Akwesasne Must Have More Land

By Doug George-Kanentiio

In Germany they called the push for more territory “lebensraum” or “living space”, a drive to expand that nation as a natural consequence. It was first used by Oscar Peschel from his summation of Charles Darwin’s “Origin of Species” and later promoted by Friedrich Ratzel in which geography was tied to physical, cultural and national identity. They believed that certain ethnic and racial groups were inclined by nature to dominate others and exercise dominion over the resources of the earth. It was the basis for imperialism and colonialism. Its effects were the primary cause of both world wars. It was also the rationale used by the European based peoples to steal indigenous lands including the alienation of Mohawk territory of Akwesasne.

The assumption by the colonists was that their actions were god driven and given. But outright theft was a violation of their laws hence the necessity of fabricating lies and using the narrowest of legal clauses to affect the taking of indigenous territory and the physical subjugation and cultural suppression of the original people followed by religious conversion and formal indoctrination into schools, both local and residential. No family at Akwesasne was spared these actions which have had a dramatic and at times terrible consequence to the people. Although our ancestors lived on a remarkable area rich in natural resources we watched as the colonists intruded using one of their infamous tactics to divorce us from the land.

In 1796 the crooks Louis Cook, William Gray, Thomas Williams and Goodstream were sent to Albany to find out why the Americans were trespassing in this region. When Cook was caught lying to the New York and federal officials about his part in previous land sales he was forced to sign the infamous “Seven Nations of Canada Treaty” in which he and his pals took bribes in exchange for ceding all of Akwesasne with the exception of “six miles square” around the village of St. Regis-which is most odd since the international boundary would have extended both of the St. Lawrence river into the colonies of Lower and Upper Canada (now Quebec and Ontario-Cornwall, Dundee, Glen Walter, Summerstown, Barnhart Island). That Cook and those crooks knew this was clear as the imposing of the international border was the primary reason they went to Albany as delegates without the authority to enter into treaty. In fact, Cook was the son of an African slave and an Abenaki woman while Gray was purely European and a former soldier in the US Army which should have excluded them from having any treaty signing status whatsoever.

These thieves received their bribes-one was given the “right” to build a watermill in the center of Akwesasne (Grays Mills which became Hogansburg) while Cook set aside the Massena springs and Grasse River sections for his own use. Thomas Williams received a lifelong pension for his role. Those three individuals, minus Goodstream, would become the basis for the current St. Regis Tribal Council, the “trustees” codified into American law by the New York State Legislature in 1892 and imposed upon the Mohawk people by force of arms.

The theft of our lands took its current form when Alexander Macomb, an Irish born speculator and fur trader who had, prior to the Revolution, hired Mohawks to carry his goods into the interior. A man without any obvious ethics, Macomb traded with both British and American merchants for his furs which became the basis for his wealth. After the war he used those profits to “buy” almost 4,000,000 acres of Oneida and Mohawk lands without the knowledge or consent of the nations as required under US law. His greed extended beyond his means and he was imprisoned for debt. His assets were sold and among those who bought land at a tremendous discount was Michael Hogan, another Irish born fortune hunter. His background is this:

Hogansburg is named for Michael Hogan, an Irish ship captain who grew wealthy in the East India trade. Hogan returned to the US in 1805 with his Indian wife; Hogan bought 20,000 acres (81 km2) just north of what became the Adirondack Park, including the Town of Bombay, which was named in honor of his wife’s birthplace. His son, William, served as supervisor, and was elected to the New York Assembly in 1822. In 1829 he became a judge of the court of common pleas for Franklin County, and in 1830 he was elected to Congress.

Hogansburg was leased by Michael Hogan from the Mohawk in 1817, as it was part of their St. Regis Mohawk Reservation, with an agreement to provide a ferry across the St. Regis River. In 1818 Hogan oversaw the building of a grist mill as well.[3]

Other mills and dams were built, including one in 1929 on the St. Regis River near here to generate hydroelectric power. It blocked the passage of migratory fish such as salmon and walleye, destroying the fisheries on which the Mohawk had depended for staple food. The owner finally found it uneconomical to continue to operate, and the Mohawk dismantled the dam in 2016, freeing more than 250 miles of river to the passage of fish again.

Source: http://www.en.m.wikipedia.org

The selling of Akwesasne by the tribal trustees took away badly needed natural resources in a time of physical need, when the Mohawks, restricted to the reservation, were in a desperate situation. That these various “treaties” were a blatant breach of US federal statutes meant nothing to the officials in New York State who would repeatedly defy the national government from the end of the Revolution to the building of the Kinzua dam on Seneca lands.

There have been attempts by the Mohawks to restore those stolen lands. In contemporary times the Tribal trustees tried to secure compensation for the destruction of sections of Akwesasne but their court action was denied in 1956. Just after that, in 1957, Standing Arrow would brush aside that tactic by physically occupying land in the Mohawk Valley only to be evicted by New York State in March of 1958, which was then building the NY State Thruway on a ridge overlooking Standing Arrow’s encampment on the banks of the Schoharie Creek south of the Mohawk River near Hunter, NY.

What Standing Arrow did was to convince others than direct action, outside of the courts, might work. In 1974 Mohawks from Akwesasne and Kahnawake proved this could work when they took back a Girl Scout camp near Eagle Bay in the Adirondacks before relocating to Altona. Ganienkeh was in response for Mohawk lebensraum, an urgent need for more land for a fast growing population literally within sound of Montreal or downwind from the stench coming from the smokestacks at the Reynolds, Domtar and Alcoa plants.

When the Mohawk Nation Council was actually active and had taken the lead in land reclamation efforts in the 1980’s a sense of urgency and opportunity intertwined. It was found that a large section of Akwesasne was permanently contaminated by the factories to the west of the community and on the north shore in Cornwall. It as perceived then, and is now being painfully released, that remaining in the area meant our bodies would be infected with diseases from cancer to diabetes. We needed more Ganienkehs, more living space unaffected by PCB’s, mercury and the dozens of other contaminants which were killing us. No family was unaffected by those ecocide killers.

Along with the late Ron Lafrance I was part of the Nation’s negotiating team. As I have stated before, Ron and I agreed we would never cede any Mohawk land, not even a square centimeter. We would discuss compensatory damages sufficient to provide a universal income for all Akwesasronons and we would identify and have returned to us an area sufficient to build a new community under the active jurisdiction of the Nation and whose residents would live in eco-harmony homes, have clean lands to farm, a forest to provide its resources and water for consumption and to fish. Additionally, this new area would have recreational and spiritual elements.

This was not to be as Ron passed on the negotiations fell apart when the Tribe withdrew and went whole hog into tobacco-alcohol marketing and casino gambling. The Mohawk Council of Akwesasne also went its own way and struck a deal to concede the Dundee area even when it did not exist when that land was stolen in 1888, the same year the Nation Council was given back its fire by the Rotinosioni Confederacy. The Nation Council itself would collapse and retreat from any semblance of governance which left a serious void in leadership among the people. Meanwhile, I adopted the concept that we had to have more land and if the people had been abandoned by their respective council, we had to find the means as groups and individuals.

Among the more contentious areas was Hogansburg, its triangle section pointed like a knife blade into the heart of Akwesasne. That area was also being sold in breach of Mohawk and US laws. When none of the three councils acted to protect this region Kanehratiio (Roger Jock) and his friends stepped in. They physically took back what is rightfully ours by principle and law. They forced the non-Native speculators to retreat and actually won their case when a local judge refused to intervene. They stated, repeatedly, that the land was available to any Mohawk who needed a home. They maintained that the Tribe did not have jurisdiction as it was a service delivery entity and had no authority to define Mohawk citizenship. They were right. The Tribe cannot decide on any citizenship issue given its very limited “powers’ under New York State’s Indian Law, article 8, Sections 95-98.

Yet the Tribe does use the total number of people (Native or not) who reside on the “American side” when it applies for grants or statutorily mandated services. So, if the Tribe, MNC or MCA retreat to litigation in hostile American and Canadian courts where they are certain to lose given their refusal to reject the infamous City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation case of 2005 what are the people to do to secure urgently needed land? The answer is-the people are left to take action and take back what is rightfully ours. That is what Kanehratiio did.

As we now know the Tribe reacted. They paid the non-Native speculators. They pledged to use the land to provide for the needs of the people. They paid $25,000 for the relocation of a modular house on the contested lands east of Hogansburg. They promised to build with utmost sensitivity to one of the last forests in Akwesasne. Discussions were held and an understanding reached. Attempts to include the Mohawk Nation Council went nowhere. But the Tribe affirmed the urgency, and tangible benefits, of land reclamation.

What this event did prove, once again, is that there is no better negotiating tool than direct occupation of our traditional lands. What took place in Hogansburg can also work in Dundee, an area the MCA forgot to return to active Mohawk jurisdiction. That area, all 18,000 acres of it, should be lawfully and historically belong to the citizens of the Mohawk Nation and they should be free to return as they deem fit with the MCA using that $249,000,000 payment to build new homes and have the current occupants leave. We need the land, we need to replace what was destroyed by the colonists and to secure fair compensation.

Hopefully, with the coming of spring will also come the taking back of Dundee, not in bits and pieces, but as a whole. We need living space. Our children need to live in areas where their bodies will not kill them. As our great leader Oren Lyons, Onondaga faith keeper says, “sovereignty is the act thereof” and no nation may exist without the land beneath their feet.