Chris Mato Nunoa: In the language of the first Minnesotans, this is a greeting, which means, "Hello my relatives, with a good heart, I greet all of you with a handshake."
I would like to begin my presentation with this quotation by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.: "Our nation was born in genocide. ... We are perhaps the only nation who has tried, as a matter of national policy, to wipe out its Indigenous population. Moreover, we elevated that tragic experience into a noble crusade. Indeed, even today, we have not permitted ourselves to reject or feel remorse for this shameful episode."
We celebrated Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s holiday on Monday, January 17, 2022. This man is a hero to me. His philosophy included me, a dark skinned Dakota man. Some of the white men who were presented as heroes and good men here at the Granite Falls Public Schools despised Native peoples. In fact, most of them were haters of, or fighters against, or killers of, First Nations Peoples. Many were all three: haters, fighters and killers. Dr. King's quotation could readily apply to the inception of Minnesota as a state. One can say, and Dakota people can also say, our state was born in genocide.
I think of Governor Alexander Ramsey's statement which he said many times in public, "Extermination or removal," referring to the Dakota people. Ramsey even said this to the Minnesota State Legislature. Ramsey was a genocider, a perpetrator of genocide. Or consider Jane Swisshelm's comments, editor of the St. Cloud Visitor, regarding the Dakota people: "Exterminate the wild beasts and kill the lazy vermin." Her comment regarding vermin foreshadowed Hitler and Himmler by 70 years plus in the Nazi's genocidal attitude toward the Jews, characterizing them as vermin. Also, her description of the Dakota people as wild beasts dehumanized the Dakota people, my people. When one dehumanizes a group it is then easy to say and do bad things to them. Lastly, General John Pope, who was stationed in St. Paul, said he would utterly exterminate the Dakota people, even if it took a year.
These statements advocate genocide and, as a result, many genocidal acts were perpetrated, which included but not limited to the forced marches, the two concentration camps at Fort Snelling and at Mankato, the mass executions, the forcible removals, the bounties placed on Dakota scalps, residential boarding schools, and dozens upon dozens of crimes against humanity advocated and perpetrated by the governor, the state of Minnesota and the Euro Minnesotan citizenry.
I would like to make a few comments on the Dakota presence in the Yellow Medicine area and about the state. First of all, the name of our ancient homelands, which includes the state of Minnesota, is Mni Sota Makoce, "land where the waters reflect the skies," translation by me, a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. The name Mni Sota Makoce is a reference to the thousands upon thousands of lakes which are located in the north central region of what is now called the United States of America. Hence, on the Minnesota car license plates we see written, "Land of 10,000 Lakes." The name of our state Minnesota is derived from our ancient Dakota name for this region.
Pioneer PBS, the Granite Falls Public Schools and the town of Granite Falls, Minnesota are all located on traditional Dakota homelands upon which the Dakota lived for millennia. These lands upon which we all now are located were involved in the two treaties of 1851; lands which basically have not been paid for. The ancient and traditional name for this area is Pezihuta Zizi K'api Makoce, "land where the yellow medicine as dug." Whoever was in the business of naming counties chose to use our ancient name for this place, Yellow Medicine County.
An incidental comment, the treaty of 1851 mentioned above reminds me of one of my favorite quotations from Roy W. Meyer, a white man, who wrote, "History of the Santee Sioux: United States Indian Policy on Trial": "Many observers have noted the moral obliquity that seemingly afflicted white men in their dealings with Indians. Men justly respected for integrity and fairness in their relations with other white men saw nothing reprehensible about resorting to all manner of chicanery and equivocation when dealing with the Dakota people." By the way, my great-great-grandfather was the first signatory on the Treaty of 1851 signed at Traverse de Sioux and his name was Eyangmani, or "Running Walker."
Back to place names containing the Dakota word for water, "mni." There is a lake near the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. We, the Dakota people, call it Mní iá Tháŋka, or literally big or large lake. In English, it is called Lake Minnetonka. Then there, then there's Minneapolis. It consists of the Dakota word for water "mni" and the Greek word "polis" which means city. So literally, Minneapolis means water city or city of water. However, in chamber of commerce style, Minneapolis is the City of Lakes.
Our site of origin is where the Minnesota river meets the Mississippi river, near the present day Twin Cities, St. Paul and Minneapolis. Most Indigenous peoples have their own origin stories. And their sites of origin are not in Europe or in Africa or the Middle East or in Asia, but here in the Indigenous hemisphere now known as the Americas. And of course we, the Dakota people, like to say: "We were not only the first peoples here, but we were always here, from the beginning, from the mists of time."
The river which flows through granite falls is Wakpa Mni Sota, or river of whitish water. The Dakota word "sota" means clear, but not perfectly so, or slightly clouded. Reverend Riggs, who compiled the Dakota-English Dictionary had a mission church here, the Pejuhatazizi Presbyterian Church or the Yellow Medicine Presbyterian Church.
Now I will say some things about my book, "The Great Evil: Genocide, the Bible, and Indigenous Peoples," which describes how Bible verses were used to justify not only exterminating the Dakota, but also to rationalize the stealing of Dakota homelands and to forcibly remove the Dakota from their ancient homelands. I have three research interests, Indigenous nations and Dakota studies, genocide studies and biblical studies. These three research interests converged and the idea for a book was conceived and developed. The book, "Great Evil," was the result.
There were three factors contributing to my book. One factor was the early missionaries especially the Presbyterians from the 1850s and the Episcopalians and the Assemblies of God which sent missionaries to our pezihutazizi oyate, "yellow medicine community." From the Assemblies of God, I learned many Bible verses and memorized dozens of Bible verses, which I still know today. The third denomination was the Episcopal church. My father was an authorized lay leader by the Episcopal diocese of Minnesota to conduct the morning offices and evening offices of prayer. I also attended Seabury Western Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois, an Episcopal seminary.
Another factor was my association with the International Association of Genocide Scholars, IAGS. I was associated with the IAGS for about seven years. I lectured in different parts of the world: Kaigali, Rwanda; Galway, Ireland; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Mumbai, India; Sydney, Australia; etc., about the genocide of the Dakota people of Minnesota and the genocide of the Indigenous peoples in the United States. I learned many important aspects of genocide and what constitutes genocide. I learned that the actions taken by the United States against Native peoples and the actions taken by the state of Minnesota against the Dakota people were indeed acts of genocide.
Now, in the time and space I have remaining, I will provide an example of how Bible verses were used to justify killing Dakota people and to steal Dakota lands. I will use the state of Minnesota as my primary example for this presentation. One of the Bible verses used to justify vengeance upon and killing the Dakota people in Minnesota was Genesis 4:10: "... And God said, 'What hast thou done? The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground.'" From the Torah, the Jewish scriptures, we read: "Then he said, 'What have you done? Hark, your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.'" The Bible verse Genesis 4:10, a reference to the incident of Cain killing Abel was used to justify the killing of Dakota people. Governor Alexander Ramsey used this phrase before the Minnesota State Legislature on September 9, 1862: "The blood of the murdered cries out to heaven for vengeance."
Apparently Governor Ramsey was using the phrase, "the blood of the murder," to refer to the Euro Minnesotans who were killed by the Dakota because these whites were stealing Dakota lands. The Dakota resisted this theft as any other human beings would, including white people. However, to Ramsey, the Dakota had no rights through their own land, lands that they had been living on for thousands upon thousands of years. Furthermore, Ramsey and other Euro Minnesotans, the Swedes, Norwegians, the Germans and others who thought of themselves as God's chosen people, believed they had a right to the promised land. So, Ramsey said to the Minnesota State Legislature that the blood of the Euro Minnesotans, the innocent, were calling out to God in heaven to reek vengeance upon the wild beast, "the savage Dakota," and Governor Ramsey and the Euro Minnesotans were going to be the Lord's instruments of vengeance.
Another Euro Minnesotan, who referred to the same verse which contained "blood crieth out" that Ramsey used in addressing the state legislature was the newspaper editor, Jane Swisshelm of St. Cloud, Minnesota, who despite being an abolitionist and an early feminist, thought the Dakota had no right to defend their own lands. Swisshelm, like Ramsey, thought that the Euro Minnesotan land steelers were innocent and that their blood was now calling for vengeance. She wrote, "Exterminate the wild beasts, ... these red-jawed tigers, whose fangs are dripping with the blood of the innocents! Get ready, ... shoot them and be sure they are shot dead, dead, dead, dead. If they have any souls, the Lord can have mercy on them if he pleases, but that is His business. Ours is to kill the lazy vermin and make sure of killing them."
Another Bible verse that was used to justify stealing Dakota homelands was Genesis 1:28: "... And God blessed them and God said unto them, 'Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.'" The "subdue the earth" notion help provide the rationale for stealing Dakota lands, for removing Dakota people from their ancient homelands. This idea was expounded on by white supremacist Charles Bryant who said of the Dakota-U.S. War of 1862 that it was "a conflict of knowledge with ignorance of right with wrong." Since the Dakota did not obey the injunction to subdue the earth, they were in the wrongful possession of a continent required by the superior right of the white man.
In a similar vein to that of Bryant, Senator Thomas Hart Benton said in 1846, "It would seem that the white race had alone received the divine commandment to subdue and replenish the earth and the indigenous peoples had no right to the land of the Americas because the land had been created for use by the white races according to the intentions of the creator for it is the only race that has obeyed it to subdue and replenish."
People like Charles Bryant and Senator Benton seemed to forget or were just plain ignorant of the fact that the Indigenous peoples of the Americas, including North America, had been farming for millennia before the white man ever came to the Indigenous hemisphere. And that the Native peoples of the Americas gave the world 3/5 of the crops now in cultivation, like corn and the potato, etc., as well as medicinal plants — 200 of them — listed in the United States Pharmacopeia in 1820. They were also ignorant, or forgot, that the early towns and colonies would not have survived if they had not received agricultural technical assistance from the Native peoples living along the east coast.
Another verse from the King James Version, Genesis 12: 6, 7, that was used involves the notions of the promised land, chosen people and Canaan. Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of Moreh, and the Canaanite was then in the land and the Lord appeared unto Abram and said, "Unto thy seed will I give this land." Probably the most powerful and influential Bible verses in teaching affecting both U.S. Euro Americans and Euro Minnesotans were and are those regarding the promised land, Canaan and chosen people. These notions, along with the genocidal commands of Yahweh, the Old Testament God, justified not only the massive land theft from Dakota Native peoples but also the mass murdering of them.
The promised land idea is found in a number of Old Testament verses, including Genesis 12: 6, 7. The New American Bible of Catholic translation also says, "The Canaanites were then in the land." Note, that these translations say that the Old Testament God was giving the land to Abram and the Israelites, or the Jews, while the Canaanites were still living in the land and had been there first. However, this fact did not stop Yahweh from giving the Canaanite homelands to the Israelites. This example from the Old Testament parallels the U.S. example where God is supposedly giving Indigenous lands to new chosen people: the Western Europeans, the U.S. Euro Americans and to the Euro Minnesotans, at least in their own arrogant thinking.
Now, let us look at how the notion of the promised land in Canaan, "Land of Milk and Honey," played out in Minnesota and other states in the north central United States and in the nation. To start, let's consider a paper written by George M. Stephenson from the University of Minnesota which was titled, "When America Was the Land of Canaan." It was read at the first Hutchinson session of the eighth state historical convention on June 14, 1929. In the paper, Stephenson talks of the thousands of letters that found their way from the USA back "to the small red cottages hidden among the pine clad rocky hills of Sweden." These letters talked about a new and ideal land, the wonderful country across the Atlantic, a land of milk and honey. A letter in November 1849 says, "I sincerely hope that nobody in Sweden will foolishly dissuade anyone from coming to this land of Canaan." A letter written on October 9, 1849 says, "My words are inadequate to describe with what joy we are permitted daily to draw water from the well of life and how we have come to the land of Canaan flowing with milk and honey which the scriptures tell us the Lord has prepared for his people."
There are many more such letters talking about the promised land, land of Canaan, land of milk and honey. These Swedish immigrants truly believed that Yahweh, the Jewish God of the Old Testament, promised and prepared Minnesota, Mni Sota Makoce, the ancient homelands of the Dakota people of Minnesota, for them! They further believed that they were the chosen people and they were symbolic Israelites, as did the Germans, the Norwegians, and English, the Belgians, and the other criminal Western European immigrants who were to become the Euro Americans, since the white settlers or land Steelers identified themselves as God's chosen people and Dakota lands were the promised land given to them by Yahweh, the Old Testament God.
What was the Indigenous perspective? Let me quote Robert Warrior, an Osage man and an academic, who wrote this classic statement with whom the Native people's identify: "The obvious characters in the story for native peoples to identify with are the Canaanites, the people who already lived in the promised land. As a member of the Osage nation, who stands in solidarity with other Indigenous peoples around the world, I read the Exodus stories with Canaanite eyes and it is the Canaanite side of the story that has been overlooked. Especially ignored are those parts of the story that describe Yahweh's command to mercilessly annihilate the Indigenous populations."
In conclusion, it is as easy to see how powerful and persuasive the biblical notions of the chosen people, the promised land, Canaan and the genocidal commands of the Jewish God of the Old Testament were upon not only the Swedish immigrants to Minnesota but also upon other Western European immigrants. These biblical notions were also the basis for the racist white supremacists and evil doctrine of Manifest Destiny. Like the Israelites who exterminated, removed and stole from the Canaanites, the U.S. and its white citizenry exterminated, removed and stole from the Dakota people of Minnesota and from the Indigenous peoples of what is now known as the United States of America.
I would like to think that you have caught a small glimpse of how significant the Bible and some of its evil teachings were and were so instrumental in what was done to the Dakota people of Minnesota and to other Indigenous peoples of the US. Hopefully you have also gotten an idea of what my book, "The Great Evil," is about. Thank you.
