About 10 million tourists will visit Seattle this year. Many, no doubt, would be shocked to learn the tribe of the great chief who gave this city its name does not possess federal recognition.
After a decades-long struggle — shot through with ironic twists and lame excuses — the narrative may change.
Late last month, U.S. District Court Judge John Coughenour told the U.S. Department of the Interior to take another look at the 2001 Bush administration’s withdrawal of recognition granted to the tribe in the waning hours of the Clinton administration.
In 2001, Tribal chairperson Cecile Hansen, Chief Seattle’s great-great-grandniece, had taken the call from the head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs’ Bureau of Acknowledgement and Research, giving her the good news about the Clinton administration’s move, but the papers weren’t signed until after the Bush administration was installed. In September 2001, the act was overturned.
All along, the Duwamish had been denied recognition because of a break in continuity in their tribal records.
Recent newspaper accounts about the struggle refer to the benefits of recognition, with inferences on fishing rights and a potential casino, but the story hearkens back to the 1855 Treaty of Point Elliott, signed by the representatives of 15 tribes, which transferred Indian land to the U.S. government.
Chief Seattle signed for both the Duwamish and Suquamish tribes. The latter got a reservation across Puget Sound, visible from Discovery Park; the Duwamish, on the other hand, were dispersed to other reservations, though some didn’t go.
The historical record is very clear: The remnants of the tribe were burned out of West Seattle in the 1890s and forced from the Duwamish waterways in the 1910s. Before that, a city ordinance declared no Indian could be in the city after dark.
The break-in-continuity argument is immaculate in its catch-22 logic. The time has come to put an end to the nonsense.
The first petition for recognition was sent to Washington, D.C., in 1977; the second, revised version, in 1989. The U.S, Department of the Interior needs to do the right thing — it’s long overdue.