Steve Russell: Open letter to non-Indian couple in ICWA feud

I mean you no harm. If I meant you harm, I would start by using your name. Every literate Cherokee knows your name. At the time before the Trail of Tears, the Cherokee Nation had a higher literacy rate than the white settlers and gold seekers who coveted the Cherokee homelands. We cannot match that literacy rate even today, but most of us do read and write.

I write this knowing that you’ve succeeded in bringing the government to your side. You even got The New York Times on your side, and I understand that’s significant. When the Times takes your side, it’s no longer an issue between liberals and conservatives, between those with reverence for what “Native Americans” represent to them and the modern Indian fighters who think we are the walking dead.

The Times is the newspaper of record in the United States. Indian Country Today Media Network is the newspaper of record in Indian country, even though it’s not a newspaper any longer and Indian country no longer has fixed borders.

The status of this publication brings up another reason I would not say anything ugly about you. Veronica will grow up. You had the money on your side and now you have the guns, so chances are she will grow up calling you mommy and daddy. I, too, have adopted children, and I understand that relationship.