Transcripts For CSPAN2 Jon Lauck From Warm Center To Ragged

Dakota for over 100 years to my new book from warm center to ragged and takes its title from mister got Scott Fitzgerald who is the author of probably most famously of the great gatsby and if you remember your gatsby from back in high school or college, you remember that nick karoly was from minnesota. Nick karoly went off to war, this would have been world war i and when he came back, he decided that he thought it would be sort of doll to move back to minnesota. Which he saw as the ragged edge of the universe. And he decided to move to new york and he got mixed up in the roaring 20s. On long island with gatsby and all that cast of characters from his book. But in the end, when he sees what happens to many of these characters, he begins to see the old midwest where he came from as the warm center of the world. So that contract is what i tried to draw in my new book, from warm center to ragged edge. In the decades after the civil war, the midwest was seen by many commentators as the pacesetter region. The place where literature was the most active, the place where their most the most dynamic economy. A place where political power was growing and would continue to grow. Most of the president s after the civil war, seven of eight came from the midwest. They came from places like ohio and indiana and iowa. And the midwest also in addition to its political and economic clout had a great deal of cultural clout because of its writers, because of its strong regionalist movement. Some of the prominent writers will be forgotten by most listeners but at the time they were household names. Im thinking about people like James Whitcomb riley of indiana whose latent state in indianapolis for a week because there were thousands of wellwishers who came through because he was so well known at this period of time. This was part of the indiana golden age of literature with featured people like riley and Booth Tarkington and lou wallace who was the author of ben hur. There were prominent authors like Sherwin Anderson of ohio and Sinclair Lewis of minnesota and f Scott Fitzgerald of st. Paul who we talked about a little bit ago. All these people were making major marks for the midwest and American Literary culture. About midway through the 20th century you could begin to say the effects of the growing cloud and growing power of the coast of american culture, especially with the movie industry, whatever the 1940s, that was the most dominant form of entertainment in the country and Many Americans went to three or four or five movies a week. That, most of those movies were shot in hollywood and in los angeles so that showed the power of california and the west coast at that time and soon after that found television. Much of which was produced in hollywood. And pretty soon, most americans in the span of a decade had a television set. When the 50s began, two percent of americans had televisions by the end of the decade, 90 percent of them did. So these local centers of the regional production of the culture in the midwest lost their one time influence. In addition to that, there was a growing cosmopolitanism in the country that looked down on what they saw as the kind of retrograde agrarian isolationist parts of the country. And this was particularly acute in the years after world war ii when there was a growing dedication to the United Nations and establishing a more prominent role for the United States of the world. The midwest or many years has been a countries, part of the country that was most ethical of getting involved in entangling affairs overseas. All these factors came together to reduce the prominence of midwestern culture , about midway through the 20th century. I think you can see the influence of the diminishment of midwestern regionalism in our politics and in the frustration of some people in the middle of the country with other people dominating or controlling the culture. I think theres a real longing in the interior parts of the country for more of a assertive role in our culture. They want to be more a part of the reflection of cultural forms that are prominent in our culture and i think you see this longing for a real genuine democratic pluralism in the country. People know and feel when theyre being dominated and when they dont have much of a voice. And i think you see those kind of frustrations bubbling up in our politics today. The good news is that there have been some major developments in the past few years that will allow people to rediscover their own regional and cultural history. I think the first step was the formation of the Midwestern History Association. Which is a National Organization that meets every year in michigan actually it was founded in sioux falls. The Midwestern History Association in particular was founded on the principle that the Academic Field of midwestern history had completely collapsed. By the mid1990s or so. And that it was far past time to redevelop the infrastructure that field. And the Critical Infrastructure is having an association dedicated to the study of a particular region. An association that meets every year, scholars together, its been on panels, get them talking about this region and also creates a space for them to publish their work. Midwesterners began to date into their own history, they are going to see similar stories and we hear those stories. You want to know what your ancestors went through and what they lived through and what shape them and what made them who they are, and thats that made people want to rediscover this history of our region. One of the complications of reviving the study of the midwest is that there are many midwesterners who are very humble and some of them think that we dont have much of a story to tell, and even if we gave, were not going to boast about it but im trying to shake these midwesterners out of their complacency and get them to think a little bit more about their region and think a little bit more about their heritage and where they come from. I think the world could certainly stand a few more stronger midwestern voices out there. Native american citizenship in the United States has had a challenging history that continues today. The author of in broken landscape, Indian Tribes and the constitution examines this history and talks about past legal casesand legislation that have interpreted and misinterpreted tribal sovereignty. I am my family came to south dakota in 1973, im originally from new york. When i first came here we lived and worked on the indian reservation for 10 years and then for three years i was directed to the plains legal services, the statewide Eagle Services program so after 10 years on the reservation and the year of fellowship, i joined the law school. They wanted me to teach indian law and its been my primary area, also from the law. But i also along the way become a tribal apologize. For several tribes in south dakota were members of the nine recognized tribes in south dakota, publicly they make up eight or nine or 10 percent of the state population so would you say in western states, native population but oftentimes its a significant part of that state population. And it made a few on the reservation and they live off the reservation. So you can find native people everywhere. Its important to understand that native people are citizens of free sovereignty. The United States system, they are citizens of the state in which they reside so native people from south dakota also are a state citizen and there are also private citizen of their tribe of which they are a family. The tribe has what is known as sovereignty. They have the authority from their free constitutional existence as selfgoverning sovereigns and thats the position they taken that they are selfgoverning sovereigns within their territory. However, thats the line with the dominant society, with the federal government interview so the struggle for Indian Tribes is to try to maximize their sovereignty. To maximize their zones of authority on and in Indian Country and to do that, that meets the approval of the United States congress and the United States Supreme Court. Sometimes sides seem to be going in the same direction and theres been an appreciation and recognition of tribal offer at the and other rhetorical contexts and other relationships seemto be going in the opposite direction where the federal government is inimical and its impossible to do tribal sovereignty. I think the main issue as far as most of the notion of expansion is that one way of looking at American History is that its premised on sort of western expansion. And its tough to engage in western expansion when there are already people here. What was one of the initial kind of amendments was how are our colonists went to deal with people that were already here. When they first came here, many people were numerically and often times militarily stronger than european immigrants but over time immigrants began to have sort of more power numerically and firepower and they began to have the upper hand. And the notion was that there had to be this continual western expansion for native land and thats been the primary historical attention of the federal government increasing growth and Movement Westward to obtain as much indian land as possible. From a native perspective, what they tried to do is to resist that as much as possible, to give up as little land as possible, to retain as much land as possible. One of the problems in that is trying to know what actually anchors that relationship. And one way of thinking and ive written about this is that we might have looked to the United States constitution to anchor and be more capable of exactly what is the relationship we need to sovereigns . All i think the constitution as originally written tried to do that, i think through both axis congress and the United States Supreme Court, they lost sight about the original relationship as described in the constitution. Native people historically have had struggles to be recognized as a United States citizen. They had to struggle to be recognized as state citizens and they fought not to have been, you wouldve thought that at some point native people would have been welcomed into the constitutional structure. Both as federal citizens and state citizens. Acrosstheboard native people have become federal citizens until 1924. The 14th amendment which we generally regarded as providing both federal and state citizenship to everyone including africanamericans in the aftermath of the civil war, theres a case that that was decided by the Supreme Court in 1881. That said because of language in the 14th amendment the 14th amendment and not make native people United States citizens, didnt make them state citizens so it was labeled sort of the postcivil war amendments which we always thought very positively about, we feel that they didnt really do anything or native people to move forward there citizenship as both several citizens and state citizens. In the l versus wilkins case, he was a native person living in omaha nebraska. Living also off the reservation and he went to vote in a local election. Anyway, he attempted to register to vote, to be able to cast his ballot and he was told that he was neither a citizen of the United States or a citizen of the state of nebraska despite the 14th amendment because theres language in the 14th amendment also appears in article 1 of the constitution. It has language from the phrase excluding indians not taxed. As you go through that phrase in article 1 of the constitution, what does that phrase actually mean . You can ask this of all all people and they really dont know. At that point even at the time the constitution was being adopted, there were a small number of indian people that lived off the reservation and at least technically were subject to taxation of the bargain in the constitution was excludingindians not taxed , meaning those native people were still living on the reservation in Indian Country, they wouldnt be counted. Those few people who moved off the reservation living in small towns, arguably subject to local taxation, would be counted for purposes and that language excluding indians not taxed for reasons not clear is still repeated in the 14th amendment. The court fastened on the continuation of that language in the 14th amendment to say that the 14th amendment did not see the citizenship status of native people. Were getting into the latter part of the 19th century and native people with rare exceptions were not considered citizens of the United States or citizens of the state in which they were living. I think that the major challenges that native people have to deal with Going Forward is one of theproblems of Economic Development. Theyre not in reservations in south dakota or among the poorest in the nation, usually roughly 4 of the poorestcounties in the United States. They are located in Indian Country in south dakota so poverty remained expensive. While that is true, thats not all of Indian Country. If people seem to know the man about Indian Country but they dont know the good. And i think thats a significant kind of problem or nonnative people to be more aware of the good things that actually occur in Indian Country. But there are colleges on reservations in south dakota, times the Fastest Growing colleges in the state. I would venture to say if you raise that question to a significant portion of the nonnative population in south dakota, they wouldnt have a clue that there are colleges on the reservation created by native people, governed by native people that are doing a tremendous amount of good work but theres some good and some things that there continues to be struggles. I think for example, its important for both sides to agree that there can be Common Ground to solve problems. At least there is the opportunity for common Economic Development schemes that would benefit both the state and the tribe to have those in Indian Country and i think there could be. I dont think thats been adequately explored in the context of tourism, for example you have a state trial partnership in the context of tourism. I think the notion of having opportunities for example members of the state legislature to travel to Indian Country, to meet Tribal Council members, just to have forums where they actually come together and i think in the absence of forums and the abs o forums and the absence of coming together, were going to have all that empty space between two people and you have a history of oftentimes that empty space is going to be filled by stereotypes, negative stereotypes. As long as people come together officially and unofficially in more contact with each other, then i think they can have a better sense of who people are and develop that respect i was talking about before. And to go around the law school here, youll see evidence not always true in other places theres a native presence here. You saw in the law association, you see start wilson in the buildings, if you go into the courtroom you will see all sorts of native artwork and stuff and traveling most other places in south dakota i dont think you will see that. Just like a basic thing. I dont think people when they come here, they see it. Its like well, theres some kind of cultural respect and native presence here and i think they dont want to underestimate that because when youre a nonnative person, you take for granted that everything reflects the background that you come from but the native people, its not like that at all. As long as people are hesitant to do that, and remain kind of separated and cautious , i think its just problematical for both sides to go forward. Quicks during the era of the american frontier, south dakota was considered a long post land where frontier justice came in many forms including lynch mobs. As we continue our look at the literary life of south dakota, stating that author of how north dakota tells the story of judge peter shannon, the man said by president Ulysses Grant to bring order to the area. Ask portions of this program contain images that some viewers may find offensive. Peter shannon was a chief justice of the dakota territory Supreme Court of the 1873 to 1882. He was admitted to the fifth bar, 1846. He had a very successful wall practice there. He was served a term as the judge and in pennsylvania. Shannon first of all, he was antislavery but also stridently anti fascists. He believed that if you seceded from the union you were a trader that could be done with accordingly. He served a short period of time in the civil war. And the pennsylvania cavalry unit and when grant was president , he offered him the position of the dakota territory to serve as chief justice. And because it was because he would be working in the law, with the law, he had previously refused a job offer to lincoln but because he wanted to be a judge, the position offered by us grant, before shannon got here, the justice was, the judges were incompetent, corrupt and lawyers were not knowl