• November 21, 2002
     
    Los Angeles Times
    Letters to the Editor
    202 West First St.
    Los Angeles, CA 90012
     
    Dear Editor:
     
                Fred Dickey’s article entitled “Indian casinos open way for Black reparations,” while interesting was based on a fundamental error.  I am pleased to see Mr. Dickey write in support of reparations for African Americans because the Black community certainly has suffered generational damage from slavery, and there is a precedent for reparations:  Japanese Americans, who were interned during World War II, received reparations and Congress recently enacted a statute authorizing war claims by Guam residents who were injured by the United States during World War II. 
     
                The right of Indian Tribes to self-government, including the right to conduct Indian gaming to fund tribal government, is however not “reparations.”  Historically, the United States – from President Washington forward – has acknowledged the facts that Indian Tribes predate the American Republic, that Indian Tribes have always been self-governing political communities, and that Indian Tribes retained their original and inherent rights to self-government through solemn treaties and agreements, where they ceded the hundreds of millions of acres of land now occupied by others in the United States.  Justice Black once said, “Great Nations, like Great men, should keep their word,” and unless the United States wants to return the lands that were ceded, we will always demand that the Federal Government honor its treaties.
     
    Indian gaming is an aspect of tribal self-government, used to fund education, health care, community infrastructure, and essential government services – just as state lotteries fund state government programs.  The status of Indian Tribes as sovereigns is acknowledged in the U.S. Constitution, where treaties already made (mostly Indian treaties) as well as those to be made, were made part of the supreme law of the land.  Indian Tribes are also acknowledged as governments in the Commerce Clause, and the unique status of American Indians as citizens of distinct tribal political communities is recognized in the Apportionment Clause and the 14th Amendment. 
     
    Contrary to Dickey’s opinion, there is nothing “19th Century” or “back door” about tribal government or the Indian gaming, which funds tribal government.  Those terms are derogatory.  We respectfully request that the Los Angeles Times stop using such derogatory language about tribal self-government in the future – even in the “independent” opinion pieces you choose to

     
    print.  Study United States history and the Constitution, and one can understand that today our Indian Tribes retain inherent rights to self-government.  Those are rights that our grandfathers fought and died to protect.  We honor our grandfathers as true heroes who had a vision of our Indian Tribes as Native communities with respect for tradition and self-government building a better life for our children and the generations to come.
     
    As to the unsupported allegation that Indian gaming is under regulated, consider this:  Indian Tribes devote over $212 million of our resources each year for Federal, tribal and state regulation of Indian gaming.  Tribes regulate Indian gaming through Tribal gaming commissions, Compliance officers, Tribal law enforcement officers, and Tribal courts.  States also regulate Tribal gaming through Tribal-State compacts negotiated under IGRA.   Federally, along with the National Indian Gaming Commission, the U.S. Department of Treasury, the U.S. Justice Department and the FBI also have responsibility for protecting Indian gaming from crime.  At the tribal level alone, we employ 2,800 top-highly qualified gaming commissioners, investigators, attorneys, auditors and other regulatory staff.  They are former FBI employees, state police officers and many other world class professionals.  Once again, Dickey’s hyperbolic rhetoric is just contrary to fact. 
     
    In closing, we would say to Mr. Dickey, that you do not have to slur American Indians or our right to self-government to promote justice for African Americans.  We, American Indians, fully support justice for all people in the United States and throughout the World.
     
    Sincerely,
    Ernest L. Stevens, Jr., Chairman
    National Indian Gaming Association