THE LAND CLAIMS STRUGGLE, Text Four

territory
survey
legislature
deed
title
allotment
protest

pro and con
conservationist
interest group
filibuster
veto
bill, act
override
amend

Students will derive from interviews knowledge of traditional land use in their village.

Interview an older person that you know. (Assign students to interview singly or in pairs.)

How did that law define land use? Make a picture or chart showing land use as defined by Alaska Natives and as defined by the Homestead Act. How were the uses alike? How were they different? Which is most like land uses practices by American Indians in the rest of the United States? Which practice is most in harmony with nature?

Play the song "This Land is Your Land, This Land is my Land." Make up original verses to accompany it, having to do with Alaska. Tape the class singing the original version.

There may be other songs the students know that they'd like to write Alaskanized original versions to.

Students will demonstrate knowledge of sequence of events regarding the land claims struggle.

Make a time line of events and acts leading up to the passage of the Land Claims Settlement Act. The class might do this as a group, with each person or group drawing a poster and writing a statement about 1 event. These could then be posted in chronological order around the room for future reference.

Students will take a survey to discover communication channels in regard to the Settlement Act.

How did people in your village find out about the passage of the Land Claims Settlement Act? By newspaper? TV? From a friend? At a meeting?

Take a survey around the village or neighborhood to find the answer to these questions.

Do the Native people where you live speak Inupiat? If not, what language do they speak? Can you speak it?

Cut pictures of objects from magazines. Find out what these objects would be called in the Native language of your area. Establish a Language Corner in the room where such word cards can be posted. In this way, you may be able to build your vocabulary in that language (and your teacher's!).

In pairs or groups, learn to tell a story in the Native language. Make finger puppets to play the parts of the characters in the story. After practicing the stories in class, see if your teacher will let you go to an elementary class to tell the story.

Students will become familiar with deeds and titles as evidence of land ownership.

Have you ever seen a deed or title to land? See if anyone has such a legal document for the class to see. Be careful with them. In modern society, such pieces of paper are valuable! Where are such deeds recorded? What is the importance of recording land ownership?

Students will discover through a simulated activity the advantages of written vs. oral communication as evidence.

Bring to class two boxes with various items which the students can divide among themselves.

It is important that they do not see what is in the first box. Group 2 does not write a description of their items but merely lets everyone know verbally who owns each.

Group 1 returns to the room. The two boxes of items are then mixed, and students are directed to select their own items.

Both boxes should contain similar items with minor differences; for instance, a pencil and a pencil with a broken tip, a ball point pen that is dry and one that works.

If there is a surveyor in the village, see if he will come to class and explain how land is measured.

On a school playground, how do groups establish territory? Visit an elementary playground and try to determine to what extent the territorial imperative is evident.

Attempt to map the school grounds according to which group claims which territory.

Students might want to read The Territorial Imperative, by Richard Ardrey, or the teacher may read key passages to the class. Do you agree or disagree with the author's statements on territoriality?

Some of the items listed below you would be willing to share a very close space with. Others, you would wish to keep at a distance.

Use a rating scale of 1 to 5. Indicate the degree of closeness you'd feel comfortable with in regard to each item. (1=close; 5=distant)

____	a puppy	____	a moving snowmobile
____	a campfire	____	a dead moose
____	a gun	____	a live seal
____	Arctic poppies	____	the teacher
____	ocean waves	____	a house on fire
____	a cliff edge	____	a river bank
____	dark roads	____	a church
____	a strange man	____	a strange woman
____	a hockey game	____	a brother or sister crying
____	a newborn baby	____	a TV set
____	a taxicab	____	a graveyard
____	a sick person	____	my grandfather
____	a book	____	a guitar

Study your responses to the list. Write a statement about yourself, beginning with "I learned that ___________________________________."

How close do they get to you before you begin to feel uncomfortable? Does it vary with different people?

Students will examine two historic Alaska Native protests having bearing on the land claims struggle.

Divide into small groups. Have each group role play the two protest incidents in Book Four (Cape Thompson and The Barrow Duck Hunting Protest). Instruct groups to supply from their imagination any facts not given in the account.

Compare these incidents to other protest incidents you can read about. (There should be a number in the American History book.)

Write a newspaper article, describing one of the incidents as you visualize it may have happened.

Students will become familiar with The Tundra Times, a major voice of Alaskan Native people.

If your school subscribes to Tundra Times, borrow a handful of back copies and spend some time reading one issue thoroughly. Categorize the articles. Compare your tally with those of other students reading other issues.

Are there topics you would like to see written about? If so, write a letter to the editor, telling him so.

If your school does not subscribe to The Tundra Times, check with the principal to see if it would be possible to do so.

If your school takes other Alaskan newspapers, see if your class can have copies, as they are outdated. Begin a class bulletin board or scrapbook on articles having to do with land claims.

Students will gain knowledge of arguments surrounding the Rampart Dam controversy.

In 1965, with the enthusiastic backing of the Corps of Engineers and Ernest Gruening, it looked like only a matter of time until Rampart Dam became a reality.

The succeeding pages have numerous quotations, both pro and con, on various aspects of the proposed Rampart Dam.

Distribute one card to each student. (If the class is large, distribute 1 per two students.)

Allow each time to study the quotation and to understand what it means in the debate about whether or not the dam should be built.

Have those who hold cards opposing construction of the dam move to one side of the room, those holding cards favoring the construction to the opposite side.

Do this till all have read their cards. (No attempt has been made to match up the PRO and CON arguments evenly.)

Use your own judgement about allowing students to intersperse arguments of their own while the card-reading is in progress.

Have students rate the quotations on a scale of 1 to 10 in accordance with their own opinion regarding Rampart.

Have students write a 1 page position paper defending their opinion on the subject.

Power Potential Held Key Factor

Favorable findings for the construction of the giant Rampart Dam hydroelectric project on the Yukon River are contained in a Department of Interior field study report released today to members of Congress.

The long-awaited and often delayed report does contain a section, with the findings of the Fish and Wildlife Service, which opposes construction of Rampart.

However, the introduction to the massive 1,000-page report says construction of the $2 billion dam "would enhance worldwide our engineering prestige and could set the pattern for development of Alaska's remaining tremendous hydroelectric potential."

Sen. Ernest Gruening of Alaska said in Washington he was delighted with the section of the report analyzing the mar

ket for the nearly 5,000,000 kilo watts of power to be generated at Rampart.

He said the report confirms earlier findings that Rampart's power can be produced at lower cost than from any other source in Alaska, that the power is needed to develop Alaska's resources, and that this power can be marketed successfully primarily to industry as it is produced.

While the wildlife sections of the report are less favorable to Rampart than the power portion, Sen. Gruening said he was "confident that all objections to the Rampart project can be overcome to the end that this tremendous development will be authorized by the Congress and placed under construction in the near future."

The 11-pound report, in three volumes, is the result of the Interior Department's studies of the effects of the dam on Alaskan resources, including fish and wildlife, and whether the power generated could be marketed.

The dam, if authorized will be built by the Army Engineers with the Interior Department's Bureau of Reclamation having responsibility for power sales.

DAM WOULD MAKE BIG LAKE

The proposed dam at Rampart Canyon on the Yukon River would form a lake larger than Lake Erie, one of the Great Lakes. The reservoir would cover an area in excess of 10,000 square miles–larger than the entire state of Massachusetts.

The huge dam would be built on the main stem of the Yukon some 90 air miles northwest of Fairbanks. The dam would have an installed generating capacity about two and one-half times that of Grand Coulee, on the Columbia River in Washington, one of the world's largest.

The dam would create a 10,000 square-mile reservoir. This man-made lake would be about 1,000 square miles larger than Lake Erie and would take about 22 years to fill completely.

Over-all costs, including power transmission lines, would be in excess of $2 billion. This does not include an estimate of $580.5 million which the Fish and Wildlife Service says would be needed to mitigate damage to fish and animal resources.

A nesting habitat which contributes annually about 1,500,000 ducks, 12,500 geese, and 10,000 little brown cranes to the four North American flyways would be completely destroyed. The resultant lake would provide no substitute. --Paul Brooks	The people of the Yukon will be immediately and most dramatically benefited by the construction of Rampart. For the first time in their long history, they will have a chance for education, for jobs, for access to the world outside, and for participation in the community of the free world -- opportunities they are now denied. --Ernest Gruening
The project will ruin our hunting, trapping and fishing on which we have lived for so many years. . . What are we supposed to do, drown or something? --Allen John, of Stevens Village	The total benefit to sport fishing with the project, based on this increased use, is valued at $60,000 annually. --Fish and Wildlife Report
We use an area of 1,648 square miles for hunting, fishing, and for running our traplines. This is the way in which our fathers and forefathers made their living, and we of this generation follow the same plan. --Stevens Village Council	When they move to make room for Rampart Dam, the people of the Yukon will have a choice as to where they will live. They will be able to state a preference as to the relocation of their villages in safe places where they will have a chance for advancement and prosperity never before possible. --Ernest Gruening
What of the people who live along the river? Seven villages in the Flats would be drowned; some 1200 natives would be evacuated; the livelihood of 5000 to 6000 more in Alaska, and an estimated 3500 in the Yukon Territory, would be affected by the reduction of the salmon run. --Paul Brooks	With labor rates among the highest in the world, with the heavy costs of transportation over such great distances, with a lack of local mineral resources to be exploited, central Alaska does not in fact offer an irresistible lure to the aluminum or any other industry. What if the dam is built and the lure fails to work? --Paul Brooks
Who ever heard of a duck drowning? --Dam Proponent	The timber industry will not benefit. On the contrary, over one billion board feet--three years of Alaska's current timber production--will be destroyed. --Paul Brooks
Are you for ducks or for people? --Dam Proponent
The dam would block spawning runs of salmon. As a result the subsistence and commercial fisheries for these fish in areas upstream from the dam would be totally destroyed. The contribution which the fish spawning upstream from the dam would have made to the subsistence and commercial fisheries downstream from the dam would be eliminated. This would result in a loss of catch . . . of an estimated 200,000 to 400,000 salmon annually. --Fish and Wildlife Report	Recreation? Water sports? Does one hear much about aquatic recreation on Great Slave Lake which lies at a comparable location geographically and climatically? Not with ice that lasts until mid summer, and winds that whip up waves as large as on the Great Lakes. Scenic beaches? Not with muddy, stump-strewn, fluctuating shorelines caused by power draw-downs. --Ginny Hill Wood
Muskrats, minks, beavers, and river otters are the most common aquatic fur animals in the area. Terrestrial fur animals include martens, wolverines, weasels, lynxes, snowshoe hares, red foxes, and red squirrels. The annual value of the fur-animal harvest is estimated at 41,000 pelts or about 7% of the entire Alaska fur harvest. --Fish and Wildlife Report	Perhaps we may find that Alaska's most valuable resource, even in terms of the market place, is not water power and an industrial potential, but space--spectacularly beautiful space that is not all filled up with people and industry as is so much of the rest of the world. We may realize that our security is based not on a government subsidy or outside investments, but on our own resourcefulness to meet the challenge of our environment, learning to live in harmony with that environment, the fellowship of our neighbors, and those qualities of the spirit that diminish as the wide open spaces recede. --Ginny Hill Wood
Nowhere in the history of water development in North America have the fish and wildlife losses anticipated to result from a single project been so overwhelming. The effects of the project on anadromous fish would be felt not only in the State of Alaska but in Canada. The losses to waterfowl populations would be evident in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The United States is bound by treaty with these nations to protect mutual interests where these migratory birds are concerned and is obligated to preserve these resources. --Fish and Wildlife Report	Rampart stirs the imagination and challenges the foresight of man, for it is in the future that Rampart finds its proper niche. The observation that this is a project of the future is founded on a projection of the population, on forecasted progress of the utilization of Alaska's minerals, and on the expanded use of electricity as man's servant, all as bases for using a large block of power. --Interior Department Field Study
	What about the ducks--and the mink, the muskrat, the moose, beaver and salmon, plus 2,000 natives whose lives revolve around these resources. --Ginny Hill Wood
The production, at the Rampart site, of nearly five million kilowatts of power at the incomparably low price of two to three mills per kilowatt-hour will bring the United States a long way toward parity with the achievements of the Soviet Union, where two hydroelectric power projects of comparable size--the largest in the world--are either producing electricity or are approaching the completion of construction. --Ernest Gruening	Rampart will provide the key to unlocking Alaska's long buried treasures. The reservoir. . . will open to mineral and timber development a sprawling land area barren, virtually inaccessible and offering no foreseeable opportunity for development. The recreational potential of the 280 mile-long lake is unlimited: fresh-water boating and sailing, hunting lodges and fish camps on the Yukon River lOO miles northwest of Fairbanks will create a major tourist attraction. --Yukon Power for America
. . . It is also important to recognize the flood control benefits that will come with the construction of Rampart. The great dam to be constructed on the Yukon will, at last, give native citizens and wildlife of the Yukon protection against the sudden disaster of floods that have caused repeated damage and destruction in the area. --Ernest Gruening	The building of power-using industries will employ workers at an increasing rate even while construction of the dam itself proceeds and tapers off. Thus Rampart will boost Alaska's economy without the drawback of the temporary boom the state has previously experienced. New workers with their families would more than double the population. --Yukon Power for America
Along the Yukon, in central Alaska, are several native villages--Circle, Fort Yukon, Venetie, Beaver, Stevens Billage, Rampart and Chalkyitsik-- where the residents have an urgent claim to relief from misery, poverty, and danger from flood waters. . . The main source of livelihood is trapping and fishing, a way of life not conducive to economic independence, and certainly not prosperity. As a result, many people are on welfare, although they should be contributing skills and work to society, and enjoying a far better existence than they do now. --Ernest Gruening	What of other sources of energy by 1986 when Rampart might be completed, such as thermal power which can be produced cheaply from coal, oil, or natural gas? Or nuclear power which may well be as cheap by then? Nor is the Yukon River a perpetual energy source for Rampart. The dam will have a limited life of 50 to lOO years until the impoundment area silts up. --Ginny Hill Wood

Divide the class into 7 groups. Direct each group to develop a case for or against a land claims settlement in accord with the position stated below. (These might be printed on 7 cards and a card be issued to each group.)

INTEREST GROUP REPRESENTED	POSITION TAKEN
ALASKA NATIVES	Our traditional hunting, fishing, and gathering grounds are being encroached upon. A settlement is necessary to protect what is ours.
STATE GOVERNMENT	A settlement act would interfere with state land selections. It would slow down development of resources.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT (PRO)	The government has a responsibility for relieving the poverty of the Native groups. A settlement act would give them money to help themselves.
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT (CON)	A land claims settlement would interfere with federal programs such as development of power projects like Rampart Dam.
OIL COMPANIES	A settlement might prevent oil development.
HUNTERS, MINERS, CONSERVATIONISTS	The time for paying the Natives for the land taken is long past. The land must be protected for recreational use, for hunting, for employment, and to prevent development.
AMERICAN INDIANS	A land settlement is the only just and honorable solution to a problem long ignored.

After the development of the arguments of the 7 interest groups in regard to the land claims settlement, have each group select a spokesman.

The spokesmen for the various groups sit in the center of the room in a circle. Other class members are assigned as observers to specific spokesmen. Their duty is to take notes on the decision-making process.

Observers are to note how individual members help the discussion or how they slow it down.

THE CENTER GROUPS SHOULD BE INSTRUCTED TO PRESENT THEIR ARGUMENTS AND TO REACH A COMPROMISE, IF THEY CAN.

Observers might watch for bargaining and tradeoffs made by certain individuals, what certain people did to gain support, what some people did to keep the process flowing, and the like.

The question of a Native Land Claims Settlement has been presented to Congress. Various interest groups are preparing bills to be presented to their Congressmen to solve the problem.

The Native Associations, the Alaska State Government, the oil companies, the Sierra Club or other conservation groups, American Indian groups, Federal Agencies (both for and against the Native position).

Each bill has to go through the following steps in both the Senate and the House:

Interest groups and Congressmen team up to introduce bills favorable to their members. Only one bill may be considered at a time. Using a deck of cards to represent votes (a 5 equals 5 votes, for instance, and a face card represents a filibuster), deal all cards to players. At the end of each round, collect the cards and redistribute them before voting in the next round.

Before a bill can be sent to committee or before it can be moved from one stage to another, supporters must get 51% of the votes. If, during any stage, opponents of a bill gather 51% of the votes, the bill must go back to the beginning stage and start over again.

Discussion can run into several problems. Using any one of the face cards as a filibuster move (in the Senate only), opponents of the bill may defeat the bill at this stage. Supporters of the bill must gain 2/3 of all votes to remove the filibuster card. A filibuster card stops all action and voting until a 2/3 vote is gained, or the bill is killed. Members of the House cannot vote in the Senate, but they may confer with members of their interest group in the other house. Amendments to the bill may also be considered in this stage.

This stage is not needed if both houses pass the same bill. Otherwise, members from both houses get together and iron out the differences. It should be pointed out that members who want to change a bill but were kept from doing this should strive to get elected to the conference committee.

If the President signs the bill after it has passed both houses, the action is complete. If the President vetoes it, he must give his reasons to Congress. They may pass a bill over his veto with 2/3 vote. Or they may re-write the bill and try again.

Each stage must have a chairman (both houses and committees). His job is to recognize speakers and call for votes.

After the conference committee has agreed upon a bill, it must be passed by both the House and the Senate before it is sent to the President for signing.

Floor action
Legislation
Veto
Filibuster
Pigeonhole

Conference committee
Amendment
Bill
Interest group
Override

POPULATION IN ALASKA

YEAR	NATIVES	NON-NATIVES	TOTAL
1880	32,996	430	33,426
1890	35,354	6,698	32,052
1900	29,536	34,056	63,592
1910	25,331	39,025	64,356
1920	26,558	28,479	55,036
1930	29,983	29,295	59,278
1940	32,458	40,066	72,524
1950	33,863	94,780	128,643
1960	43,081	183,086	226,167
1970	50,654	249,728	300,382
1974 (est)	59, 536	277,464	337,000

Make graphs showing the growth in Alaskan population, both Native and non-Native.

Part of the class might make line graphs, some bar graphs, and some picture graphs. Which best depicts the information?

What caused the white population to double during the 40's and almost double again during the 50's?