WASHINGTON – Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, R-Colo., has been in national politics for more than 18 years, moving from the U.S. House of Representatives to the U.S. Senate, and throughout that time has been one of the most prominent and outspoken voices on Indian issues.
Some think that should come naturally since he is a member of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe in Montana and the only American Indian in the Senate. However, Sen. Campbell says that while he is a staunch advocate for the rights of tribes, he also represents the people of Colorado and considers both Indian and non-Indian views whenever he makes a decision. As chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, he also recognizes the important leadership role he has taken on within Congress and Indian affairs in general.
In the five years since he became chairman, he introduced and helped to pass a record number of bills which directly impact Indian people and tribal governments. But he said it is an achievement long overdue and unfinished.
“I was very pleased,” Campbell said of the measures passed. “Almost all of them had something to do with trying to make the lives of American Indians a little better. Some dealt with health care, some with economic development and the creation of jobs, some were to strengthen tribal sovereignty, some dealt with the juvenile justice system, the consolidation of Indian lands and a number of other things. We heard a great deal from the Indian community both before and after, but we’re ready to do more.”
With such an ambitious agenda, the senator was unable to push through every initiative, but said he hopes to build on last year’s success despite the nature of politics in Washington.
“There are a couple that we didn’t get through that I’d like to get through this year, if we can get an agreement with a few senators,” Campbell said. “Unfortunately, the way it works here in the Senate is that any senator can stop the advancement of any bill through the means of a filibuster or a hold.
“The rules work in favor of those who don’t want something to go forward rather than those that do want something to go forward. So, you have to work with them to get things passed.”
In highlighting what Indian country can expect this year, Campbell focused on a few, key issues. One is tribal recognition and the process involved with becoming a federally recognized tribe.
“One initiative is to form a commission and I think this is the most important one that we’ve worked with so far,” Campbell said. “We started to try and do it last year, but it ran into some opposition from several senators.
“The administration, be it Republican or Democrat, is having real difficulty now trying to identify tribes, as tribes that want to be reinstated as federally recognized tribes or people who never were recognized but think they should be. It really goes to the core of how you identify who is Indian and that is through some federal means of identification.
The senator went on to say that with the advent of casinos “there are a lot of people who didn’t care about being Indian 15 years ago that now say it very important that they be recognized as Indian. That makes me think some of them want to become Indian because they think there is money involved in it now, rather than the true belief in the values of what Indians believe.”
As part of this new approach, Campbell believes some recognition problems can be resolved through a more streamlined method which remains thorough and complete. He sees the current process as overburdened and lengthy.
“There is a process in place now that if somebody wants to be recognized as an Indian tribe, they go to the Bureau (BIA) and they are told to do certain things,” Campbell said. “They have to have certain kinds of forms filled. They have to be able to track ancestry. They have to be able track blood lineage. They have to do a number of things before they become recognized.
The process is slow and clumsy, he said. “Some of them have been trying to get recognized for 30 years and they still have not gotten through that process yet. Last year, then-Assistant Secretary Kevin Gover came to me and asked me, as the chairman of the Indian Affairs Committee, if we would put a moratorium on any more tribes being recognized until they could work their way through the problems.
“I didn’t feel comfortable doing that because there are some legitimate Indian people that want to be re-recognized. I talked to my vice chairman, Sen. (Daniel) Inouye, (D-Hawaii) and he wasn’t comfortable with it either, so we decided not to do that.
As an alternative, he came up with the idea of a commission “that would work its way through all that and try to expedite the process.”
“Unfortunately,” Campbell said, “the only opposition we have is from the Alaskan senators because when Ada Deer was assistant secretary she, as a matter of course, identified all Native Alaskans as tribal groups and some of them don’t call themselves a tribal group, but corporations.”
The senator said that in some cases following a disagreement a few people have formed a splinter group, “so you have some real problems” under the Tribal Priority Allocations (TPA) that “gives a great amount of money to a few Indians that probably shouldn’t be getting that amount. Then you have very large groups getting less per capita.
Alaska’s Republican Sens. Frank Murkowski and Ted Stevens “think that is wrong and they want a better formula before we do this commission,” Campbell explained.
On the political front, the reputation of President Bush as governor of Texas and his statements on tribal sovereignty, which many in Indian country perceived as anti-Indian, lead some to question Campbell’s support of Bush. The senator said he disagrees with those perceptions and sees Bush as a real advocate for tribes and tribal sovereignty.
“That was a red herring, that simply wasn’t true,” Campbell said. “He said something early on in the campaign that I think was taken totally out of context and was identified in the Indian community with the help of the Democrats in power to mean that he was opposed to sovereignty.
“He was asked about state and tribal sovereignty and if there was a difference of opinion between the state and the tribe. In the context that he was trying to frame it, he believed the states should have the final authority.
Campbell said, “Whoever took that statement and tried to misuse it, implied that he was across-the-board opposed to tribal sovereignty. We asked him when he was campaigning if he would make a statement dealing with tribal sovereignty and he did and it was a very complete statement about his support for sovereignty. In fact, in my view after reading it, I thought it was the best one since Richard Nixon.”
Of commitments Bush has made to Campbell with regard to Indian issues, the senator cited education as the most important.
“The first commitment he made was in front of 13 tribal chairman in New Mexico, and that was to fully fund Indian school construction and I think he is well on his way to doing that,” Campbell said. “We don’t have all the numbers yet, but I’m confident that he believes as he said, that with all children we should leave no child behind. That includes Indian kids, too.
“I’m convinced that in his general programs, like trying to increase the literacy rate in America, he will emphasize those that have been left behind more than anyone and that’s Indian children. I think he’ll do a fine job for our Indian children and to me that’s the future. It’s hard to correct the mistakes of the past, we just have to make sure we don’t repeat them and do a better job in the future.”
Throughout last year’s campaign for president, both Republicans and Democrats tried to court the American Indian vote. Asked about the parties and what each offers Indian country, Campbell cited a difference in their basic philosophies toward working with tribes.
“I think the philosophical disagreement is not whether we should help Indians, but it is how you do it,” Campbell said. “We have to comply with the trust responsibility. That’s a commitment the federal government has made to tribes as separate nations. But, if you’re trying to improve the lives of people, one way is to give more and more things, money or whatever, the other way is to put in place an atmosphere in which they can make progress on their own.
“I think if you talk about real sovereignty, you can’t be sovereign and depend on another nation. If you’re going to be sovereign that means you taking care of yourself. If you’re going to be dependent then that’s another game.”
He went on to say he thought “Democrats tend to say we’re going to help Indians by making them more dependent. Republicans want to put in place things like direct pass-through money so that tribes can actually get the money they’re entitled to and yet run the thing themselves.
The senator said if one examined what his committee had tried to do in the past several years, it was to “put those bills in place that will enable tribes to take care of themselves. Still some of the money needs to come from the federal government. We owe that to them and we ought to give it to them.”
Earlier this year, a number of senators signed onto a letter supporting the nomination of former Sen. Slade Gorton, R-Wash., to a federal judgeship, including Campbell. That recommendation was opposed solely by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., based on Gorton’s negative record on Indian issues.
The senator brushes off such criticism of his position because of what he sees as a lack of understanding, a misconception about Gorton. He said as long as he has known him and that’s been for years and years, Gorton “has always believed that in Indian country there are non-Indians who are denied their civil rights if they live on reservations.
“That was his big push back here, to get the non-Indians on the reservations equal opportunity and it even went so far as them getting a vote at council meetings and things of that nature. I don’t believe that.
“I think he was wrong on that score, dead wrong, but when he was chairman of the Interior Appropriations Committee that provides funding for Indian programs, I found him very easy to work with. Almost anytime you would ask for money for an Indian school or money for an Indian program or support on legislation, he was always right there. He always came to the plate and he was always willing to help.
“So, I think Slade got a bad reputation that was not totally earned. That’s not uncommon because people in America tend to categorize other people too easily.
“If you do something 90 percent good for someone and 10 percent you don’t agree with, they come back here and yell about the 10 percent, not the 90 percent.
Campbell said he thinks “Slade was one of those kinds that did a lot of good and he did some not so good” but he doesn’t think “you should throw the baby out with the bath water.”
With devolution, the transfer of power from the federal to the local levels, some are concerned tribal sovereignty and the federal trust relationship will be diminished and forgotten in the political process. Campbell said he disagrees and thinks tribes will be a major part of that process, but only through their continued involvement.
“There is no question about that. The tribes are becoming more and more important players. I can remember a time some Indians, including some of my own relatives, would ask me why I wanted to be a part of that government because they are the ones that took away our land, they are the ones that took away our freedom. ‘Why do you want to be a part of that?’
“Well, I told them then, as I tell them now, because it’s the only game in town. We are not going to go back to the way it was in the 1700s. There is no human way that we are going to do that.
“What we’ve got to do is put in place a system for our Indian kids where they remember and revere the traditions, the skills, the stories, the things in the past that make them Indian in their soul.
He cautioned that at the same time “you’ve got to teach them marketable skills so they can get a job to take care of themselves and their family. We have got to have a voice inside the decision-making authority, which is here in Congress, that’s it. Who else are you going to go to except here to get fairness out of this nation? You’ve got to be involved.”
The senator said he has always encouraged Indian people to run for office, not just complain. “Don’t just sit there and whine about something, get involved. If you don’t want to run yourself, work for someone else who is going to run for office.
“We have a thing now that over 80 percent of people vote in tribal elections, but the same Indians have only about a 20 percent turnout for general elections. They can be meaningful voices. Indians can turn the tide. In many states that has been proven.
“You’re better off being in the room where they’re making the decision than outside complaining about the decision,” Sen. Campbell concluded.
Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part interview with Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell on his views of Indian country and the political process over the next few years.