by Ben Freund
'Termination' was a government policy of ending individual tribal identities to relegate American Indians to passive citizenship as a voiceless minority group without reservations, reparations or representation or legal protection. During the '40s and '50s, politicians freely spoke of this policy as 'emancipating' American Indians from federal control. In 1953, House Concurrent Resolution No. 108, passed. It stated that termination would be the federal government's ongoing policy. In 1954, the tribe selected as most likely to remain self-sufficient after termination was the Menominee Tribe of Wisconsin.
The Menominee did not want to cooperate with the program, but Senator Arthur V. Watkins of Utah, the main proponent of
The reservation was to instead become a new Wisconsin county, with a termination deadline set for 1958. The deadline was extended three years as it became obvious that the experiment was not going to be a success. Nevertheless, the tribe was officially 'terminated' on April 30, 1961. Menominee County was, at its inception, the poorest and least populated county in the state, without the tax base for such essentials as police, waste disposal, and firefighting. Hospitals and schools followed. The tribes' funds, now in a company called Menominee Enterprises, Inc. (MEI), were drained from over $10 million at the beginning of termination to $300,000.
By this time, the experience of the Menominee and the only other terminated tribe, the Klamath of Oregon, had taught other tribes and eventually even Congress that termination did not work. But the Menominee remained terminated, without the tax base to support themselves or the federal funds that all local and state governments are typically entitled to. Finally, in desperate need of funding to cover debts and maintain roads, water and electricity, MEI decided to sell tribal land to real-estate developers for Legend Lake, an artificial lake ringed by recreational homes unlikely to be used by any Menominee themselves.
All tribal members were stockholders of MEI, and when they realized the specifics behind the 'economic plan' they had voted for, many were angered, feeling they had been tricked into selling part of what little remained of their tribal land to non-tribal members. That they should be forced to do this as a result of unfair government pressure and negligence was outrageous. Two tribal members -- Ada Deer and James White -- organized a plan to fight back.
Deer and White formed the Determination of Rights and Unity for Menominee Stockholders (DRUMS) in 1970. In two years, through grassroots politcal movements, organized protests and shareholder campaigning, DRUMS had blocked the Legend Lake development plan and controlled the majority of the MEI board of directors.
A year later, DRUMS succeeded in its biggest goal and, with the strong support of then-president Richard Nixon, reinstated the Menominee's status as a federally recognized tribe on December 22, 1973. The newly reestablished tribe elected the Menominee Restoration Committee with Ada Deer as its head. In 1975, Menominee County became a reservation again; in 1976, the tribe adopted a new constitution; and in 1979, the newly elected tribal government was elected.
Deer was determined to use her success and new-found influence to continue helping American Indians. After running for Secretary of State in 1978 and 1982, and in 1992, became the first American Indian woman to run for Congress, winning the democratic primary without any PAC funding. In 1993, she was appointed Assistant Secretary of Indian Affairs at the U.S. Dept. of the Interior and became the first American Indian woman to head the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
She resigned from the position in January, 1997, and in 2000, she was appointed the Director of the American Indian Studies Program at University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she had occasionally taught classes since the '70s. She continues to work for the advancement of her people, mentoring a new generation of students and overseeing a growing faculty in her department, which has more than doubled in size in the five years she has headed it.
The Wisconsin Communiy Fund recently recognized her as a Community Change Maker at an award presentation held at the Cardinal Bar on December 1, but her accomplishments continue to mount. Even now, Deer, at the age of 70, is involved with an AmeriCorps re-entry project to help ex-offenders lead productive lives after serving time in prison as she continues to educate a new generation of American Indian leaders.
