South Dakota’s Great Sioux Nation has asked repeatedly to be heard on the issue of the Keystone Pipeline. But so far the Department of Indian Affairs is not listening.
According to a Truthout report, SD’s Lower Brule Lakota Sioux Tribe insists that 40% of the state is off limits to TransCanada’s pipeline, and with a recent press release, they’ve invoked a clause from the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 to protect their lands.
Visit http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/30696-lakota-sioux-tribe-invokes-bad-men-treaty-clause-over-keystone-pipeline
Called the “Bad Men” clause, it stems from the Treaty’s promise to protect the Indians from wrongs committed by “bad men among the whites, or among other people subject to the authority of the United States….“
In this case, say the Lakota Sioux, “This pipeline and tar sands extraction has brought death, devastation, and destruction” to their Northern relatives, and therefore they say they know that TransCanada will do the same in South Dakota. Thus these are "bad men" who have been engaged in unethical business practices.
The Tribe demands an immediate removal of TransCanada from the aboriginal and territorial treaty boundaries of the Oceti Sakowin - or Great Sioux Nation.
Tell the Department of Indian Affairs you support the Sioux Nation’s fight to preserve its land and protect its people. Don’t allow TransCanada‘s “bad men” or the pipeline on Sioux territory.
We, the undersigned, agree that the Fort Laramie Treaty protects the Great Sioux Nation from “bad men“ who would harm their land and their people, and it should be enforced.
Truthout’s report on the story quotes Kevin Wright, Acting chairman of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe, explaining why his people oppose the XL Pipeline and TransCanada’s infringement on their territorial rights.
Wright says “It is not an option to bargain with our grandchildren's future so we can live comfortably today.” Then he points out that “atrocities” have been committed by TransCanada against the First Nations in Canada, and that “The children and women of the First Nations have felt the true effects from this pipeline.”
And, adds the report, the Great Sioux Nation believes, because of their treaty relationship with the United States, the Department of Interior and State Department should have consulted with them when TransCanada first proposed the project.
Clearly the Oceti Sakowin has rights that have been violated, and the Nation is therefore justified in its demand that TransCanada be removed from its territories at once.
We ask that the Department of the Interior, Bureau of Indian Affairs comply with this demand.
Thanks for your time.
