Newman, Sandra

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The Arctic and Energy: Exploration and Exploitation Issues; Indigenous Peoples; Industry

Case Western Reserve University School of Law

Canada-United States Law JournalVolume 30 | Issue Article 48January 2004The Arctic and Energy: Exploration andExploitation Issues; Indigenous Peoples; IndustrySandra NewmanFollow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cusljPart of the Transnational Law CommonsThis Speech is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Journals at Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons.It has been accepted for inclusion in Canada-United States Law Journal by an authorized administrator of Case Western Reserve University School ofLaw Scholarly Commons.Recommended CitationSandra Newman, The Arctic and Energy: Exploration and Exploitation Issues; Indigenous Peoples; Industry, 30 Can.-U.S. L.J. 307 (2004)Available at: https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cuslj/vol30/iss/48THE ARCTIC AND ENERGY: EXPLORATION ANDEXPLOITATION ISSUES; INDIGENOUS PEOPLES; INDUSTRYCouncilor Sandra NewmantCanadian SpeakerGood afternoon. I have to get my time correct. I never know if I am inthe east, west, north, or south sometimes. We are all over the place.Outside, just before we did our presentation. We met a couple of peopleand they asked what city are you from? The Chief said, "Old Crow, Yukon."They said, "well, how many people in your city?" We replied 300; and Icommented that it is hard to believe that we are taking on the government ofthe United States with that many people.I want to thank you for allowing me to walk on your traditional territoryas a native person, even though there may not be a native person here fromOhio, I still have to acknowledge from my people that we are on someoneelse's land and that we respect that land, in the same way that we hope thatwhen you are on our land in North Yukon, you respect it also.We are as you say, the only town in North Yukon, which has been ablessing for my people. Two weeks ago, it was minus 40 up there and whenI left, it was about minus 20 or minus 15, which is almost a heat wave for us.Nevertheless, it has been a blessing in a few ways. One, it has sustainedour culture. Our culture compared to other First Nations people in Canadaand the U.S., our culture is pretty much in tact.I am not a Chair of anything, I am not a lawyer, and I do not have littleletters under after my name. However, I am Gwitchin. For me to stand hereand acknowledge that is one of the true strengths that I can have as a FirstNation's person. That strength keeps my people doing this kind of work andin standing up in front of sometimes hundreds of people and relaying thatt Councilor Sandra Newman was born and raised in Old Crow, a small village at the heartof the Gwitchin Nation in northern Canada. After completing high school in Whitehorse,Yukon in 1984 and then attending the University of Fairbanks for Human Services studies,Sandra has returned to Old Crow with her twelve-year-old daughter. Deeply proud of herVuntut Gwitchin (people of the lakes) heritage, Sandra is working for her First Nation Gov-ernment as the Director of Government Services and Caribou coordinator. She is thankful toher past and present leaders for their strength and courage in preserving a culture and way oflife for Vuntut Gwitchin people. She thanks her ancestors for their wisdom, courage andknowledge. "I want to thank my ancestors for taking care of this land for us, Mahsi Choo."1 Old Crow Temperature Averages, available at:http://www.weatherbase.com/weather/weather.php3 ?s=719681 &refer=-.1Newman: The Arctic and Energy: Exploration and Exploitation Issues; IndigPublished by Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons, 2004CANADA-UNITED STATES LAW JOURNALmessage. I come from North Yukon, way down here, I feel like a little insectin this whole United States. To try to ask people to help my people, andconvey a message can be quite challenging sometimes.You will have to excuse my voice; I have a bit of a cold here. That is an-other sort of strength to my people, is that every time we come down here,there is a chance we may take something home. There was the outbreak ofSARS, there was the West Nile Virus, the sniper, you never know whatyou're going to go home with, even though, you know, you basically take thebest care of yourself, you can, go back to 300 people, you come back withSARS. It is dangerous because you can virtually wipe out your communityand the elders if you are not too careful, just to sum up the basic things wedeal with when we come down here.In Old Crow, my people have been there approximately 20 thousandyears. Archeologists have found human bones up in that area that date back20,000 years2 and the caribou bones 30,000 years ago.3Not many people could go up there and live there. We know that we werethe people that came from that land. Just knowing about our culture, ourancestors and the animals that we live with gives us a strong sense of powerwithin ourselves.We live with the animals. We have caribou, moose, wolves, wolverine,salmon, white fish, pike, rabbits, bears, almost any type of animal that youcan think of. We have them.We live in a community and in an area that is virtually untouched by hu-man beings, except us. That is one of the highlights of being so remote inNorthern Canada. Another highlight was that when the first politicians ofsorts started signing treaties with native people, they could not access ourcommunity very well. My grandfather told me the story of how politicianshad come to our community once every few years, trying to get our commu-nity to sign a treaty, but we would not ever sign a treaty. That just showshow strong of a people that we are.Jon Groetzinger mentioned somebody cannot have a conversation with amoose. Coming from a cultural perspective, a native perspective, comingfrom a First Nation's person, I can say that you can have a conversation witha moose. That is how we are connected to the land, and the animals, therocks, the air, the fire, is through a spiritual connection. That is where we getour strength from, the animals and they get their strength from us.Our connection to the Porcupine caribou herd is through our spiritualconnection.2 D.E. Nelson Richard E. Morlan J.S. Vogel J.R. Southon C.R. Harington, New Dates onNorthern Yukon Artifacts: Holocene not Upper Pleistocene, SCIENCE, May 9, 1986, at 749.3 id.[Vol. 30:3072Canada-United States Law Journal, Vol. 30 [2004], Iss. , Art. 48https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cuslj/vol30/iss/48Newman-The Arctic and EnergyWhen our mother's are pregnant and they are starting to nurture and nour-ish the fetus, they eat caribou. It is just a natural sense. When the blood ofthe caribou goes into the blood of the fetus, we begin our spiritual connec-tion.When our elders are ready to pass over into the next world, we feed themcaribou broth because it strengthens their spirit for the journey.We had an archeological assessment on the mountain behind our commu-nity a few years ago for a rock quarry, and the area that we were assessing,they found two caribou horns. Tests were conducted to determine their age.One was 25 years old and the other was 500 years old. That was only fiveminutes from my house, I can go up there with a snow machine in five min-utes, and the Caribou horn sat there for 500 years.The Chief mentioned that many First National communities' tribes havebeen impacted by development and have been touched by other people thathave invaded their home, taken away the food, the spirituality, the connec-tion that sustains their tribe.Around the world, it is becoming harder to find tribes. We are one of thelast remaining people that still have this connection, that can still stand hereand say, "Yes, I'm connected to this earth and I'm connected to this land, andplead with people to help my people just like our ancestors did for us."I could walk up the mountain and go off on a trail and walk on a trail thatis 500 years old that my great, great, great, great grandmother walked on.Our fight, our challenge, is to preserve that same trail for our children, mygreat, great, great, great grandchildren. Sometimes, it is hard to get that mes-sage across to people who are focused on economic gain, and that is my job.Regardless of where we live in the world, we do have high-speed internet,we do have a website, and it is Oldcrow.yk.net. On that website, you canlearn about the Gwitchin people, and can view a copy of our self-governmentagreement with Canada.We understand that America needs energy. We know that, and like theChief mentioned, we do not consider ourselves environmentalists, and we areonly opposed to oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. How-ever, we must take responsibility of the oil that we use.A few years ago, they used this issue based on California's energy crisis.The fuel and the propane, I guess, went sky high in California. They said,"We need to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to help California."I was on tour that year in Arizona, and did a brief stop in Las Vegas. I couldnot believe that Nevada had so many lights. Nevertheless, California wassaid to have an energy crisis.I was thinking, "Oh, my God, do these people know sometime in the fu-ture, there are great, great, great grandchildren that are coming and they maywant to use some of those lights, they may want to have a warm home, andhave this same type of comfort that we have? I couldn't believe it.2004]3Newman: The Arctic and Energy: Exploration and Exploitation Issues; IndigPublished by Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons, 2004CANADA-UNITED STATES LA W JOURNALI'm sure many of you will be politicians in the future and are on that road;maybe you could cancel one of the Indy 500's for one year or so, and seewhat you can do with that energy that has not been used up at that time.We use all parts of the Caribou, except the stomach. We bury the stom-ach. We give it back to the earth, or put it back in the water. We use thecaribou head, we use the hoofs, we use the skin, and our connection is one ofspirituality. It gives us food. It gives us clothing, gives us tools, gives usmedicine, and, in return, we take care of the land for the caribou to continueto roam free as they are meant to be.When the women tan the caribou skin in my hometown, they soak skinwith the caribou brains. It does not cause a mad caribou disease. It makesthe skin soft and easy to use.My people have been living by these rules for thousands of years. Thatmakes us who we are. We would not live our lives in any other way, even ifwe were presented with the option.I have a good example. I do not know how many of you have ever triedto pluck a geese, have any of you ever tried? It is hard as is plucking blackducks. We eat the geese that fly up to Old Crow. When they migrate north,they come to see us; and we are happy when they come back. We are excitedthat they have another chance to visit with us.There is this new invention, I am sure it has been around for a few years.You can put the geese in a wax and just peel the feathers off; also, there is amachine that takes the feathers off. We would not think of using innovationslike those even though they are available.We do need lawyers, however.We live with the animals, trees, rocks, rivers, icebergs, insects, waterground, air and fire. If you saw our land, you would not believe how un-spoiled it is, how pure it is. We have clean water and clean land. While wedo have millions of dollars, yet we rely on the land to feed us and give usclean water to drink. It does not matter how many millions and billions ofdollars if you have, if there is no food left in the world, your money is notgoing to buy you anything.We have been learning about the economical and investment aspects ofgovernment.I noticed on the pamphlet Bombardier and Pfizer was here. We havestocks in those companies; we watch those stocks on a quarterly basis; at theend of five years, we review that and then we make the changes dependingon the type of the advice that we get from our investment company.Therefore, we are quite prepared and quite willing to sustain our culture,our population, our spirit, and our identity for our children. That is what wedo. That is whom we work for, the children in the future. That is whoworked for me and that is who works for the Chief.[Vol. 30:3074Canada-United States Law Journal, Vol. 30 [2004], Iss. , Art. 48https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cuslj/vol30/iss/48Newman-The Arctic and EnergyWhen our children are hungry, we cannot feed them oil. This is the storyof my Gwitchin people in the land where I come from; I shared this with youso that you can understand me and hopefully teach other people about ourconnection with the Porcupine caribou herd.I was walking through South Dakota. I was in Rapid City, South Dakotaa few years ago. All I had to do was walk a few feet from the hotel to a con-vention center. Half way through my little journey, I felt feelings of pain andsorrow and agony; and I could not understand the source. I was going to aPOW WOW, and we were doing the same type of presentation. During thatwalk, I just stood and looked around me. If you just stop, look around, andlisten, you can hear what the earth is telling you. It is simple, and everyonehas it in them. I was in middle of Sioux people. I was on the land that wasonce full of buffalo, and I can feel that pain and that agony of what the Siouxpeople went through to lose that important part of their culture and sustain-ability.I went to see the one white buffalo that had recently been born, and shewas in a fence. Nevertheless, it was a blessing to see the buffalo; and Ithought of our caribou. I feared that 30 years from now my children mightbe viewing caribou in a fence. That is what will be taken from us. I fear that30 years from now there were only going to be a few caribou left on thisearth. They will be behind fences. Then, no one will be able to hunt themfor sustain ably. The pain that native people go through when they lose thattype of culture endures for countless generations.I want to thank my past and present leaders for their strength and couragein challenging all levels of government to secure a better future for our chil-dren.I want to thank my ancestors for their wisdom and vision in taking care ofthis land for our children tomorrow. I want to thank them for thinking aboutus when we are not even born yet.I am sure a lot of you can remember when you were growing up the kindof house you lived in. I am sure a lot of you did not have running water, a lotyou lived close to the land, and I can see it in your eyes that some of youconnect with the message I am saying. We are in a new millennium wherewe have technology to do things differently. We can use corn to make oil tofuel our cars. We can bring up the standards of how many miles per gallonour vehicles can go. We can go to the moon. If we can go to the moon, I amsure we can develop new technologies to give our country energy.Thank you for listening. I appreciate it and Mahsi' choo Kekwadhut.That means, thank you, Creator.2004]5Newman: The Arctic and Energy: Exploration and Exploitation Issues; IndigPublished by Case Western Reserve University School of Law Scholarly Commons, 20046Canada-United States Law Journal, Vol. 30 [2004], Iss. , Art. 48https://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/cuslj/vol30/iss/48

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