White Christians Are Still Taking Native Children

11/29/2022 by

Carrie N. Baker

The Brackeen case is one of many lawsuits by conservative legal
groups to weaponize constitutional equality protections against people
of color to the advantage of white people. 

Rosa
Alvarez, a Yaqui Indian Native American, was protected under Indian
Child Welfare Act, passed by Congress in 1978 to help keep Native
American children close to their families and traditional heritage.
(Joshua Lott / The Washington Post via Getty Images)

This article originally appeared in the Daily Hampshire Gazette.

On Nov. 9, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case, Haaland v. Brackeen, challenging the constitutionality of the 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). The act gives a preference for Native American
people to foster and adopt Native American children. The lead
plaintiffs are a well-to-do white, evangelical Texan couple, Chad and
Jennifer Brackeen, who are seeking to adopt a Navaho girl against the
wishes of her relatives, who want to adopt her themselves. Among other
arguments, the Brackeens allege reverse racism—that the law discriminates against them based on their race in violation of the equality guarantees of the U.S. Constitution. 

This case is just the most recent chapter in a long history of white
people taking Native children from their parents, tribes and cultures.

Beginning in the late 19th century, the U.S. government set up an extensive system of boarding schools for Native children
designed to assimilate them by eliminating traditional Native American
ways of life and replacing them with mainstream American culture. Many
were run by Christian missionaries.

The federal government forced Native families to send their children
to these schools, often far from home and for many years. The white
people running these schools forbid the children from speaking their
Native languages, gave them English names, forced them to cut their hair
and give up their traditional clothes, and coercively replaced their
own traditional religious practices with Christianity. The schools were
run like military schools, where children had to wear uniforms, march in
formations, and adhere to strict rules or face harsh discipline.

The boarding schools taught Native children that their cultures were
inferior, with some teachers ridiculing and making fun of the students’
traditions. These lessons taught the children to be ashamed of being
Native American. A recent Interior Department report found “rampant physical, sexual, and emotional abuse; disease; malnourishment; overcrowding; and lack of health care in [the] boarding schools.” 

In the 1970s, in response to continuing high rates of public and
private agencies removing Native American and Alaska Native children
from their homes, Congress passed ICWA. The law requires states to
notify tribes before placing a Native American child for adoption and to
prioritize placement of children with their extended family, members of
their tribe, or other Native American families. 

ICWA advocates supported the law as a way to preserve Native American
families, traditions and cultures and counter the widespread assumption
that white parents are best for all children. Advocates also argued
that the ICWA protects tribal sovereignty by granting tribal nations
“exclusive jurisdiction” over their enrolled members and their
lands—removing control from federal or state governments and private
Christian organizations. 

The lawsuit against the ICWA, brought by the Brackeens, the state of
Texas, and three other white couples seeking to take Native children
from tribes, could be just the first step to reduce tribal sovereignty
and nationhood, creating opportunities for white people to take tribal
land and resources as well as children.

It’s not surprising that the plaintiffs in the current case are
represented for free by Gibson Dunn, a high-powered law firm that has represented oil and gas companies.
One of their previous clients was Energy Transfer and Enbridge, a
company responsible for the Dakota Access and Line 3 pipelines. This
firm also has clients in the gambling sector. Eroding tribal sovereignty would threaten tribal rights over valuable resources such as mineral rights and gaming operations.

The
Lakota People’s Law Project urges in this graphic for readers to fight
to uphold the ICWA and protect Native self-determination.
(Lakota Law)

More generally, the Brackeen lawsuit is part of a series of lawsuits
brought by conservative legal groups and lawyers to weaponize
constitutional equality protections against people of color to the
advantage of white people. 

Last month in an affirmative action case,
the Supreme Court appeared ready to eliminate the ability of schools to
promote the admission of historically disadvantaged students, using
reasoning similar to that used by the ICWA case plaintiffs. Republican
members of the Court made comments indicating that they believed the
14th Amendment equal protection guarantee—adopted after the Civil War to
protect Black people—does not allow any law designed to address
longstanding and harmful race discrimination against people of color. 

By advocating for “color blind” applications of the law, the Court
would allow white people with greater access to resources and power to
take money, land, and even children from communities of color—all in the
name of equality. In the ICWA lawsuit, the equality guarantees adopted
to protect Black people from the violence and discrimination of white
people may now be used by white Christians to continue their
long-standing practice of removing Native children from their tribes and
cultures—and eradicating their religious practices.

The Brackeen case is a shameful display of the ongoing white
supremacist settler colonial project in American society. All people
must speak out against this centuries-old genocidal behavior against
Native Americans that continues to this day.