President Obama Signs Native American Apology Resolution
President Barack Obama signed the Native American Apology Resolution into law on Saturday, December 19, 2009. The Apology Resolution was included as Section 8113 in the 2010 Defense Appropriations Act, H.R. 3326, Public Law No. 111-118.
The Apology Resolution had originally been sponsored in the Senate by Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) as S.J. Res. 14. A companion measure, H.J. Res. 46, was also been introduced in the House by Congressman Dan Boren (D-OK) earlier this year. Senator Brownback successfully added the Apology Resolution to the Defense Appropriations Act as an amendment on the Senate floor on October 1, 2009.
Senator Brownback said that he introduced the measure “to officially apologize for the past ill-conceived policies by the US Government toward the Native Peoples of this land and re-affirm our commitment toward healing our nation’s wounds and working toward establishing better relationships rooted in reconciliation.”
The Apology Resolution states that the United States, “apologizes on behalf of the people of the United States to all Native Peoples for the many instances of violence, maltreatment, and neglect inflicted on Native Peoples by citizens of the United States.”
The Apology Resolution also “urges the President to acknowledge the wrongs of the United States against Indian tribes in the history of the United States in order to bring healing to this land.”
The Apology Resolution comes with a disclaimer that nothing in the Resolution authorizes or supports any legal claims against the United States and that the Resolution does not settle any claims against the United States.
The Apology Resolution does not include the lengthy Preamble that was part of S.J Res. 14 introduced earlier this year by Senator Brownback. The Preamble recites the history of U.S. – tribal relations including the assistance provided to the settlers by Native Americans, the killing of Indian women and children, the Trail of Tears, the Long Walk, the Sand Creek Massacre, and Wounded Knee, the theft of tribal lands and resources, the breaking of treaties, and the removal of Indian children to boarding schools.
April 8, 2010 at 4:49 pm
I am deeply touched by this effort, of The United States of America to apologize for all the tragic things done to these people. These people of The Creator, like the rest of us, did not deserve what was done to them. Though their technology was not superior to the Western Europeans that invaded the land given to them to take care of and watch over, by The Creator, their spirit and belief was strong and still remains.
The next effort, to this Earth should, be an apology and actions to make amends to The Creator for raping Mother Nature and Father Sky.
May 15, 2010 at 2:28 am
This Apology is a load of CRAP!
December 3, 2010 at 9:25 am
[...] legislation (which I didn’t even know existed), signed by President Obama in December 2009 called the Native American Apology Resolution. It “apologizes on behalf of the people of the United States to all Native Peoples for the many [...]
December 28, 2010 at 4:40 pm
[...] gunned down the sick and cold back in 1890. The wingnuts are also outraged that one year ago today President Obama signed an Apology to Native Americans passed by the 111th [...]
March 17, 2011 at 10:22 pm
Still today Native Hawaiian People suffer in their land with no land, born to poverty, in a system not of their own. Forced to be what they are not, we are the generation and outcome of the U.S. illegal overthrow of the sovereign hawaiian kingdom. Born hawaiian taught to be american, how do we get back to being sovereign in an unsovereign land? I can only hope I see it in my life time or my son see it in his, or his childrens see it.
The land is important to our survival, and if we have none how do we survive? Restore what is right and true, then goodness shall prevail. The land suffers now, and so does its people. Lets see some posotive change quickly before the next generation suffers the same ill fate as our ancestors have and now we face. How long more?
April 27, 2011 at 10:16 pm
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April 28, 2011 at 2:54 am
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October 17, 2011 at 8:01 am
I commend president Obama for signing the apology and his fairness to minorities. However one apology does not right all the wrongs and cultural genocide. People who misunderstand what the rights of an aboriginal person, this can make life a fight. We do not pay taxes because we never surrendered this is still all of our land the fact that we have to live over populated on a reservation is still no better than penning wild animals on a farm. We live on reservations to protect our rights. Many feel as if you leave the reservation and you lose your rights and identity. That is wrong to have taught and encouraged that with containing a growing population on an ever dwindling land.With all respect President Obama the resolution paper is a farce. The idea is respectable, and I understand the need to protect the states assets, but who protect ours?
October 17, 2011 at 11:48 am
I feel if it were not for the Indians fighting for sacred sites and land and enviromental issues, this land would be gone!
January 16, 2012 at 11:49 pm
We have to restore everything that was stolen from the first people, and offer more than apologies. My grandmother on my fathers side was sent to a boarding school, and was badly abused there. We are Yu’pik. My grandmother was made to speak English and was beaten if she tried to speak Yu’pik. They took her Yu’pik name and gave her a white name. She does not remember her people. How do we give her back to the Yu’pik people? An apology changes nothing. It will change only when everything stolen is returned. I don’t hate anyone. But I will make sure before I die that I find her family. It is my obligation to her. So we can restore what was stolen from her Village. And bring balance that the churches and government stole from us.