Pine Ridge Indian Reservation

Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is an Oglala Sioux Native American reservation located in the U.S. state of South Dakota. Pine Ridge was established in the southwest corner of South Dakota on the Nebraska border and consists of approximately 2.7 million acres (11,000 km²), roughly the size of Connecticut. Most of the land comprising the reservation lies within Shannon County and Jackson County, two of the poorest counties in the U.S.

Unemployment on the Reservation hovers around 85% and 97% live below the Federal poverty level. Average annual family income is $3,800 as of 1999^*. Adolescent suicide is 4 times the National average. Many of the families have no electricity, telephone, running water, or sewer. Many families use wood stoves to heat their homes as opposed to more modern ways to keep warm. The population on Pine Ridge has among the shortest life expectancies of any group in the Western Hemisphere: approximately 47 years for males and in the low 50s for females. The infant mortality rate is five times the United States national average.

History

Pine Ridge Reservation was originally part of the Great Sioux Reservation established in the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 and originally encompassed approximately 60 million acres (240,000 km²) of parts of South Dakota, Nebraska and Wyoming. In 1876, the U.S. government violated the treaty of 1868 by illegally opening up 7.7 million acres (31,000 km²) of the Black Hills to homesteaders and private interests. In 1889 the remaining area of Great Sioux Reservation was divided into seven separate reservations: Cheyenne River Agency, Crow Creek Agency, Lower Brule Agency, Rosebud Agency, Sisseton Agency, Yankton Agency and Pine Ridge Agency.

Starting on February 27, 1973, the reservation was the site of the Wounded Knee Incident, a 71-day stand-off between entrenched American Indian Movement (AIM) activists and FBI agents and the National Guard. Some 200 activists occupied the site of the 1890 Wounded Knee massacre in protest of poor conditions on the reservations. In the months after the stand-off ended peacefully, a number of murders of those opposed to the tribal government installed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs took place, many of which were never solved.

On June 26, 1975, the reservation was the site of an armed confrontation between AIM activists and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation in an event which became known as the Pine Ridge Shootout (Wounded Knee Incident). It resulted the death of two FBI agents and one Native American, Joe Stuntz Killsright. The hunt for the killer of the two FBI agents led to the controversial extradition, trial, and conviction of the AIM member Leonard Peltier. This event is chronicled in the film Incident at Oglala, a Robert Redford production.

The reservation is also the setting for the Chris Eyre movie Skins and the book On the Rez by Ian Frazier.

On March 21, 2006, Oglala Sioux tribal president Cecilia Fire Thunder announced her intention to bring a women's health clinic to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, which would provide abortions in the event that the South Dakota abortion signed into law by South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds were to take effect. [http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12101999

On May 31, 2006, the Oglala Sioux tribal council unanimously voted to ban all abortions on the reservation, regardless of the circumstances (i.e. no provision in case of rape, incest, health of the mother). According to Indian Country Today, the ban also includes "the use of any drug that would prevent a pregnancy or abort a fetus the day after any sexual activity." The council also voted to suspend tribal president Cecilia Fire Thunder for 20 days pending an impeachment hearing. ^*

A month after her suspension, on June 29, 2006, Fire Thunder was impeached from her duties as Tribal President. Six charges were made against Fire Thunder, the most topical being that she organized the aforementioned clinic outside of her authority as president and that she didn't consult with the council about the project and get their permission. Other charges were that Fire Thunder used the media, the U.S. Post Office and the Oglala Sioux Tribe to solicit funds for the clinic.

External links

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Pine-Ridge-Reservation

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History

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