Reagan Discusses American Indians

As a citizen of an American Indian nation and a citizen of the United State--(a dual citizenship held by all Indians born in the U.S. since 1924)--I must say that it is difficult to be proud of the second half of that duality at a time there is continuing evidence and worldwide awareness of the fact that we are the only nation with a leader whose age exceeds his IQ.

How can we Americans be anything but embarrassed when President Reagan, abroad in the Soviet Union on a delicate diplomatic mission, shows gross ignorance about the status and condition of American Indians (Part I, June 1) in his own country? What illiterate bigot could have come up with a more insensitive, inaccurate, and outrageous statement than Reagan, who dared, when challenged in Moscow as to the treatment of American Indians, responded that “We may have made a mistake in giving them millions of acres of land to pursue their own primitive life style instead of requiring them to become citizens?”

Can anyone, even a dottering old actor without a script in hand, be so ignorant of American history as to not know of the U.S. Army’s numerous campaigns of mass murder carried out against America’s original inhabitants, the killing and/or imprisonment of our leaders, the devastating effects of alcoholism and other diseases introduced by the invaders, the huge theft of Indian lands, and the breaking of virtually every treaty made with an Indian nation in order to steal what resources remained in or on those remnants which Indians were allowed to continue regarding as our own?

Our “primitive life style,” as one of the Indian representatives in Moscow during Reagan’s visit pointed out, did not, prior to the takeover by Reagan’s noble, non-primitive race, include alcohol and other drug epidemics or a huge incidence of other problems. Child abuse, battering of the elderly, and homelessness were actually unknown among Indian cultures. Even the President, educated only by Hollywood cowboy-and-Indian movies, must know this much about the history of the American Indian citizens he has so grossly misgoverned and misconstrued.

ROBERT SUNDANCE

Los Angeles