"When Ira Hayes, a Pima Indian famous for helping raise the flag at Iwo Jima, returned to Arizona after World War II, he couldn't vote.

Neither could the Navajo and Hopi men who served as code talkers. And more important for history's sake, neither could veteran Frank Harrison, a Fort McDowell Yavapai who did something about it.

Harrison, along with his friend Harry Austin, a tribal chairman, filed a suit that ended 60 years ago this month with a state Supreme Court ruling that confirmed the right of American Indians to vote in Arizona.

In the July 15, 1948, decision, Judge Levi S. Udall wrote, "To deny the right to vote where one is legally entitled to do so, is to do violence to the principles of freedom and equality."

Patricia Mariella and Violet Mitchell-Enos researched the story of Harrison and Austin for an Inter Tribal Council of Arizona project nearly 30 years ago.

They interviewed Frank Harrison, now deceased. He told of how he and Austin walked into the Maricopa County Recorder's office to register on Nov. 8, 1947, and were turned away.

"A young man - he refused to register us: 'You're under the ward of (the) government,' " Harrison said. "

Get the Story:
Anne T. Denogean: 60 years ago in Arizona, Indians won right to vote (The Tuscon Citizen 7/25)

Related Stories:
60th anniversary of Indian voting rights ruling (6/23)