mothers’ homes was also viewed as unacceptable. In addition, women in many Indian nations retained the right to separate from an unwanted husband and retain her property.
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Europeans found the role of Native women perplexing, often describing it as uncivilized. Many rights of Native women within their nations were not recognized, and in some cases were declared illegal in European and American law. Native women were socially measured according to European standards of how women should behave. The differences that existed between women of Indian nations and European women were not only misunderstood as uncivilized, but also perceived to be unchristian.

In particular, the use of violence to control the behavior of a woman was not a belief or practice common to Indian nations. While British common law and early United States cases permitted abuse and violence against a wife by a husband,
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such behavior was unacceptable within Indian nations. When individual incidents of violence against Native women occurred in precolonial times, they were addressed in the context of the worldview and spiritual beliefs of the tribe.
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Unlike non-Indian jurisdictions, the commission of an act of violence held harsh consequences for the abuser, and the right of a husband to beat his wife was not legally sanctioned.

Prior to contact, such spiritual beliefs and cultural practices formed the basis of the customary law of Indian nations that created safety and respect for Native women within their homes and nations. European and later American governments misunderstood this combination of concepts that were reflected in the social structure of Indian nations. Native women, because of their strong identities and important roles, were perceived to be uncivilized and subsequently became targets of the federal efforts to civilize the Indian populations. The following petition for citizenship by the Alaska Natives of the Village of Hydaburg is but one of many examples of the erosion of the rights of Native women as terms of conquest.

We the undersigned, Alaskan Natives of Hydaburg, Alaska, hereby declare that we have given up our old tribal relationships; that we recognize no chief of clan or tribal family; that we have given up all claim to or interest in tribal and communal houses; that we live in one family house in accordance with the customs of civilization; that we observe the marriage laws of the United States; that our children take the name of the father and belong equally to the father and mother, and that the rights of the maternal uncle to direct the children are no longer recognized and that in the case of death of either parent we recognize the laws of the United States relative to inheritance of property; that we have discarded the totem and recognize the Stars and Stripes as our only emblem; and that we are a law abiding and self-supporting people. We therefore believe that we have fulfilled all requirements necessary to citizenship in the United Sates, and we respectfully request that the Congress of the United States to pass a law granting to us the full rights of citizenship.
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Colonization and the Erosion of Safety for Native Women

Let your women’s sons be ours; our sons be yours. Let your women bear our words
.
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In 1781, a Cherokee woman named Nancy Ward spoke these good words in addressing the United States Treaty Commission at Holston. She believed that peace could only be sustained if the Cherokees and their enemies became one people bound by the ties of kinship. As a leader of the Cherokee nation she called upon the women of the United States because, in her worldview, only the women could accomplish this goal. At a subsequent meeting in 1785 at Hopewell, South Carolina, Nancy Ward was again introduced by the Cherokee Chiefs to speak to U.S. treaty commissioners as a “beloved woman who has borne and raised up warriors.”
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Perdue writes, “The political power of Ward and other Cherokee women rested on their position as mothers in a matrilineal society that equated kinship and citizenship. In such a society, mothers—and by extension, women—enjoyed a great deal of honor and prestige, and references to motherhood evoked power rather than sentimentality.”
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She did not know that the women of the United States did not possess the authority to respond to her call for peace.

In 2005, 224 years after Nancy Ward’s appeal to the women of the United States, Tex Hall, former president of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) stated: “Our women are abused at far greater rates than any other group of women in the United States. The rate of violent assault is so high because (the) lack of authority given to tribal police has created a system destined to fail our people and our women.”
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The journey from 1781 to 2005 is one of the physical, cultural, and spiritual survival of Native women. It is markedly similar to the process that occurred around the world, as indigenous nations became colonies of Europe. In response to the imposition of foreign governments, Indian nations were forced to dismantle or modify their systems of governance. This disruption included a breaking down of customary law and tribal lifeways that safeguarded Native women from crimes of physical and sexual abuse. The legalization and cultural acceptance of violence perpetrated against Native women as populations began with the conquest of Indian nations by colonial governments such as Spain, France, Russia, and England.
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An outstanding characteristic of conquest was the physical and cultural genocide of indigenous women of the Americas. Historian Bouvier writes:

Spain’s conquest of California, like that of its other American colonies, occurred in three phases: exploration (often referred to as “discovery”), colonization, and evangelization, the last two overlapping considerably.... During the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, Spain’s golden age of exploration, rumors spread that lands inhabited by women lay undiscovered just beyond the reaches of the charted territory. On his first trip across the Atlantic Ocean, Christopher Columbus wrote of the existence of such an island.
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Such rumors piqued the curiosity of Spanish monarchs, who began to request that explorers search specifically for these mythic women, whom they called Amazons.
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The purpose of their conquest was to claim the vast riches of a new land and its strong women.

Under the dominion of each conquering nation, Native women became targets of the colonizer in the quest to conquer and assimilate Indian nations. Within the United States, the body of law and policy that governs the legal relationship between Indian nations and the United States is known as Federal Indian Law. It is within this legal context that Native women have witnessed a dramatic shift in their quality of life as a population. This legal relationship, established over hundreds of years, separates Native women from any other population of women, as illustrated in the following historical episodes.

Erosion of the Authority of Indian Nations to Protect Women

As the aboriginal
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people, Indian nations have always exercised the right of self-government, including authority over all persons committing acts of violence against women within their territorial lands. This authority of Indian nations over their members and land is known as
inherent authority
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It is the natural and permanent authority that Indian nations have held over their members as governments for thousands of years. In 1831, in a case arising between the Cherokee Indian Nation and the State of Georgia, Chief Justice Marshall acknowledged, “The Cherokee Nation, then, is a distinct community, occupying its own territory, with boundaries accurately described, in which the laws of Georgia can have no force, and which the citizens of Georgia have no right to enter but with the assent of the Cherokees themselves or in conformity with the treaties and the acts of Congress.”
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Independent of European nations, Indian nations make specific reference to the fact that they retain power to govern their land and the people who come within it. For example, among the Iroquois Confederacy, the Great Law addressed the Confederacy’s jurisdiction:

Roots have spread out from the Tree of the Great Peace, one to the north, one to the east, one to the south, one to the west. The name of these roots is The Great White Roots and their nature is Peace and Strength. If any man or any nation outside the Five Nations shall obey the laws of the Great Peace and make known their disposition to the Lords of the Confederacy, they may trace the Roots to the Tree and if their minds are clean and they are obedient and promise to obey the wishes of the Confederate Council they shall be welcome to take shelter beneath the Tree of the Long Leaves.
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Women under the Great Law were granted rights and privileges that outlawed violent and abusive behavior, thereby creating a culture within the Five Nations that afforded fundamental safety to women.

Historical accounts of nations punishing offenders for abusing women exist on the opposite side of the continent as well. In the land now known as Alaska, Russian sailors were held accountable for abuse of Native women, as told in the story “Taa’ii’Ti’”:

When the Russians landed they fooled around with the Indian women during the night. There were lots of men in the big ship. The Chief named Taa’ii’Ti’ told them not to bother the women, but they still did it, so he told them, “Don’t ever do that again.” He spoke very loudly. The Russian men he was talking to at that time were feeling his body muscles like this (gesturing) and said to him: “You have a weak body, why are you talking?” He was like a President himself so he was really mad when they told him that. He didn’t say another word until everyone went to bed. The next morning, he reminded them not to do it again, but they still fooled around with the women, even the married women. The people in the village told him about it. The Russian men were sleeping at that time. They were sleeping in tents, and Taa’ii’Ti’ got his cane and hit all of them. They all cried out in pain. While doing that he reminded them that they underestimated him and that his body was not weak. He only spared four men. They didn’t like it, but what could they do about it. He ordered the rest of the men away to continue what they were being punished for. So the four men invited him to return with them since they knew he knew their own leader too. “Okay, yes,” he said. So he went over with them (laughs). When they arrived (in Russia) they took him to the President there. Taa’ii’Ti’ told him about the shipload of men that went over to Alaska and how he killed them all that one morning.
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