The new age chief fiddles amid the Blackfeet ruins of white man encroachment on the reservation, crowding the Indians from prime grazing lands, irrigated farm lands, oil fields, and cattle ranching which is the only economic success of the tribe. In 1893 the Blackfeet Indians had survived attempts by Montana border-whites to exterminate the Blackfeet people by massacre, mass starvation, small-pox, whiskey trade, and removals to tiny reservation land base. The Blackfeet cattle ranchers had built a cattle industry of 25,000 cattle, 500 tribal brands, ranch houses, barns, and improvements that made the Indians self-sufficient which success was written into the 1896 Agreement/Article Five reserving the entire reservation for cattle ranching and Indian landowners. The white man robbed 312,250 acres by 1922 and the Indians have fought for the claims since 1928 until Chairman Old Person rejected our claims in 1981, calling the landowners a "bureau problem" and refused to represent us in Congress. In 1982 we researched the Blackfeet claims and found many tribal and allotted claims that had been neglected by Chairman Old Person and Vice-Chair Archie St. Goddard who had 35,000 acres of tribal land leased under his authority as land board chairman. Earl was found to have 85 awards from national white organizations and the BIA. Money and fame were their goals. The BTBC passed tribal resolution #364-82 in 1982 which resolved to recover minerals underlying the reservation owned by white men as a result of the forced patents cases in which the agent did not reserve the minerals for the tribe. We found these claims to be worth an estimated billion dollars to the tribe and allotted land owners, but Chairman Old Person would not pursue claims against the BIA. The Forced Patents claims are estimated @ $600 million dollars for the Dispossessed Heirs to the Original Blackfeet Allottees robbed by white men, and there are century-old Indian Money Damage Claims for loss of reserved water rights, trespass and rights-of-way claims, Old Age Assistance claims for elders who were robbed by Glacier and Pondera county officials who forced them to sell their trust lands as a prerequisite to receiving welfare, and BIA officials who sold their land without their consent, and after their deaths the county filed claims to recover county welfare payments from the IIM accounts with "bureau" approval; and Secretarial Sales of Deceased Indian lands sold by the Secretary of the Interior to white men without any consent or knowledge of the Indian heirs. I estimate the value of allotted and tribal Money Damage Claims to exceed $2 billion dollars and 529,000 acres of allotted lands restored to tribal and Blackfeet ownership. Why the council and chief Old Person spend tribal time and dollars for endangered species and not spend any time trying to save the endangered Blackfeet cattle ranchers and heirs to the forced patents claims? BTBC resolution #370-82 "Formally demands the Secretary of the Interior to take such actions to clear and quiet title to tribal minerals rights underlying the reservation and compensate the tribe for lost bonus payments, rental, and total production obtained from such lands" Why is chief Old Person helping the new age hippies and not his own people whose land and water are endangered in the water compact? Earl is a failed Baptist minister who makes fun of tribal religion and who has never defended the Blackfeet cattle ranchers or landowners robbed by white men despite tribal council resolution #224-2001 ordering him to testify to Congress as Chairman and chief of the Blackfeet nation to recover all allotted lands and minerals, and to force the county and state to refund all taxes collected since 1919 on the reservation. There is another billion-dollar claim! Please Vote no on the Blackfeet Water Rights Settlement Act unless you give up our tribal and allotted claims.forever!
Bob Juneau Sr.
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