One of the best fringe benefits of researching a book are the surprises that await you when you begin such a daunting process. I spent years (not day after day, but years nonetheless) researching Coyote Warrior, and one of the most surprising things I discovered was that the honor of really turning things around for the Native Americans fell to a man whose role in lifting up Native nations in the late 20th century would come as a surprise to most Americans. In fact, he was elected president almost a century to the day after William Tecumseh Sherman sued Red Cloud for peace at Fort Laramie, in 1868. That guy was none other than Richard Nixon.
On July 8, 1970, Nixon delivered the first speech ever made to Congress by an American president on behalf of Native rights. He had made this promise to native leaders during his campaign, and he held to it. And this wasn’t a bit of fluff. Nixon’s vision was bold and ground-breaking: “The American Indians have been oppressed and brutalized, deprived of their ancestral lands, and denied the opportunity to control their own destiny,” he declared. “The story of the Indian is a record of endurance or survival, of adaptation and creativity in the face of overwhelming obstacles. The time has come to break decisively with the past.”
To that end, Nixon’s speech was a powerful reaffirmation of John Marshall’s original vision of a “domestic sovereign nation,” and he got the help of the progressive Democratic senator from South Dakota, James Abourezk, to help him turn those words into legislation. To his everlasting credit in Indian Country, Congress passed the Native American Self-Determination Act in 1975, two years after his administration came to its inglorious end.
Twenty-five years later, Senator Abourezk gave me what is likely the best answer to the obvious sixty-four thousand dollar question: “Why Richard Nixon?”
“Nixon loved football. He played the game when he was in high school, and it was his coach, who happened to be a Cherokee Indian, whom he credited with teaching him everything he needed to know to become president of the United States.”
I’ve often reflected on that coach and wondered if he ever had any inkling how his inspiration and mentoring had one day benefited the lives of millions of his fellow Native Americans. There’s a lesson in that for all of us.
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