On December 29, 1890 some 200 Sioux were massacred at the Battle of Wounded Knee at Pine Ridge, South Dakota. The battle was regarded as the final episode in the conquest of the North American Indian. But they refused to submit to the will of the White Man.
On February 27, 1973 some 200 members of the American Indian Movement took the Wounded Knee Reservation by force, declared it an independent nation and vowed to stay until the government agreed to address Indian grievances. AIM was a civil rights organization founded in 1968, originally to help urban American Indians displaced by government programs. It later broadened its efforts to include demands for economic independence, autonomy over tribal areas, restoration of illegally seized lands and protection of Indian legal rights and traditional culture. The government would not concede. And Native Americans would not quietly skulk off to their teepees, tomahawks dragging in the dust. They had become militants.
After a 71-day violent standoff, the American Indian Movement surrendered at Wounded Knee on May 8, 1973. Two protestors were killed during the seige: Frank Clearwater on April 17 and Lawrence "Buddy" LaMonte, a Vietnam Veteran, on April 27.
On February 27, 1973 some 200 members of the American Indian Movement took the Wounded Knee Reservation by force, declared it an independent nation and vowed to stay until the government agreed to address Indian grievances. AIM was a civil rights organization founded in 1968, originally to help urban American Indians displaced by government programs. It later broadened its efforts to include demands for economic independence, autonomy over tribal areas, restoration of illegally seized lands and protection of Indian legal rights and traditional culture. The government would not concede. And Native Americans would not quietly skulk off to their teepees, tomahawks dragging in the dust. They had become militants.
After a 71-day violent standoff, the American Indian Movement surrendered at Wounded Knee on May 8, 1973. Two protestors were killed during the seige: Frank Clearwater on April 17 and Lawrence "Buddy" LaMonte, a Vietnam Veteran, on April 27.
1 comment:
I thought the whole AIM movement (and their run-ins with the Government--especially COINTELPRO) was amazingly captured by the book In The Spirit Of Crazy by Peter Matthiessen. It's actually a heartbreaking--and required--read.
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