Gabe Galanda Named to "50 Faces of Indian Country"

Gabriel “Gabe” Galanda was honored by Indian Country Today Media Network, as one of “50 Faces of Indian Country.”

Gabe was recognized as one of 50 Native people who epitomize “the day-to-day struggle for [Indian Country] to regain what was taken . . . and that it’s possible to achieve [our] dreams without sacrificing our strength and beauty.”

Gabe was dubbed “The Crusader” by ICTMN, in honor of his advocacy to “get Native inmates the right to worship in traditional ways” and“’find a cure’ to the disenrollment epidemic.”

In 2011, Gabe caused the Washington State Department of Corrections to reform its religious practices policies to accommodate traditional Indian worship.  In 2012 Gabe was named a Difference Maker Award by the American Bar Association, and in 2014 the Washington State Bar Association bestowed him the Excellence in Diversity Award, for his Indian prisoner religious rights advocacy. 

As ICTMN observed, Gabe has also emerged nationally “as one of the most outspoken critics of the practice” of disenrollment, the “roots of [which] lie in colonialism, not indigeneity.” In 2015, he co-authored a 92-page law review article, “Curing the Disenrollment Epidemic: In Search of a Remedy.”

Gabe has defended nearly 600 Indians against disenrollment, including having kept the Nooksack 306 enrolled since 2013; obtained a “watershed decision” for 66 Grand Ronde Chief Tumulth Descendants; and protected 132 Elem Pomo Indians from being exiled, which would empty their Reservation.

Gabe, an enrolled citizen of the Round Valley Indian Tribes of California, is a founding Partner of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, an American Indian-owned law firm with office in Seattle and Yakima, Washington and Bend, Oregon, dedicated to advancing tribal legal rights, Indian civil rights, and Indian business interests. 

Still Sacred: Why Energy Transfer Partners' Cannonball Land Grab Doesn't Change Anything

The media was quick to report that Energy Transfer Partners, the developer of the "Dakota" Access Pipeline (DAPL), purchased the Cannonball Ranch last Thursday.  

What wasn't reported was the extent to which Ranch is sacred to both Native and Non-Native society. Indeed, its sacredness spans both worlds. As the Rapid City Journal reported a decade ago:

The ranch, since statehood, has been the land that bridged North Dakota to the Standing Rock Sioux Indian Reservation, on the other side of the Cannonball River.

Through the eyes of non-Natives, the ranch "was the first to be inducted in the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame."  The Sioux Peoples likewise believe it to be a sacred place; even according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: 

At the Cannonball Ranch, there are burials of notable Standing Rock memebers [sic] and their families including Maltida Galpin, Alma Parken, Louisa Degray Van Solen, and Charles Picotte, among whom are signatories on the Treaty of Fort Laramie. There is also an unmarked grave of Mrs. Harrison at the mouth of the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers.

The Sacred Stone Camp's #NoDAPL movement has only enhanced the sacredness of the ranch.

Apparently Energy Transfer Partners believes the acquisition will allow it to "better access its construction sites and the pipeline, when [or, if] it is finished."  The company will surely also proclaim its newfound "private property"---as it did over and over again to the U.S. District Court in defense against an injunction sought by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe--in hopes of stymying #NoDAPL activism.

But fundamentally, as Indian Country and its allies lock arms to defeat DAPL, the company's land grab at Cannonball does't change much.  It doesn't change the fact that:

1. Any further destruction of Indian graves, cemeteries or cultural resources remains illegal under various North Dakota state laws, and Standing Rock Sioux customary laws.
2. The ranch remains eligible for proclamation by President Obama as a National Monument under the Antiquities Act, which would be legally unassailable. U.S. v. California, 436 U.S. 32 (1978); Cappaert v. U.S., 426 U.S. 128 (1976); Cameron v. U.S., 252 U.S. 450 (1920).
3. The ranch remains eligible for designation by the Obama Administration as a cultural district on the National Register of Historic Places. 36 C.F.R. 60.3(d).
4. The ranch remains "unceded Indian territory" reserved to the Sioux Peoples, to which reserved hunting and other usufructuary rights also attach, under the 1868 Treaty of Ft. Laramie. Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, 526 U.S. 172 (1999).
5. Any destruction of the ranch (or any DAPL oil spill) could land Energy Transfer Partners in Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Court. Wisconsin v. EPA, 266 F.3d 741 (7th Cir. 2001) ("There is no case that expressly rejects an application of Montana to off-reservation activities that have significant effects within the reservation...").
6. There are various legal strategies to protect the ranch from desecration. See "21st Century Indian Wars," Gabe Galanda and Debora Juarez, Indian Country Today, Oct. 25, 2007; "Off-Reservation Cultural Property Protection," Sharon Haensly, Indian Country Today, Nov. 1, 2017.

So to Energy Transfer Partners I say: Caveat emptor.

Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California.  

Galanda Broadman Lawyers Reinstated as Counsel of Record for the Nooksack 306

In sweeping fashion, the Nooksack Appeals Court handed down three significant decisions yesterday in favor of the Nooksack 306 and their counsel, Galanda Broadman, PLLC.  

The Appeals Court did so one day after six Indian law professors filed an amicus brief expressing concern "regarding patent violations of [the federal Indian Civil Rights Act], harm to the integrity of all tribal courts, and, most importantly, the strategic deprivation of counsel and barred access to justice for Nooksack tribal citizens."

Most dramatically, the Appeals Court reinstated Gabriel Galanda, Anthony Broadman, and Ryan Dreveskracht "as advocates admitted to practice before the Nooksack Tribal Court," for their 331 enrolled Nooksack clients.  In addition to the Nooksack 306, they represent scores of clients, including Chairman Bob Kelly's two sons, who have sued to compel a Tribal Council election.

The appellate judges found that the lawyers "have been unlawfully denied their right to have the Tribal Court rule on their challenge" to their apparent disbarment in late February 2016 and that the court's previous efforts to provide them relief had been "unlawfully ignored and the rule of law on the reservation, at least within the scope of this case, has completely broken down."  

As reported by Law360, Galanda commented yesterday: "This is an enormous moral victory, meaning a win against wholly immoral forces."

In a related Order, the Appeals Court awarded the Galanda Broadman lawyers $2,790.15 in attorneys fees and costs against Nooksack Police Chief Rory Gilliland, pursuant to the Court's previously issued contempt Orders against him.  

Finally, the Appeals Court issued its latest injunction order, expanding its previous injunction over to cover 17 more members of the Nooksack 306, until such time as the Tribal Court reopens its doors for the Nooksack 306 plaintiffs to hear various motions that have been pending since January 2016, including a motion to compel an election for four expired Tribal Council seats.

Galanda concluded: "We and our clients will take advantage of all three orders issued by the appeals court."

Tangled Web of Lies: U.S. Army Corps' DAPL Historic Properties "Review"

Cannonball River in Sioux Treaty territory, pictured by Gabe Galanda

"Oh, what a tangled web we weave! When we first practice to deceive." --Sir Walter Scott

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' "review" of historic properties in ancestral Sioux Treaty lands, associated with the "Dakota" Access Pipeline (DAPL) project, is fundamentally dishonest---especially considering the easement the Corps must still issue to allow drilling underneath Lake Oahe and the Missouri River pursuant to the federal Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899. 

In fact, the Corps have woven together a tangled web of lies, and are telling those lies to the Great Sioux Peoples and the entire country.

Under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, the Corps must take into account the effects of its undertaking---here, the Corps' "grant [of] an easement for the DAPL project to be placed under Lake Oahe"---on historic and cultural properties, including Sioux sacred sites.

Lake Oahe sits at the confluence of the Cannonball River into the Missouri River, and constitutes reserved Sioux Treaty territory; in fact, the eastern boundary of Ft. Laramie Treaty lands. And as the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe previously advised the Corps, according to Corps' own words:  

At the Cannonball Ranch, there are burials of notable Standing Rock memebers [sic] and their families including Maltida Galpin, Alma Parken, Louisa Degray Van Solen, and Charles Picotte, among whom are signatories on the Treaty of Fort Laramie. There is also an unmarked grave of Mrs. Harrison at the mouth of the Cannonball and Missouri Rivers.

The Corps ostensibly reviewed the effects that Enbridge Energy Partners' horizontal directional drilling under Lake Oahe and the Missouri River would have on such Standing Rock Sioux historic and cultural properties, concluding:

there will be no direct or indirect effects to the Standing Rock Sioux tribe.  This includes a lack of impact to its lands, cultural artifacts, water quality or quantity, treaty hunting and fishing rights, environmental quality, or socio-economic status.

That conclusion comes as no surprise when one ascertains the Corps' identified area of potential effect (APE), which generally means the geographic area or areas within which an undertaking may directly or indirectly cause alterations in the character or use of historic properties.

For DAPL, the Corps' so-called APE was only those bore holes on both sides of Lake Oahe and Missouri River that would be needed to run the DAPL underneath the lake.  In a 1,261-page document titled "Mitigated Finding of No Significant Impact," the Corps admits: 

The APE for this project will not include construction of any portion of the pipeline that extends past the bore pit locations.

Among other geographic areas, the APE does not even include the lands "under Lake Oahe" that will be subject to horizontal directional drilling so that DAPL can run beneath the Missouri River---i.e., lands "under Lake Oahe" and the Missouri River that require a Corps easement for drilling.

This is an exceedingly narrow---and illegal---APE.  Indeed, how can the Corps, in good faith, justify needing to issue a federal easement for drilling an oil pipeline "under Lake Oahe" and Missouri River, while concluding that the APE is simply boring pits on each side of the Lake and River?  

They can't.  The Corps are lying to themselves, to the Sioux Peoples, and to us all.

For sake of the truth, the APE includes---and must, via the U.S. District Court or any higher court, still include---Lake Oahe and the Missouri River, as well as the vast Sioux historic and cultural properties that surround DAPL's proposed crossing of those sacred waters.  

Until then, the Corps' 1,261-page Section 106 "review" will remain fundamentally dishonest, and constitute the latest set of bold-faced lies told by the United States to the Great Sioux Peoples.

Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California. He opposes the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL).

Standing Rock, Sacred Stone Camp, DAPL: Sacred Treaty Lands & Waters

My legal takeaway from Standing Rock and the Sacred Stone Camp:

Those sacred lands and the sacred lands astride the Missouri River in rightful dispute, are reserved ancestral Sioux Treaty territory.

The 1868 Treaty of Ft. Laramie reserves ancestral lands "commencing on the east bank of the Missouri river where the 46th parallel of north latitude crosses the same, thence along low-water mark down said east bank..."

Without getting into the technicalities of any Sioux Treaty land diminishment vis-a-vis the 1851 Ft. Laramie Treaty, the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation sits along the west bank of the Missouri River, as does the Camp.

The Treaty does not define reserved Sioux Treaty territory as to the west bank, or the low-water mark down said west bank, of the Missouri River.

Missouri River, at Sacred Stone Camp, on Tuesday, August 30 (photo by Gabe Galanda)

The Treaty defines Sioux Treaty territory as running across the Missouri River, from west bank to east bank---including the low-water mark down said east bank---i.e., including the lands astride the Missouri River.

How then can there not be a legitimate claim to protect the water that runs through reserved ancestral Sioux Treaty territory---water that has demarcated the eastern Treaty boundary for 150 years---water that has run through Sioux lands since time immemorial?

It is my hope that the #NoDAPL narrative begins to include the fact that these are reserved ancestral Sioux Treaty lands and waters.

Gabriel S. Galanda is the managing lawyer of Galanda Broadman, PLLC, in Seattle. Gabe is a descendant of the Nomlaki and Concow Tribes, belonging to the Round Valley Indian Tribes of Northern California. He opposes the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL).