Cecil reports that Native American populations didn’t suffer from the sterilizations, and offers as evidence that there are 3 times as many around today than 25 years ago. What the Master seems to have missed, however, is that many more people consider themselves Native American than in the 1970s. Stigmas have lessened, and more importantly many tribes are reaping the benefits of casino gambling. Many people who previously hadn’t registered as belonging to a tribe are doing so in record numbers, in an effort to cash in.
Besides the folks wanting to cash in on casino earnings, there are two other groups that come to my mind. One is the folks with some NA ancestry who wish to explore NA spiritual paths and ancestral culture. The other is folks who have found out about scholarships and educational subsidies for NA students. In the first group is a friend of mine who is studying Lakota and Cherokee healing rituals, as well as the links among the various tribes’ spiritual rituals. In the second group is another friend who once thought of himself as a Croat, but with further research, found he was a German with a Dineh grandmother. His children are apparently eligible for some help with their educational expenses.
I agree with Peeps. Once it became profitable to be Indian a lot of people signed up. Also there are more federally recognized tribes now than there were in 1970. However, with the BIA’s less than perfect history of record-keeping, it is doubtful we will ever find enough accurate hard data to confirm or refute this claim.
Another reason that it’s good to be a Native American is the access to cheap or free health care (which is great, if they aren’t forcibly sterilizing you ;)). I went to high school just outside a reservation (in the late 70’s and early 80’s, actually), and knew a lot of kids whose family would get care at the tribal clinic even though they were 1/16 Native, tops.
By the way, thanks for the question, J. Gatwood of Albuquerque, New Mexico. I bet Unca Cecil didn’t have to look too hard for information on this subject, did he? 
I agree with the earlier posters regarding the increase in numbers of people claiming Native American ancestry. There is another reason: better counting. Over the past decades, many “increases” in things like crime, illness, and ethnic groups have come about simply because of better, more systematic (and computerized), counting.
One cannot simply “sign up” to get on a tribal roll. In some areas - like Oklahoma - a person can be a very small part Native American to be registered in a tribe (and they still have to prove it). Many of them no longer have language or much of their original culture left. But in New Mexico, to belong to most tribes you have to be at least half.
Yes and no, JillGat. Some tribes are more stringent than others in granting membership, but it is a fact that tens of thousands more people register as Native American to reap the benefits (penuniary, spiritual, or otherwise).
One good example is the Mashantucket Pequots, operators of Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut – the most profitable casino in the Western Hemisphere. The Pequots were not even a tribe until the 1970s, having been considered wiped out for 300 years. However, they returned Phoenix-like to gain Congressional recognition, and started up Foxwoods. Now how in the world does a non-tribe re-populate itself? According to this CBS News story:
And since then, even that requirement has been dropped (the Pequots now boast a population of over 600; but this has occurred across the country with many other tribes). The point is, it’s difficult to gather an accurate census of native populations given all the enticements that go along with it.
In New Mexico, you go in a Seven-Eleven and you’re likely to hear Native American teenagers speaking Navajo. Ain’t no “wannabe’s” here. I used to date a guy whose mom was Laguna Pueblo and his dad was Navajo. He spoke both Tewa and Navajo. He was on the Navajo tribal roll and wanted to change to Laguna so he could work on that reservation. It wasn’t an easy task, even for someone who was fully half.
I know that some tribes in other parts of the country allow people with very little blood to be counted, because otherwise the tribe would not qualify for certain programs.
To do otherwise would be unfair discrimination against the severely anemic.
I guess the real CCC question here is where Cecil got the numbers that he listed in the column. There are all sorts of potential self-selection biases and motives out there, and knowing what the numbers actually measure (tribal enrollment, census questionairres, etc.) would go a long way towards telling us what those biases might be. I certainly agree, however, that the bulk of the apparently large population increase is more likely to be a result of willingness to identify as Indian than to be the result of basic reproduction.
But, from what Cecil said, other racial groups reported similar if not larger rates of (voluntary) sterilization as Native Americans. It still appears that there is no evidence of forced or coerced sterilization of Native American women.
I was referring to the enormous (apparent) population increase, Jill, not the sterilization rates.
As was I. The original question asked whether such sterilization rates affected the growth rate of the Native American population, to which Cecil responds with “No way, there’s more than three times as many today as 30 years ago.” This is poor and inadequate evidence.
As discussed here, this growth hasn’t been due to some native baby boom. Instead, their growing numbers are largely due to increasing self-identification as Native American, not increased fecundity or (contrariwise, and apropos of the question at hand) decreased sterility rates of that population.
If the numbers were taken from the US Census, then tribal regulations about membership wouldn’t make a difference. Anyone who considered themselves Native American could be counted as such. Of course, there’s still no evidence to support mass sterilizations of Indian women either.
I take no position on the liklihood of sterilizations, forced or otherwise, but this discussion is based upon an incorrect assumption, which is that sterilizations would necessarily result in decreased populations. The age of the women involved is reported as 15 to 44. Most voluntary sterilizations for birth control purposes are obtained by women who have already had children. Even mass sterilizations of women over 35 who had already had two or more children would not result in a population decrease.
Actually, a program of sterilizing every woman after two children would result in a slight loss of population, since some people never procreate. The program described in the question (sterilizing every woman possible of childbearing age) would have resulted in a large population loss, all other factors remaining constant.
My points were (1) that those factors may not have remained constant, depending on where the data on population came from, and (b) that this merely fails to disprove the argument; it does not prove it.
There are a number of factors here. Re census data, I agree that it doesn’t mean much, as anyone can check any box they like on the form. The increase in the official number of Native Americans probably comes mainly from more people checking “Native American”. There are many reasons for people doing this. Some probably think that checking that box on the form will get them some govt benefit or other – but in other cases, you may have people who really do have Indian ancestry. In the past, they checked “white,” not wanting to admit to any non-white ancestry that did not show in their appearence. With changing times, they’ve decided to come out of the closet (so to speak). Also, wasn’t the latest census the 1st one where people could check as many boxes as they wanted? This probably encouraged people of mixed ancestry to check all applicable boxes.
Re forced sterilization, I have no doubt that, in the '70s and earlier, many impoverished minority women in the US were sterlized without informed concent being obtained. I doubt if the figure for any group was as high as 40%, but any such cases are too many.
[[The original question asked whether such sterilization rates affected the growth rate of the Native American population, to which Cecil responds with “No way, there’s more than three times as many today as 30 years ago.” This is poor and inadequate evidence.]]
No. The original question asked whether indeed such mass involuntary sterilizations of Native women had occurred. A population decrease would just be one possible indicator. It is true that most VOLUNTARY sterilizations are done after a woman has had all the children she wants. If, however, there were mass INVOLUNTARY sterilizations - presumably as a form of genocide or some other mal-intent - one might expect to see a decrease in population size.
Again, I say that it is not that easy to “join” a tribe. I don’t know if the population data presented by Cecil were taken just from the Census or from tribal rolls.
So far I have seen no evidence showing that ANY such involuntary sterilizations have occurred among Native American or other minority women. Certainly plenty of tragic offenses have occurred and been perpetrated upon minority populations in the US (such as the Tuskegee Syphilis experiment). I’m just trying to pin down any proof of this particular claim.
Jill
One reason for the jump in census numbers of native Americans is that in 2000 you finally could claim to be of more than one race. A lot of US citizens have some native ancestry but wouldn’t list “native” as their race if given only one choice. There is also less stigma in being native American or partially native American than in the past (this shouldn’t be a factor in a confidential survey but it may well have been a factor).
You obviously didn’t read the original question very closely, which asked:
As you concede, a large population decrease would be one possible indicator. However, it is in fact relatively “simple” to join tribes east of the Mississippi. The point is that Cecil has provided insufficient evidence that native populations have not suffered as a result of sterilizations – which was the point of his column, and so the burden of proof rests on him. Your defense of Cecil is admirable, yet not defensible in evidence. Population increases, which he cites as evidence, have many more exaplanations than native fertility. Even if a decrease in population might be expected, it would be overweighed by the number of people opting to register as Native Americans, for whatever reasons.