CPS and America's native communities. A history of...what else(?) tragedy and failure. Part II.

With the gradual, but rapidly increased, changeover of the United States from a self-reliant republican nation to a government-run-and dependent nanny-state during the middle part of the last century, the rights of parents and families to function in traditional ways suffered greatly. Native American families, who had suffered the fate of conquered people for two generations prior to that even, suffered even more.

Not only had much of their cultural identity and pride been stripped away, but native families also lost everything that other American families lost with the rise of so-called "child protective" "services" (CPS). In addition, prior to the rise of the massive influx of guilt-ridden "government assistance" of the late twentieth and early 21st-centuay (and the casino culture that came with it) native families were routinely relegated to a position of grinding poverty and a sort of "house arrest" on barren and bleak reservations located in the backwaters of America.

(Per usual, Michigan seems to always be leading the way toward bureaucratic interventionism...)

Indeed. everything about the fate of most native Americans during the same period of time that modern CPS was coming into its full range of dictatorial powers was conducive to depression, loss of dignity, alcoholism, and everything that could possibly combine to make any type of parenting--native or European--difficult and nearly unachievable for native families. In such an environment, native families were still viewed by most petty bureaucrats (of the type that populate CPS offices) as "easy pickings," especially if the children were attractive and so-far "undamaged" by "wastrel" parents.

While South Dakota is a bit of an outlier, statistically, they are not all that different in many ways to other small rural states with large native populations. Consider the following excerpt from a recent published series on native children by NPR titled "Special Series: Native Foster Care: Lost Children, Shattered Families:"

"Native American families feel the brunt... Their children make up less than 15 percent of the child population, yet they make up more than half of the children in foster care. Critics say foster care in South Dakota has become a powerhouse for private group home providers who bring in millions of dollars in state contracts to care for kids. Among them is Children's Home Society, the state's largest foster care provider, which has close ties with top government officials. It used to be run by South Dakota's Gov. Dennis Daugard. An NPR investigation has found that Daugard was on the group's payroll while he was lieutenant governor — and while the group received tens of millions of dollars in no-bid state contracts. It's an unusual relationship highlighting the powerful role money and politics play in South Dakota's foster care system.

'They make a living off of our children,' said Juanita Sherick, the tribal social worker for the Pine Ridge reservation. Some children are removed from their homes for legitimate reasons. But in South Dakota very few are taken because they've been physically or sexually abused. Most are taken under a far more subjective set of circumstances."

(Juanita Sherick...courtesy of npr.org.)

You would think at this late date, given attitudinal changes towards natives and native culture of the past 20-30 years that such a disparity in children seizure rates by CPS would no longer be possible. But, alas, old habits die hard. The generation or two prior two our current one saw thousands of children taken from parents and placed in boarding schools where they were "improved" by the education and acculturation they received there--all while the overseers of such institutions patted themselves on the back for the civic mindedness and benevolence. Of course, little thought, until very recent times was given to the powerful detrimental influence on the sustainability of native tribes that such actions represented. Indeed, it could be argued that this type of removal was a soft form of cultural genocide.

The Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) of 1978 was written, in large part, to "correct" such (sometimes well-intended) abuse. Here is an excerpt from:

https://newsmaven.io/indiancountrytoday/archive/indian-child-welfare-act-preserves-and-strengthens-american-indian-families-HF--l4yEVkac5fROHatdpA/

"The goal [of ICWA] is to preserve and strengthen American Indian families and culture by re-establishing tribal authority over its children."

(Image courtesy of onjijinkta.com.)

The empowering of tribal government during the past twenty years has been a boon for many native American communities. There are many places (including the Maliseet Band of Micmacs near where I live in Maine, and with whom I've had many positive and deep interactions) where the plight of native peoples has been vastly improved as a result. This sort of "home rule" with even internal policing and courts, has made positive inroads to the re-establishment of tribal and individual pride within native populations, and even (in some locations) produced re-invigorated parental rights v.v. CPS.

Here in Northern Maine which is analogous to South Dakota in many different ways, tribal government has been allowed to flourish in such helpful ways that our version of CPS would never dare to set foot on a reservation to take a child without the direct involvement and prior approval (and usually with the assistance of native police) of native authorities. Our CPS here is every bit as much of an overall failure as it is anywhere else, but at least when it comes to interaction with the native communities, Maine seems to be "doing it right." We have nowhere near the horrendous statistical foster care rates of native children as does South Dakota, and no financial boondoggle and/or outright apparent State-approved racketeering.

Still, although tribal government has done wonders for returning native pride and nurturing an environment where the better elements of native culture can be practiced in many areas, most CPS agencies in major parts of the nation still surreptitiously treat native communities with kid gloves at best, and as macro-orphanages with nuisance grownups in the way of direct intervention, at worst. Some states don't even require notification of tribal authorities in the event of heavy-handed response to reports of suspected abuse of native children...or if they do, it is purely "notice" and not any kind of "collaboration."

Native peoples "on the res" are (or have been) very conscientious of being a "welfare class" totally dependent on government largess, and that too, has been an enabler of low self esteem, especially for adult males. The onset of the "casino culture" has helped mightily to mitigate that problem in those areas where permits have been granted, and where natives have had the opportunity to share equally in the administration of, and the revenues, from such operations. However, that has not resolved all issues. Native susceptibility to alcoholism, for example, has only been exacerbated in certain communities where the means with which to abuse that inherent problem has suddenly been enhanced. Many bureaucrats in the proximity of large casino operations have found ways to "get their cut," and the attitudes toward native families have not largely improved even if those families are now driving late model vehicles and dressing better than ever before.

(Quora.com.)

(Casino.org.)

(debate.org.)

Native children still (according to a PEW Research survey in 2007) find themselves in foster care environments at 60% greater rates, nationally, as compared to their white counterparts. Additionally, there is a crisis in terms of finding native placements for "abused" (legitimately established, or otherwise) native children. Things are NOT getting better despite CPS growing into a leviathan with near dictatorial powers over all families. Have a look at the following link:

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/a34g8j/inside-the-native-american-foster-care-crisis-tearing-families-apart

Here is an excerpt from the above:

"Nationwide, American Indian and Alaska Native children are placed into foster care at a rate 2.7 times greater than their proportion in the general population, according to the National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA). With a disproportionate number of Native kids removed from their homes each year, the need for Native foster homes is huge—and there aren’t enough to meet the need. That shortage leads to non-Native foster parents taking in kids from tribal communities. Sometimes, those foster parents decide they want to adopt the foster child even though the law is supposed to prevent virtually all such non-Native adoptions.

This has led to nasty fights over custody; one highly publicized dispute was over Lexi, a young Choctaw girl whose foster parents sued to prevent her being given to the girl’s paternal family. The case stretched over four years and attracted international media attention until 2016, when the case was resolved in favor of her father’s family. In 2013, a little girl known as Baby Veronica was at the center of yet another maelstrom, this time after her non-Native mother turned her over for adoption leaving her Native father to fight for her return. This time, the outcome was different: The non-Indian adoptive family got to keep the girl."

I am not sure how much of the increase (between the 2007 PEW study and the article just cited from 2018) an be attributed to adding in Alaskan natives, but it is clear we are making no progress in terms of keeping native children safely placed with their own people. It is also clear from the above excerpt that the intent of the IWCA has largely been thwarted as a result of this crisis.

The problems associated with preserving native culture while at the same time applying modern CPS strategies and dicta within native communities is intractable and probably insurmountable. Many tribal communities, we will have to one-day recognize, are simply broken beyond repair, and may not even have enough "institutional/collective memory" of their own culture, traditions and spirituality to ever truly function again as stand-alone communities outside of the dominant American culture.

(Image courtesy of wanderings.net.)

We can bemoan that sad fact, or we can take those communities as they are and offer the type of truly Christian non-compulsory assistance they may need or request.

In short, even the all-powerful nanny state is not going to be able to right all wrongs, or even right many wrongs, without producing more, sometimes far more egregious wrongs as a result of its interventionism.

Those larger or more successful native communities that do have enough "memory" and resources to sustain their own insular civilization should probably just be left, mostly, alone to deal with ALL of their own internal issues--even ones where CPS has grown accustomed to being "cop, jury, judge and executioner."