Everyone. My name is grant two bulls. Once again happy to represent georgetowns native American Law Student Association and as copresident. Big thank you to our speakers today for coming out. Personally, im a enrolled member of the oglala sioux tribe from south dakota, but im originally from minnesota. Minneapolis, minnesota, the birthplace of the American Indian movement. And yeah, its my honor today to. Welcome you all. First of all, thank you for filling out georgetowns various requirements and policies and everything, but most importantly to our three speakers today we have sharon wyatt leonard, author of the book i will, which covers the early history of the American Indian movement and Dorothy Ninham former tribal judge for the United Nation and also features prominently in the book and last but not least, kevin sharp former Federal District court judge and Leonard Peltier is attorney. So without any further ado, thank you once again for coming out. Ill pass it on to our panelists. Thank you, grant. I want to say thank you. Deeply grateful that youre here and youre given your time. A very unique story combination of stories. In 1997, i talked to Leonard Peltier for the first time. He had a cherokee friend that introduced us, timberwolf. It was telephone, of course. It went on for quite a while, i would say almost a year before i actually was able to meet with them. The experience for me started like this. My husband also an attorney, came home one day and i said id heard a story about someone who was called Leonard Peltier. Thats what id written them. Thats how little i knew. I like to keep that piece of paper. He immediately said, do you mean Leonard Peltier . And i said, you know, youve heard of him. He said, i dont think you graduate from law school in america and youre not aware of the peltier case. I thought that was interesting. He said, if you want to get people to listen to this story, find a law school anywhere in america and youll get people to listen. So we picked Georgetown University law school back in that day, and we did come in. Peter matheson came, spoke, he wrote in the spirit of crazy horse. So wonderful book. Warren allman came, who was minister of justice, came all the way from canada, bill styron and his wife rose. The bill wrote sophies choice. Big supporters harvey arden came, who was the editor of prison writings. Also important. So it was a wonderful panel. It was a long time ago and a lot happened next. I was told youll need a similar to get in to meet Leonard Peltier in leavenworth. Its not likely to happen. Oddly enough, with the way that the rules were sometimes arbitrary, larry, they allowed a prison powwow that someone organized pottawattamie lady and they said, no one can come in to the powwow thats on is visiting list only people that arent on the list. So interestingly enough, i didnt qualify for that list. I qualified to go into the powwow. I remember going through the underground of this big structure and being told that most of the time visitors never see past the front door. But because the powwow was going on in a gymnasium, you could hear the drum all through those tunnels and we got to really see the whole structure. It was very powerful, very moving, very important. I remember we were told, dont ask anyone how long theyve been here. Dont ask them what theyre here for. You wont like the answer and the drums started and are very young, man. I mean, he looked young enough to be my son. Started quivering and shaking the minute he heard the drum. I couldnt help it. Being a mom, i said, are you here for very long . And he answered, i know. I get out in six months, but i didnt think i was going to be able to make it. Ive been here 20 years. I heard the drum and i realized that if its out there, im going to be okay. And that kind of changed everything. I just thought, this is very important. So the work went on for quite a while. Phone calls back and forth. Got to know leonard pretty well that way. He had to, you know, live through your day. Frequently you would hear, you know what i would say, how is your day . He would say the same. How is your day . What went on in your day . What are you cooking for dinner . How are the kids . That kind of conversation. We noticed jim and i, my husband, not only being an attorney, he worked with doctors and the atlanta area, Emory University and he noticed that when he visited leonard that his jaw was frozen open, that he was even eating awkwardly. He mentioned he had migraines from this condition. Many people worked on trying to get him a proper surgery to correct it. They were able to get a doctor from mayo clinic saying if he could come to him, he would give him the correct surgery. And again, many people had worked on this for a period of years trying to accomplish it. We went to congressman john lewis for help a local amnesty represent a tip got us in. Ray jenkins. We went in and congressman lewis said, well, hes not really from modest sect, but he had a granddaughter that was living with this cherokee family and he made the exception and he heard jim out with the medical records. This was really important. He could come down with stomach cancer as all kinds of testimonies were given from people who tried to help, saying it should not linger. So he wrote the appropriate letters. He called this back in in a couple of weeks, and he said, i have a letter to read you. The letter said that mr. Peltier didnt have any medical issues and hadnt complained of having any, and that the information soon was not correct. So i remember just jim kind of his mouth opened. He was kind of dumbfounded, like, how do you get misinformation to a congressman . And remember, congressman lewis just called, leaned over and patted upon me, like comforted them, like, its okay. Im going to write a letter and say im going to go see for myself. Im going to take some other congressman with me. Overnight, leonard was flown to the mayo clinic and the surgery was performed and it put us on a whole other plane with, wow. This is important and its not easy and its going to take some time and some building. And a lot of people, again, worked tirelessly on it all the time, year in year out, and its important you feel rewarded doing it. I started collecting stories from him that focused on his childhood, mainly what was interesting to me, the humanity that i think can get lost when its a big case because its about saving his life. Its about the rules. Its hard to get in, but the stories were awesome. I remember at one point he was working on prison writings at the time and i commented on solitary sounded so harsh in his book, but he hadnt complain of that to me. And at that point, he said, always kind of put me at ease. He said, theyve been putting me down there since i was nine years old. How bad can it be . Said nine years old. Was there a solitary when youre nine years old . And i realized back later he was talking about boarding school for the first time. And we started going from there all the way through his fishing rights struggles and many stories. It went on over a period of years. The lompoc trial stories were some of my favorite because you could tell that, you know, native people had come from all over the country and canada to be there. They filled the rows. Roberta black coat pulls up and arrested out. School bus says big mountain or bust and got out with ribbons, shirts and a basket and even the judge letter changed their clothes. He said what can you do . Its a grandmother, you know. And people cooperated. Then there was a buffalo altar that was put on the lawn that the police came up and said, you got to move that. And Leonard Crow Dog did not want to move it. He had already prepared it. They had a permit. He said yes, but youll hurt the grass. That always stood out to me like, well, the greatest environmentalist in the world. Theyre going to hurt the grass. They actually started roving with the buffalo after he said, and moved it around the lawn and had people up under this £200 robe and complied. It was quite an awesome side. And peter mathis in i attended and later talked about how he decided to write his book with some of the things that he heard there. And bill hazlitt shared with him and some files. So it was extraordinary stories. Again, always a Human Element that when i met Dorothy Ninham about eight or nine years ago, i said, you know, im interested in all the days that happened before the things begin to escalate. I want to know the humanity. Thats the families and the people that love and draw to this. And i interviewed 15 members of the American Indian movement over that period of 20 years. Ethel pearson in canada stands out. Then leonard started saying, youve got to meet dorothy. And wow, i did. He actually introduced us. I commonly reminder that if shes in the story so much, its leonards fault. He thought of it, and shes been wonderful. So with that, id like to pass to dorothy and say she is well, she. She survived. She said something recently to me when we were at a symposium to fight heroin on the reservation, which has always been an interest of hers. Traditional methods to bring healing and there was a big screen into the simple, beautiful young girl who said she had survived heroin for 18 months. She had become a counselor. She was helping others said socialize. It looked like it was still very hard for her. And dorothy leaned over to me and she said, shes a survivor. Why is she up on the screen . Why isnt she here with us . And why isnt she in our circle . She survived it. Shes the only person i want to listen to. Theres a survivor in the room, and i thought i was going to have to introduce dorothy sim. And i wanted to say, wow. Dorothy survived milwaukee red ghettos and third chapter in an American Indian movement and went to wounded knee and arrested pickup truck in the frozen winter. Of 1973. But she didnt just survive. Her granddaughter reminded me, jessica. She said she thrived so much happened with those occupations and attention that was brought that still making a difference today. So the survivor and the thriver Dorothy Ninham. Hmm. Yeah. Im dorothy from the milwaukee ame milwaukee chapter. And i think one of the reasons that we started the American Indian movement in milwaukee, we agreed to carry on is i remember one weekend when dennis, clyde, Vernon Russell came in in milwaukee and they met with my my husband herb and they were talking about the movement and all my life, i think ive been raised to i wasnt culturally raised. I lived on i was born on the united reservation. And of course, your neighbors were brought to wisconsin with an episcopal priest. So we werent into culture or anything. We didnt bring any of that with us. And i talked to sharon about it, and i said, theres something in our dna that knows that were different. I always wanted something different. I wanted to be who i was meant to be and not go. Go to churches. Go to anything like that. I wanted. I wanted to be native. I wanted everything that went with it. And so when i moved to milwaukee, i was 18 years old. And i met a moved and met her married herb and we started the American Movement chapter after he was sober for like six months. And we started as a movement for sobriety. It was called the American Indian council on alcohol and drug abuse because i felt like in order to raise a family, in order to survive, we had to be sober. I never drank in my life and never got into that kind of lifestyle. And i kind of surprised myself when i was older that i didnt get into it because everybody in our community did. It seems like that was the only entertainment or whatever it was on the reservation or bars. So bars and churches and so when when dennis and those guys came, you know, i told her that i thought it was a really good thing that you know, lets go after our culture. You know, we need to join the movement thats going to stand up and demand that we be who we are. Because wed already been fighting the schools in milwaukee who were having a fight with they were doing the desegregation at the time. And so what the White Communities would do is they would count native people as white and the black communities would count natives as black. So when the busing started, they wanted to bus our kids back and forth. And i remember herb having a big meeting with a lot of the officials, and he said, you can you know, this fight is just black and white. Its not with us. Were not involved in this fight. You know, were going to our kids are going to go to school. We want them to go to school. And youre not going to dictate to us that they have to be a part of whatever your numbers are. We dont play em. So we were always involved in that kind of struggle to try to keep the get the culture there. And when we started our alcohol program, we met some medicine people from south dakota. We met learn crow dog first. And right after we started the movement, we did a takeover of the coast guard station down in milwaukee and we were able to keep it. Herb went to dc, flew to dc, and he met with brad patterson, who was nixons assistant, and native affairs, and he met with them and somehow, for some reason he took a liking to herb and agreed to help us. And so we had that land turned over to herb as and we put signs up. It was our native reservation. So we had an Indian School moved on to there that my sister in law had just started. The Indian Community school and we also made a Halfway House for people who are recovering and we boarded it off and native people would come down there on weekends and wed have, you know, like big feasts down there. Everybody just enjoyed it. It was right on the lakefront, real nice lakefront property. I know the neighborhood werent appreciative of us, but that was our land. You know, that was thats still part of our land. I consider it all all of our land, you know, anywhere. And i was telling sharon this. I said, no matter where anybody walks on this mother earth, if its east or west, south, north and and in the United States, thats Indian Country. There were walking on the bones of our people. Were all in that. This is ours. So no matter where anybody goes and tries to say this is, you know, whatever land that still belongs to the red people, you know, and i think that we need to remember that. And the other thing that i want to say is that in our red, people extend into other countries. Theyre theyre in canada. Theyre in mexico. Theyre all, you know, in the southern countries, because we dont we never considered borders. We didnt have our people dont have borders. You know, we welcome each other. And i think theres another thing about us that i was explaining to sharon that i had this adopted brother that came from pine ridge and moved in with me and my family in milwaukee. When herb was in prison for his involvement with wounded knee and and the struggle. And he said, you know, sometimes i think, you know, our family here, he said they really want to be indian people more than my people back home. He said theyre really trying hard, you know, to, you know, get the sweat lodge back at ceremonies, whatever it is that it takes, you know, this family here that ive adopted, he said they really want to be in india, really trying to live up to it, you know. And he said and what i noticed is that i can walk down the street. And he said it seems so different to me. He said, because ill see the white people walk in and they just keep their head down. Are they looking to another direction . And he said they dont look at each other. They dont greet each other. He said the black people, too, they dont they dont acknowledge each other. He said indian people across the street, if they see another one to shake their hand and say, its good to see you, you know, were all in this together, you know, and i really, really appreciated that. And and, you know, like i was saying that i, i really felt that as much as indian people, you know, dislike the relocation that happened to us, i was thinking about it and i said, you know, thats one good thing the government did for us is create that Relocation Program because it brought all different tribes into different areas. And we bonded with each other, we found each other and we were able to gather with each other. And thats how the movement is made up of all kinds of different tribal people, all different nations were coming together. But as a movement, were one. We have one. You know, we have one thought, one mind, one in spirit. You know, we look out for each other and i think thats you know, i think thats a really good thats what i love about it is is the cultural part. You know, i remember so many times that we would go home and some of the the Tribal Councils would say, you know, movement is nothing but thugs and misfits. You know, but it took those thugs and misfits to move this country and to get people off their knees and start fighting, you know, because since then we have the indian Child Welfare act that i understand were fighting again. You know, i remember fighting for indian kids, being with indian families before there was indian Child Welfare, before there was an act. And i remember fighting some social workers because they wanted to take this little baby that was reported to social services. Her mom was 13 years old. She was a 13 year old, adopted native girl. And she was kicked out because she wanted to recognize her heritage and she was adopted by a family in indiana. And they they called me and they said she just she just like her mother. She just wants to be drunk and she just wants to be, you know, going to powers and doing stuff like that. And theyre saying, we take her once a year, we go to powers. Isnt that enough . You know, and i felt really bad. And i told them, i said, you know, i guess it was really nice with for you when she was a novelty, when she was a baby, you know, shes a little and cute. But when she starts thinking on her own,