Local History Proposal

For my local history this quarter, I am going to finish taking my old letters that I found and make summaries and connections to history with them. I may also attatch them to a calander and do a map much like last quarter since I think the project turned out well.

Civil War Questions

1. Use evidence to describe the economic impact of casino ownership and gambling on Native American tribes.

The Casino ownership only benefits certain tribes. The tribe Mashantucket Pequots who owns Foxwoods largest casino has got rich off from it. But, only less then a quarter of Americans 557 Indian Tribes own casinos. Around 400,000 Indians have the highest rates of poverty and unemployment.

2. What is the most significant problem of trying to understand the condition of the modern Native American population?

Because there are over more then 2 million people who belong to over 500 different tribes. Each tribe has their own history and living circumstances which makes things hard to understand.

3. In what ways are Native Americans a unique minority group in the United States? Do these reasons seem justified today, or should Native Americans be considered as a "regular" minority group (like African Americans, Asian Americans, women, etc.)?

America has signed peace treaties which is the only ethnic group with a government agency. I think they should have their special minority group because they went through things we should make up for. If they have their own, African Americans should too because they have a story as well.

4. Please find 4 specific examples of the sorts of events generalized in this paragraph. For each specific example, include a hyperlink to a website explaining the specific event, and a summary of that event.

Dispatching children to boarding Schools:
Children as young as the age of five were forced to leave their parents and attend Christian schools away from home.
http://www.amnestyusa.org/amnestynow/soulwound.html

Making War on Native Americans:
Also known as "Indian Wars". We wanted to take the Native Americans land to have for ourselves for settlement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Wars

Increasing funding for the BIA:
We increased the funding to the Bureau of Indian Affairs
http://www.bia.gov/idc/groups/xocfo/documents/text/idc007883.doc

Sending Native Americans to Oklahoma:
We sent many of the Native Americans to Oklahoma to live which is now known as the Oklahoma tribes. (some of them)
http://www.talewins.com/oklahoma/native.htm

5. What is meant by the phrase 'diseases of the poor'? What is the relationship between economics and health implied by that phrase?

If you are poor, you are more likely to get disease because you can't buy the things you need to keep healthy. One third of the Native American population live in poverty and are four times as likely to die of alcoholism. Also they are three times as likely to die of tuberculosis and twice as likely to die of diabetes.

6. Is John McCain correct in his assessment of the treatment of Native Americans? Why?

Not exactly. Although it is obvious what we did was wrong, not everyone would see it this way. Still many people don't see what we did to African Americans was wrong either.

7. Please define each of the following terms in the context of Native American policy:

removal: They have been removed from us for awhile because they were so different.
allotment: They were given allotments and couldn't own their own land.
termination: We got rid of many Native Americans while invading their land.
relocation: Once we willed Native Americans, we made them relocate to different land.
assimilation: We culturally combined Native Americans with us and gave them their own minority.
self determination: They never gave up and many Native Americans still live in this area today and respect our rules.

8. Finally, give a paragraph summary on what self determination means, and why it either is, or is not, the appropriate policy for Native American people with respect to the Federal government.

I believe that the Native Americas really did have self determination. Self determination is the free choice of ones own acts without external compulsion. The Native Americans continue living in the United States and respect our rules after everything we did to them. I think this could make their policy self determination.

Essay

The United States intentions are to push American values such as freedom of speech, religion, and assembly in a Humanitarian way, but that may not be what other countries want. Each country has its own values and strong feeling of importance for their own unique independence. By doing this, it starts revolts against our Country and sparks the question, is what the United States does to other countries really right?
President McKinley thought taking the Philippines from Spain would benefit America. McKinley made it seem like America was helping the Philippines to help educate the Filipino's. In February 1899, The Filipino’s raised a revolt against the American rule. Although the Filipino’s raised the revolt, soldiers testified and said that the United States fired the first shot which started the revolution in the Philippines. William Hearst, an American newspaper magnate and leading newspaper publisher helped plan the war against Spain. Hearst stated, "You furnish the pictures, I'll furnish the war."
During the revolt with the Philippine's the United States was very racist. In the United States at this time, on an average of every two weeks, two colored people were grabbed by mobs, tortured and killed because of the color of their skin. The United States could not tolerate difference in it's own country. A general in the war stated, " The more I burn and kill, the more pleased I will be." America had no remorse about the killings that had happened. Another American from Washington said, "This shooting human beings beats rabbit hunting all to pieces." Not only could the United States not tolerate the color of the Philippine's skin, but American's didn't like the Filipino's education system either. American tried bringing the Philippine's to the United States to have Filipino's education more like America's. The Philippine's had their own system that was working for their country that didn't need to be touched.
During McKinley's presidency, the United States also tried invading Cuba. America had a huge economic interest in Cuba's railroads, sugar, and shipping. This had huge potential of being helpful to the United States economic needs. Albert Beveridge has pushed the idea upon the United States that the Philippines had the same potential. He stated that Cuba and the Philippines had "limitless markets" that could some day be America's. Beveridge reminded all American's that "there are 5,000,000 people to be governed." The United State's economic problems were not Cuba's, or the Philippine's issue, it was America's.
The Philippine's and Cuba each have their own values and strong feeling of importance for their independence. When the United States push American values onto countries like Cuba and the Philippine's it makes America look violent, greedy, and intolerant of difference. Each country is unique and deserves to have independence to their values.