~ Success ~

Akwesasne Notes. LaDuke/Churchill. Alfred.

The Hau de no sau nee, People of the Longhouse, who are known to many Europeans as the Six Nations Iroquois, have inhabited their territories since time immemorial. During the time prior to the coming of the Europeans, it is said that ours were a happy and prosperous people. Our lands provided abundantly for our needs. Our people lived long, healthy, and productive lives. Before the Europeans came, we were an affluently people, rich in the gifts of our country. We were a strong people in both our minds and bodies. Throughout most of that time we lived in peace.

The European penetration affected every facet of the Native Way of Life from the very moment of contact. The natural economies, cultures, politics, and military affairs became totally altered. Nations learned that to be without firearms meant physical annihilation. With the introduction of firearms, war became a deadly business. Akwesasne Notes Mohawk Nation, “Policies of Oppression In The Name of “Democracy””, in Basic Call To Consciousness, Akwesasne Notes (eds), 1993.

Native North America is struggling to break free of the colonialist, industrialist, militarist nation-state domination in which it is now engulfed. It is fighting to “secede” from the United States and Canada. But, because of the broader implications of this, we refer to the results we seek not as “secession”, but as “success”. This is true, not just for Indians, but for all living beings and the earth itself. Winona LaDuke, “Succeeding Into Native North America: A Secessionist View”, in Ward Churchill, Struggle For The Land: Indigenous Resistance To Genocide, Ecocide And Expropriation In Contemporary North America, 1993.

The Great Law will come to shed light on the minds of the people … everyone shall become related to one another, so that it will become a single family consisting of every tribe; and they will be kind to one another, all of the people … Thereupon Tekahioke said, ‘But what will happen should the other nations, who have continually picked on us, presently kill a few of us now that we are letting go of protecting ourselves in order to survive’? “Great Law of Peace, Mohawk, 15^th century”; in Gerald R. Alfred, Heeding the Voices Of Our Ancestors: Kahnawake Mohawk Politics and the Rise of Native Nationalism, 1995.