A Native American photojournalist is promoting a “Land Back” movement across the U.S. for territory ceded or taken during colonization.
Joe Whittle presented his case at the University of Oregon’s Knight Library Tuesday afternoon, complete with photographs he’d taken across many corners of Indian Country.
Whittle is a member of the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma, and descendent of the Delaware Nation. A former backcountry wilderness ranger for the U.S. Forest Service, he proposed that the U.S. government return public lands due to violating every single treaty ever signed with Indigenous peoples.
“Those treaties are Constitutional,” he said. “They’re the law of the land.”
Whittle said another reason for justifying the return of Indigenous peoples’ lands is that traditional ecological knowledge can benefit the environment.
“A lot of data shows that Indigenous people are better and more sustainable stewards of the land than private industry or the United States government has ever been, due to how deeply embedded in U.S. politics private industry has become on public lands,” Whittle said.
Examples shown were cultural burns, where Native people deliberately burned areas to rejuvenate the landscape, eliminate pests and disease, and assist certain flora that use fire to release seeds. The restoration of salmon and lamprey were also discussed.
Whittle’s argument just appeared in TIME Magazine. He’s hoping an inspired attorney might take the federal government on and force a settlement similar to the Cobell vs. Salazar class-action lawsuit which was announced in 2009. The government was found to have violated its trust duties to tribes tied to monies owed for leases, timber, and mineral interests.
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