IRS Auctions off Sioux land to pay back taxes
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has auctioned off 7,100 acres of land belonging to the Crow Creek Sioux Tribe in central South Dakota, one of the most impoverished reservations in the United States.
The land was sold on Thursday in a bold but hardly shocking attempt by the IRS to recover $3.1 million in federal employment taxes, penalty charges and interest that was owed by the Tribe.
According to a recent lawsuit filed by the tribe, the IRS acted unlawfully because the land is owned by Crow Creek Tribal Farms Inc., a corporation formed under Tribal law.
The lawsuit further contends that the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) misinformed the tribe, telling them “that, because it was a federally recognized Tribe, it was not necessary to pay federal employment taxes.”
“It’s very disgraceful, very shameful. It’s devastating to us,” said Tribal Chairman Brandon Sazue, who was in attendance at the auction. “Our land is never for sale.”
In addition to this, the land is a part of the Crow Creek Indian Reservation, which was established by the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.
Just prior to the treaty, in 1863, the US government established Fort Thompson some eight miles from the Crow Creek tributary in South Dakota. Fort Thompson was a military-controlled site, which also served as a prison camp following the 1862 mass hanging of 38 Dakota warriors. Rarely mentioned in history books, it was the “largest public mass execution in American history.”
The site became occupied by descendants from several members of the Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota Sioux, who eventually came to refer to themselves as “Hunkpati” (the making of relatives, to live).
When the 1868 Treaty was signed, it brought the reservation into Trust Status. However, the United States govenrment honored the treaty for just six years, until General George A. Custer arrived with the 7th Cavalry to try and capture the Black Hills. The invasion ultimately led to the 1876 Battle of Little Big Horn.
One year later, the US Government unilaterally granted itself title to the Black Hills through the Allotment Act of 1877. Also known as the “Sell or Starve Bill,” the act further divided Sioux lands into individual plots of land which were then handed out to Sioux males .
In 1889, the government took things even further, by removing Crow Creek from its Trust status and selling plots of lands to non-Indians. A 7,100 acre swath was purchased by LeMasters, who held onto the land until Crow Creek Tribal Farms bought it from them in 1998
The company bought the land to consolidate the Tribes land base, explains the lawsuit, and to ultimately ensure an economic future for the tribe. Crow Creek, like other every other reservations in the region, is considered to be a prime location to make renewable energy from the wind.
The reservation isn’t willing to give up the hope. Not when the alternative is abject poverty.
December 3, 2009
To All Tribal Leaders Across Indian Country,
We haven’t given up, the Tribe has 180 days yet and Crow Creek Sioux Tribe and I and our Pro bono Attorney are still working on this. Starting Mon. we are setting up Tipi’s and having Han Blece’Yapi on the land. It is bitterly cold here with snow flurries. It is prime land overlooking the Missouri, the Tribe wanted to use for wind energy. It was not held in trust, but fee land. The Sioux Tribes are supporting Crow Creek.
It is time to make a stand once and for all! Make a statement that our land never will be for sale!
Please help Crow Creek Sioux Tribe. Below are the contact numbers for the
SD Congressional Delegation and the article in USA Today.
Adrian_Arnakis@thune.senate.gov
kenneth_martin@johnson.senate.gov
Neal.ullman@mail.house.gov
Allison_Binney@Indian.Senate.gov
A. Gay Kingman, M.Ed. Executive Director
Member, Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe
Great Plains Tribal Chairman’s Association
1926 Stirling St.
Rapid City, SD 57702
Cell: 605-484-3036
Fax: 605-343-3074
E-mail: KingmanWapato@rushmore.com
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so so sad. mother earth needs her protectors not greedy destroyers. God be with the people of the Sioux
THere is an account set-up for tax deductible donations to help them save their land we have 120 days to raise the funds
WELLS FARGO BANK
ATTN: CINDY ADAMS
201 S MAIN
CHAMBERLAIN, SD 57325
605-734-6001
“SAVE CCST LANDS FUND”
ACCOUNT NUMBER: 9917827345
WTF??I thought the American government was trying to get a better relationship with my people??
Really very sad, what is the motivation in keeping people in extreme poverty? With the lack of jobs available on Reservations we cannot let them take away productive jobs and native owned Business. And this place was a farm, so in reality not only have they taken jobs but they have taken away potential food as well. Your right Gilli we cannot keep destroying our mother Earth, we need to be the ones who save her and they (the government) need to realize that the Tribe’s are an integral part of that. Who else has lived here as long as we, I ask you? I’m sending you my warmest thoughts, even though right now I’m really upset about the way the Government has handled its self again, though if you think about how the American Government has handled the Native People of this country over time this action is not surprising at all. Which only makes it hurt more in this day and age.
Sad my ass!!!!! This is no more than the same taking of our tribal homelands by a foreign government that never had the best interest of Indian people (the Indigenous Peoples of the Western Hemisphere) at heart. Where are the real “warrors” that have gone off to college and graduated. Why aren’t you back in your tribal communities fighting the “Good Fight” for your people? Or at the very least speaking out against these injustices that continue to take, take, take from your people? Where the hell are you?
So is it up to the elders like me to fight? Geeezzz give me a freaking break!!!! One pissed off old man……..
The genocides of “the people” continue, for no justifyable reason. The “corps” say that it is progress. This type of thinking and devolution, is partly why this continual stripping of the human spirit and the land in the name of progress and the economy does not stop. When the surrounding non-indigenous people wake up to the fact that “the people” have been the scapegoats for progress all this time, well I cannot say that a mass joining would happen, but we live in a society that doesn’t care until it is too late…
This disturbing and unacceptable reality pattern, is a vicious cycle around the world. What is the real pattern here? Elitists would probably tell you that they are genuinely concerned with the well being of others, and all the while they are shaking the hands with their counterparts that take away more land and decieve the people to get it and then eventually end up destroying it, does this makes sense, stealing land to eventually strip it and destroy it! hmmm…nothing has changed “the people” and the land end up suffering. Add it up at the end of the day and what you get is what you started with…so what is the answer? I can only say that this oppressive and destructive type of thinking and doing must stop obviously. We have to remember that the “corps” don’t have a conscience and neither does money. I also realize that saying good words does not stop anything,
Dar
Well the great spirits are really irked with Washington over this thievery for the IRS’s head office is in Washington.If they go threw with this the IRS,then all natives leave Washington for they are going to have one hell of a winter.If they don’t have a wonderful Christmas and winter.
There is a fund set-up to collect donations to help them to purchase theland back from the IRS.
Too bad the President could not step in and say, “Hey wait a minute, it is our trust obligation to protect the Native people and their land.” but I guess he don’t know any better. But with all of the Indians in the White House, you’d think that one of the would have alerted him to the situation.
ALL DONATIONS ARE TAX-DEDUCTIBLE AND CAN BE SENT TO
WELLS FARGO BANK IN CHAMBERLAIN, SOUTH DAKOTA
CONTACT LEROY THOMPSON FOR MORE INFORMATION
605-245-2304
605-730-0091
- “Our land is never for sale.” And never was for sale.
If they were to pay such monies that the IRS claims, then they are declaring that they believe their land can have a monetary value associated with it– As far as I am aware that is denying an aspect of the fundamental beliefs that are true for all indigenous nations across Onowaregeh, and so I suppose that it would mean that they are no longer the Sioux nation.
– Completely embarrassing to both sides, that there even are still 2 sides fighting over our land today! But, …while it shows the US for the bullying, racist colonialists they all are { except for approximately 0.002% I’de say [not more--probably less], who are genuinely evolved individuals, but such individuals amongst the US population are exceedingly rare when it comes right down to acknowledging the fundamental realities of the truth about why the USA came into existence in the first place and what perpetuates it)… I have to say that it really does reflect far worse on whomever has been entrusted through previous generations to make decisions and uphold the sovereign integrity of the Sioux nation.
– And thank you for including significant historical facts which are pertinent. I think it is appropriate for all indigenous nations, when faced with ongoing colonial and similar threats to their sovereign integrities, to insist that a succession of cumulatively pertinent historical facts always accompany information campaigns.
It’s deplorable that the richest country on the face of this earth resorts to stealing one of the only tangible assets owned by the people. The United States was built on the blood of the people and it continues to take what is not marally, ethically and perhaps even legally theirs to take. There is no issue of eminent domain or any other reason why this land has been targeted for theft by the United States government. The people are being treated without regard for their civil rights. In fact, illegal immigrants have more rights than those who have inhabited this land for twelve thousand years. We’re now engaged in a “payback” to descendants of former slaves, but when does the red man get his? They suffered then. They suffer still. When will the father in Washington take notice of what is being done to the people? It makes me sick to my stomach.
Does anyone recall that line Barack Obama spoke during one of his campaign speeches -{Might’ve been his victory speech?}- when he said something like~ ‘ ” … When a Native American family is forced off of their land without due legal process, that is an offense to my civil rights …” ‘
Perhaps the people can join with the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund (http://www.farmtoconsumer.org); there are those of us (whites) who are working to keep the government from interfering with our right to eat real food and the rights of farmers such as the Amish to produce it (naturally, no hormones, pesticides, or processing).
Yes, there is a reason to impoverish people; so it’s possible to steal from them the only thing they have. It is cultural genocide and all people of Truth must stand together to protect the rights of others as they are also our rights.
Thanks Patti.