The Longest Walk of 1978 to 2008
Some two thousand people evenly split between Native Americans and the people who supported them embarked on a journey
across the country from San Francisco California to Washington D.C. in the year of 1978 having walked 2,700 miles as a protest. This event was planned and organized by The American Indian Movement (AIM) because it felt as though indigenous water, land and hunting rights were being violated. This was called The Native American Spiritual Marathon, or the Longest Walk.
The purpose of this march was to protest against eleven bills before Congress that the Natives felt would completely change treaties between our government and many Native American tribes. Some of these bills would have banned tribal government and shut down hundreds of native hospitals and schools. Another some of these bills would have taken away many of their hunting and fishing rights, so in return they went on a march across the country to prove that what was theirs, was theirs.
across the country from San Francisco California to Washington D.C. in the year of 1978 having walked 2,700 miles as a protest. This event was planned and organized by The American Indian Movement (AIM) because it felt as though indigenous water, land and hunting rights were being violated. This was called The Native American Spiritual Marathon, or the Longest Walk.
The purpose of this march was to protest against eleven bills before Congress that the Natives felt would completely change treaties between our government and many Native American tribes. Some of these bills would have banned tribal government and shut down hundreds of native hospitals and schools. Another some of these bills would have taken away many of their hunting and fishing rights, so in return they went on a march across the country to prove that what was theirs, was theirs.
Since then, there has been many other walks to commemorate and try to make an effort to change legislation's vote on the bill in which they were trying to gain their rights back. One example of this was the longest walk 2.Thirty years after the original Longest Walk in 1978 the American Indian Movement organized another Longest Walk. It began in the San Francisco Bay area. The walk had two representatives from over 100 Native American tribes, indigenous people and their supporters who traveled through a total of 26 states to reach Washington D.C. The purpose of this walk was to commemorate the original walk, call for environmental sustainability plans, and to protect their sacred lands. Many people along the way picked up more than 8,000 bags of garbage, which helped them try to show what they wanted out of the walk.
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Another walk that took place was the Longest walk 4. This walk took place in 2013 and the point of the peaceful march was to reaffirm the heart of Traditional Tribal Sovereignty rooted in Ceremony and land based spiritual relationships.This walk began at the Washington Monument in Washington D.C. and concluded in San Francisco following the same route that the original walkers had taken. It has been said that ,"We walk to educate our own peoples on what tribal sovereignty means from an Indigenous Peoples way of life. We walk to affirm to the world that we still continue as free and sovereign peoples as we define it. We walk to remind those of our peoples engaged in dealing with the nation-states that tribal sovereignty is not defined by non-indigenous laws, rules and regulations; nor by economic development, good governance, and corporate structures.”
Sadly each time the walk takes place, Congress has never seemed to change their minds about the bills that are being passed in which the Natives are trying to prevent. Over fifty years has passed and the indigenous peoples are still not getting the Justice they deserve.
Sadly each time the walk takes place, Congress has never seemed to change their minds about the bills that are being passed in which the Natives are trying to prevent. Over fifty years has passed and the indigenous peoples are still not getting the Justice they deserve.
Non- Indian supporters of the walk...
- John F. Kennedy
- Lyndon B. Johnson
- American boxer Muhammad Ali
- US Senator Ted Kennedy
- actor Marlon Brando
- Many people of other nationalities
Who is Dennis Banks?
"Dennis Banks (born April 12, 1937), a Native American leader, teacher, lecturer, activist and author, is an Anishinaabe born on Leech Lake Indian Reservation in northern Minnesota. Banks is also known as Nowa Cumid (Naawakamig in the Double Vowel System). His name in the Ojibwe language means "In the Center of the Ground." He has been a longtime leader of the American Indian Movement, which he co-founded in 1968 with Native Americans in Minneapolis.In 1968 Banks co-founded the American Indian Movement (AIM) in Minneapolis. They were seeking to ensure and protect the civil rights of Native Americans living in urban areas, whom they believed were being discriminated against by law enforcement. Their related goals became to protect the traditional ways of Indian people and to engage in legal cases protecting treaty rights of Natives, such as hunting and fishing, trapping, and wild rice farming.Banks participated in the 1969–1971 occupation of Alcatraz Island, initiated by Indian students from San Francisco of the Red Power Movement, and intended to highlight Native American issues and promote Indian sovereignty on their own lands. In 1972 he assisted in the organization of AIM's "Trail of Broken Treaties", a caravan of numerous activist groups across the United States to Washington, D.C. to call attention to the plight of Native Americans. The caravan members anticipated meeting with United States Congress leaders about related issues; but government officials, most notably Harrison Loesch, the Interior Department Assistant Secretary responsible for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), refused to meet with delegates. The activists seized and occupied the headquarters of the Department of Interior and vandalized the offices of the BIA. Many valuable Indian land deeds were destroyed or lost during the occupation.
Banks went to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1973 when the local civil rights organization asked for help in dealing with law enforcement authorities in nearby border towns. Residents of Pine Ridge believed the police had failed to prosecute the murder of a young Lakota man. Under Banks' leadership, AIM led a protest in Custer, South Dakota in 1973 against judicial proceeding that reduced the charges to a second degree offense against a white man accused of murdering a Native American.
AIM became involved in the political faction wanting to oust the elected chairman of the Ogala Sioux Tribe, Richard Wilson. A failure of an impeachment proceeding against him led to a large protest. Banks and other AIM activists led an armed takeover of Wounded Knee. After a siege of 71 days by federal armed law enforcement, which received national attention, the occupation was ended. Thirty resident families returned to the village to find that their homes and businesses had been looted and destroyed by the activists. The town was never rebuilt. Banks was the principal negotiator and leader of the Wounded Knee forces. Subsequent investigation of Wilson found questionable accounting practices, but no evidence of criminal offenses.
As a result of involvement in Custer and Wounded Knee, Banks and 300 others were arrested and faced trial. He was acquitted of the Wounded Knee charges, but was convicted of incitement to riot and assault stemming from the earlier confrontation at Custer."
Banks went to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1973 when the local civil rights organization asked for help in dealing with law enforcement authorities in nearby border towns. Residents of Pine Ridge believed the police had failed to prosecute the murder of a young Lakota man. Under Banks' leadership, AIM led a protest in Custer, South Dakota in 1973 against judicial proceeding that reduced the charges to a second degree offense against a white man accused of murdering a Native American.
AIM became involved in the political faction wanting to oust the elected chairman of the Ogala Sioux Tribe, Richard Wilson. A failure of an impeachment proceeding against him led to a large protest. Banks and other AIM activists led an armed takeover of Wounded Knee. After a siege of 71 days by federal armed law enforcement, which received national attention, the occupation was ended. Thirty resident families returned to the village to find that their homes and businesses had been looted and destroyed by the activists. The town was never rebuilt. Banks was the principal negotiator and leader of the Wounded Knee forces. Subsequent investigation of Wilson found questionable accounting practices, but no evidence of criminal offenses.
As a result of involvement in Custer and Wounded Knee, Banks and 300 others were arrested and faced trial. He was acquitted of the Wounded Knee charges, but was convicted of incitement to riot and assault stemming from the earlier confrontation at Custer."