Electronically reproduced with permission from:
Native Support Network
P.O. Box 146
Philo, CA 95466
(707) 895-3736
Write or call for a copy of the newsletter!
APACHE SACRED MOUNTAIN UNDER SIEGE
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The San Carlos Apache people in southeastern Arizona are battling for their
cultural survival. Their most sacred mountain, Dzil nchaa si an (Mt. Graham),
is being desecrated by a telescope project (the "Columbus" Project) of the
University of Arizona and the Vatican.
In the 1860's Western Apaches from several bands were placed on the San
Carlos Apache reservation with orders not to leave. In 1873 Dzil nchaa si an
was removed from the San Carlos Apache reservation by Federal executive order.
By 1903 other executive orders had reduced the reservation by one million
acres. These executive orders removed Dzil nchaa si an from Apache control and
made access to the mountain more difficult.
Mt. Graham is located within the Pinalenos mountain range and is under the
control of the US Forest Service (USFS). Since 1870, half of the forest of the
Pinalenos was cut. Oak groves of special value for acorn gathering were
destroyed. The Apaches were never consulted, nor were they ever informed by the
US Forest Service of any actions. The Apaches had no political tools to protest,
and not until 1948 could the even vote in Federal elections.
Despite the passage of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act (in 1978)
and the National Historic Preservation Act, the Forest Service did not contact
the Apaches when it issued a permit to the astronomical consortium to build a
testing station on Mt. Graham. A Native American shrine was bulldozed during
the placement of a temporary station erected for the project.
The Apache people are now in court pleading to stop a project which
government lawyers claim has been exempted by Congress from all US cultural
survival and environmental laws. A special rider lobbied by the University of
Arizona (UofA) was slipped in during the final hours of the 1988 Congress.
According to UofA lawyers, this rider exempted the project from the Native
American Religious Freedom Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, the
Endangered Species Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act. These laws
require environmental impact studies and consideration of cultural and
religious values. The 1988 rider's passage - the culmination of a million
dollar lobbying effort - bypassed public hearings and testimony. An open public
review process would have revealed the project's profound cultural and
environmental problems.
The UofA and the Vatican have ignored every plea of the Apache elders,
spiritual leaders, and Tribal Council. But others have heard. All of UofA's
US collaborators have abandoned the proposed project, including Ohio State,
Harvard/Smithsonian, University of Texas, University of Chicago, National
Astronomy Observatories, Cal Tech, and NASA, calling the project an affront
to cultural and biological diversity, and recognizing that superior sites are
available elsewhere.
Mt. Graham highlights the vulnerability of Native American sacred sites to
being trampled nationwide in the white man's courts. The astronomer's lawyers
are now citing cases from US law where US courts have _legally_ destroyed the
sites of Indians: (1) the Havasupai in their effort to protect their sacred
Red Butte and Havasupai Falls from Uranium mining desecration and destruction,
and (2) the Navajo and Hopi efforts to protect their sacred San Francisco peaks
from ski lifts and other Forest Service developments. The Forest Service plans
for a tourist center at the Big Horn Medicine Wheel in Wyoming deeply offend
a dozen Plains tribes. These all involve Forest Service or Bureau of Land
Management public lands expropriated or piecemealed from reservations or
ancestral lands.
The Apache Survival Coalition sorely needs your contribution to halt the
course of Apache cultural extinction. It will require our efforts both in and
out of court. But we will prevail. We will never give up our opposition to
this desecration. America is changing, and your help can stop this cultural
annihilation. The Board of the Apache Survival Coalition consists entirely of
Native Americans, Apache elders, Apache Tribal Council members, and Apache
spiritual leaders.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
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Send contributions to the Apache Survival Coalition, PO box 11814,
Tucson, AZ 85734, or contact them for more information on how you can help.
Call or write your Congressional representatives. Urge them to contact the
US Forest Service to STOP the COLUMBUS PROJECT ON MT GRAHAM.
-- Bill Faulk bill@phony25.cc.utah.edu--