N.M. Tribes Stand Ground on Issues
Native Americans have recently taken more active roles in public forums, increasing their clout and inspiring foes
By Leslie Linthicum
Journal Staff Writer
Native Americans have been portrayed as an obstacle in New Mexico's history, a people to be moved, converted or killed on the march from Spanish province to Mexican territory to New Mexico territory to statehood.
"You don't forget the history," says Herman Agoyo, a former governor of San Juan Pueblo, which marks its 400th anniversary of Spanish conquest next summer.
Modern history is another story. The past two years have seen nearly every one of New Mexico's 19 pueblos, two Apache tribes and the Navajo Nation standing its ground in some high-profile disputes.
From gambling to land claims in the Sandia and Sangre de Cristo mountains to court fights over water quality and ownership of buffalo, tribes have taken more active roles in public and political forums. Whether they have won or lost in individual debates, they have increased their clout -- and inspired their foes.
"As long as we kind of play the game, as long as we're kind of passive and silent," says Agoyo, "everybody likes the Indian. But as soon as we start to be a major player, once we begin to assert ourselves, people begin to get maybe scared or threatened."
Fight for gambling
The push to legalize casino gambling on reservations here is the most evident us-and-them collision -- a long, bitter rollercoaster of legislative maneuvering and bad feelings.
The 1996 legislative session was the political coming out party for New Mexico's tribal leaders and marked the first time Native Americans participated fully in a process controlled since before statehood by Hispanics and Anglos.
Governors of the 14 pueblos that had signed gambling compacts with Gov. Gary Johnson, only to have them declared illegal because Johnson had not waited for legislative action, went to the Roundhouse looking for passage of a gambling bill and lost spectacularly. Not only was gambling not approved, but the Legislature also acted to change a law that had allowed tribes to distribute gasoline tax-free.
Tribal leaders left Santa Fe stunned. Regis Pecos, director of the state's Office of Indian Affairs, called the experience "vicious."
It was another lesson in what Jimmy Shendo, a former tribal administrator at Jemez Pueblo, calls the politics of assimilation.
"We are always being told that we should come together and throw ourselves in the melting pot," says Shendo, the director of the Native American Studies Center at the University of New Mexico. "But there is always somebody else who owns the pot. We participate and we entertain the ideas of togetherness, but when we get to that point of something being decided, it's never our idea."
Tribes returned to Santa Fe this year with lobbyists and won support for a gambling bill -- by one vote.
Not just another minority
The gambling debate, Sandia Pueblo's ancestral claim to a large portion of the Sandia Mountains, Isleta Pueblo's demand that the city of Albuquerque clean its wastewater beyond federally required standards before releasing it north of the pueblo -- all are issues that revolve around the doctrine of tribal sovereignty.
Sovereignty, the doctrine that gives tribes the right to govern themselves and gives them independent-nation status in dealings with the federal government, has always bolstered Native Americans' argument that they are more than "just another minority."
"It's ironic that something like gaming would highlight the status of American Indian tribes," Agoyo says. "It has brought sovereignty to the forefront, and it has created much more dialogue and awareness to all New Mexicans."
While the fight has been painful, Agoyo views it as a growing pain.
"It kind of forced us to come face to face with everybody," he says. "It was necessary."
