by Robin Potter ‘24.5
The intention of this paper is to provide a history of the Abenaki people as they fight back against erasure in their journey for legal recognition by the state of Vermont. In writing this history, I emphasize the survivance of the Abenaki, and not the ways in which they were oppressed.
I will begin by acknowledging that, as a non-indigenous white person, I am not speaking for or on behalf of the Western Abenaki or any other Indigenous community. My family and ancestors have not been subject to hundreds of years of oppression. I have never been forced to hide my ethnicity or heritage for fear of my life. I benefit from white privilege. This paper is a culmination of what I have learned from Abenaki individuals including Chief Don Stevens, Roger Longtoe Sheehan, Dr. Frederick Wiseman, artist Carol McGranaghan, and others working to preserve Abenaki culture and fight against the continuous oppression of Indigenous people.
It has long been believed by dominant settler culture that the Abenaki are a people of the past, that they no longer call N’Dakinna (land in and around the state of Vermont) home but have migrated elsewhere or simply dissipated out of existence. Such “white interpretation privilege” stems from one sided history dating back to and before the colonization of the Americas. In this narrative, the Abenaki were (and still are) viewed as ‘borderland people.’[1] Because they traditionally lived on and around the United States-Canada border, neither country acknowledged the presence of the Abenaki on the land that was within their border. Instead both Canada and the United States claimed that the Abenaki had migrated over the border and were living within the legal limits of the other country.[2] Accurate representation of Abenaki history was replaced by “a history that privileges the expansion of Europeans and colonists in to what they considered a fluid space of nebulous occupation by a variety of obscure and indistinguishable people.”[3] In viewing the Abenaki as ambiguous borderland people, settlers dehumanized the Abenaki and minimized their existence. This enabled white settlers to believe that no one was living on the land, making it free for taking. Thus, in this version of history, settlers weren’t ‘conquerors’ of anything. They were only making use of what lay before them. As Puritan settlers infiltrated Abenaki land, they subscribed to this reasoning, reporting back to the king that the land had no owner—it was only “used” by the Abenaki for fishing and hunting.[4] Elnu Abenaki chief Roger Longtoe Sheehan calls this racially charged interpretation of history the ‘Great Puritan Lie.’[5]
Some believe that the Abenaki left Vermont generations ago, never to return. Others recognize the current presence of the Abenaki people in the state Vermont but claim they only returned after temporarily fleeing to Canada. As late as 2002, the Attorney General’s Office of Vermont claimed such an argument as a way to deny legal recognition to the Abenaki tribe.[6] To prove that the Abenaki did not have a continued presence in Vermont after 1900, as is required of legally recognized tribes, William Griffin, Chief Assistant Attorney General of Vermont, used federal census survey results. “I think it was surprising,” he said on Vermont Public Radio, “to find that for many of those censuses, starting around the turn of the century and into the 1940s and the 1950s, there were no individuals who identified themselves as Native American.”[7] What Griffin and the Attorney General’s office fail to acknowledge, however, is that during the time of this exact census, the Abenaki were being targeted by a state by sterilization program.
In 1925, a professor at the University of Vermont named Henry F. Perkins organized the Eugenics Survey of Vermont. Through this survey, Perkins aimed to reduce Vermont’s “underclass” population through forced sterilization of various demographics of Vermonters, most notably the Abenaki.[8] To avoid being targeted, many Vermont Abenaki, including Nulhegan Abenaki chief Don Steven’s grandmother, were forced to hide their indigeneity, going as far as to change their names. Stevens, who was especially close with his grandma, shares, “she changed her name three times. She was born as Lillian May, married as Pauline and died as Delia, because she was trying to avert the survey.”[9] To return to the claims made by William Griffin and the Attorney General’s office, it’s no surprise that the Abenaki were hesitant to disclose their heritage to the government. Doing so could have threatened the survival of their lineage and their culture. As historian Dr. Frederick Wiseman points out in opposition to the U.S. Census being used as hard evidence, “[The information] doesn’t lie in the records of a government that was during the nineteenth century deliberately oppressing native people.”[10] Just because their names didn’t appear on the Census, does not mean Abenaki individuals weren’t continuing to call N’Dakinna their home.
The effects of the Eugenics Survey continue to oppress the Abenaki. Even today, many Abenaki individuals are skeptical of government surveys like the Census, fearing that the data will be used against them. “So here’s still a lot of people that don’t want to be on a list, if you know what I mean,” says Chief Stevens.[11] Others continue to feel the impact that the survey had on their ancestors. Abenaki artist Carol McGranaghan’s great grandmother’s family was also targeted by the Eugenics survey. They were forced to hide their Abenaki culture, language and spiritual teachings in order to avoid being recognized as Indigenous. “I feel that loss every day,” says McGranaghan of the traditions that were never passed down.[12]
The history of the Abenaki is fraught with erasure and oppression. However, it is also a history of resilience and survival.[13] The Abenaki have overcome colonization, racism, targeted sterilization and being classified as legally extinct in their homeland until 2011. They continue to be confronted by those who refuse to listen to their history, that accuse them of being frauds and lying about their identities. In her book Decolonizing Methodologies, Linda Tuhiwai Smith describes the project of “Celebrating Survival — Survivance” as accentuating “the degree to which indigenous peoples and communities have retained cultural and spiritual values and authenticity in resisting colonialism.”[14] The word survivance is a combination of two words: resistance and survival. Despite hundreds of years of oppression and continued hardship, the Abenaki continue to preserve and celebrate their culture and traditions.
At times, the preservation of culture has taken the form of silence. Although the Abenaki have been fighting the state government of Vermont for legal recognition as a tribe since the 1970’s, the tribe refrained from attracting any attention throughout the 1900’s in order to avoid ridicule and accusations of fraudulence.[15] Eugene Rich, co-chair of Missisquoi Abenaki Tribal Council reflects, “there [was] a time period in which we weren’t talked about. We didn’t talk about ourselves. And people forget [about us].”[16] More recently, however, the Abenaki have used activism and legal action to make themselves heard.
The Abenaki Nation’s fight for legal recognition and relationship with the government of Vermont began in the 1970’s and was filled with setbacks and false hope. In 1976, Vermont governor Thomas Salmon passed an executive order on Thanksgiving Day to give the tribe legal recognition. However, the order was revoked the next year by successive governor Richard Snelling. Governor Snelling responded to the large voting block of hunters and fishermen who feared that, as a legally recognized people, the Abenaki would be able to hunt and fish without paying for a permit.[17] His actions spoke loud and clear: the government of Vermont lacked all respect for its native inhabitants.
By 1993, Abenaki tribe members were collaborating to begin the legislative phase of official recognition. They aimed to pass a statute, instead of relying on an executive order that could be so easily reversed. This time however, it was Vermont governor Howard Dean who squashed the movement. Governor Dean anticipated that, after gaining state recognition, the Abenaki would work towards federal recognition, which costs six to eight million dollars and involves extensive lobbying research.[18] Ironically, he feared that, after gaining this federal status, the Abenaki would file land claims and take away land from the state of Vermont. In 2006, there seemed to be a glimmer of hope for the Abenaki: a recognition bill was passed. The bill, however, only recognized the Abenaki as a minority, not an official tribe. According to existing law, there weren’t yet any Abenaki legally living within the state. Therefore, no one was able to receive any of the benefits allocated by the minority status. The state of Vermont continued to deny the Abenaki any steps forward. Even this hollow promise of recognition was not seen through. Just as the bill was supposed to be signed, it was gutted.[19]
In the powerful spirit of survivance, the Abenaki did not stop fighting. On March 16th, 2008, they formed a coalition between the four main tribes (the Elnu, Koasek, Missisquoi and Nulhegan), called the Vermont Indigenous Alliance.[20] In 2010, with input from Chief Don Stevens and the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the state of Vermont controversially[21] established a criteria for what it means to be considered “Indian.”[22] American Indigenous people, it should be noted, are the only minority in the United States that are required to prove their minority identity statuses. Still threatened by the possibility of the Abenaki receiving federal recognition and with it increased sovereignty, the state of Vermont loosely based their criteria on federal recognition standards but included intentional differences in order to prevent state recognized tribes from easily making the next step to federal recognition. Around this time, the Missisquoi Abenaki made an impromptu effort for federal recognition and were denied. Strangely (or maybe not so strangely), as soon as the Attorney General and Governor of Vermont realized that federal recognition was harder to obtain that they had thought, and therefore less of a perceived threat, they relaxed in their opposition to state recognition.[23] On April 22nd, 2011, the Nulhegan Band of the Coosuk Abenaki Nation was recognized, followed by the Abenaki Nation of Misissquoi.[24] The Elnu Tribe of the Abenaki and Ko’asek Traditional Band of the Sovereign Abenaki Nation were recognized in 2012. Finally, after hundreds of years, the Abenaki were legally acknowledged by the state of Vermont as a fully non-extinct, living, being people.
Legal recognition was a huge step in asserting the presence of Abenaki within the state of Vermont. Since colonization, the Abenaki have been forced to live and operate within a government system that was constructed without their consent or input, one that actively oppressed them and denied their existence. The passing of the statute works to strengthen cooperation between the Abenaki and the government of Vermont and act as a platform for future dialogue. In addition, because of their new legal status, Abenaki artists and craftsmen and women can now sell their art without being accused of being a fraud, going to jail, or paying upwards of $250,000 fine per “illegally” sold item.[25] Previously, in accordance with the Indian Arts and Crafts Act, tribes unrecognized by the state were not allowed to sell original art under their Indigenous names.[26] They were forced to classify themselves as “of Abenaki descent,” instead of simply Abenaki.
Although the new legal status acts as important cultural recognition, it still exists within dominant colonial government structures. With few other options, the Abenaki are forced to act in compliance with these structures in order to enhance and preserve their culture, which is in danger of being lost. The Abenaki, however, have always known their history. They didn’t need the government to tell them that they exist and have called this land, N’Dakinna, home for more than 12,000 years.[27] Nevertheless, they aim to use the momentum created by state legal recognition to increase economic development, revive their language and work towards self-governance and sovereignty, breaking away from a decades old compliance with colonial structures.[28] Instead of functioning under the government of Vermont, they wish to acquire equal footing and develop further dialogue.
In the spirit of Tuhiwai Smith’s Project of Survivance, the Abenaki continue to gather to observe traditions and celebrate art and culture. “Events and accounts which focus on the active resistance are important not just because they speak to survival” writes Tuhiwai Smith, “but because they celebrate our being at an ordinary human level and affirm our identities as indigenous women and men.”[29] By emphasizing education and representation, the Abenaki hope to instill pride in the younger generation. “It’s a new generation, that much further removed from the dismissal and the astigmatism that plagued the Abenaki for so many generations,” says Missisquoi Chief Lawrence “Moose” Lampman, “I think there’s gonna be a brighter future for our children.”[30]
Works Cited
Dillon, John. “State Says Abenaki Do Not Have ‘Continuous Presence.'” VPR Archive. Last modified March 20, 2002. Accessed April 29, 2021.
Evancie, Angela. “What Is the Status of the Abenaki Naive Americans in Vermont Today?” VPR. . Last modified November 4, 2016. Accessed April 29, 2021. http://www.vpr.org/post/what-status-abenaki-native-americans-vermont-today#stream/0.
Manore, Jean L. “The Historical Erasure of an Indigenous Identity in the Borderlands: The Western Abenaki of Vermont, New Hampshire, and Quebec.” Journal of Borderland Studies. 26, no. 2 (March 2, 2011): 179-96.
“Missisquoi History and Chronology.” Abenaki Nation of Missisquoi, Swanton, VT. Last modified March 22, 2021. Accessed April 28, 2021. http://www.abenakination.com/missisquoi-history-and-chronology/.
Nulhegan Tribe Abenaki Nation Vermont. “Our History.” Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe. Accessed April 28, 2021. https://abenakitribe.org/teaching-our-culture.
The University of Vermont. “The Eugenics Survey of Vermont 1925-1936: An Overview. “Vermont Eugenics: A Documentary History. Accessed April 28, 2021. http://www.uvm.edu/~eugenics/overview.html.
“The Vermont Abenaki: A Struggle for Recognition.” Video, 0:21:44. Town Meeting TV. January 1, 2013. Accessed April 28, 2021. https://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/vermont-abenaki-struggle-recognition?fbclid=IwAR2-zKnQ-VNkdaZ2_zF9f9m5wogStcELOSe1XnuEtQ6Poj2u1wZKVt _gWQ.
Tuhiwai Smith, Linda. Decolonizing Methodologies. 2nd ed. London, UK: Zed Books, 2012.
“Vermont’s Native Abenaki.” Video, 0:58:40. YouTube. Posted by Vote for Vermont, August 15, 2018. Accessed April 28, 2021. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZ7Gih5s4ao.
[1] Jean L. Manore, “The Historical Erasure of an Indigenous Identity in the Borderlands: The Western Abenaki of Vermont, New Hampshire, and Quebec,” Journal of Borderland Studies 26, no. 2 (March 2, 2011).
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Angela Evancie, “What Is the Status of the Abenaki Naive Americans in Vermont Today?,” VPR, last modified November 4, 2016, accessed April 29, 2021, http://www.vpr.org/post/what-status-abenaki-native-americans-vermont-today#stream/0.
[5] Ibid.
[6] John Dillon, “State Says Abenaki Do Not Have ‘Continuous Presence,'” VPR Archive, last modified March 20, 2002, accessed April 29, 2021, https://archive.vpr.org/vpr-news/state-says-abenaki-do-not-have-continuous-presence/.
[7] Ibid.
[8] The University of Vermont, “The Eugenics Survey of Vermont 1925-1936: An Overview,” Vermont Eugenics: A Documentary History, accessed April 28, 2021, http://www.uvm.edu/~eugenics/overview.html.
[9] Evancie, “What Is the Status,” VPR.
[10] Dillon, “State Says,” VPR Archive.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Carol McGranaghan, e-mail interview by the author, Vermont, March 28, 2021.
[13] “Vermont’s Native Abenaki,” video, 0:58:40, YouTube, posted by Vote for Vermont, August 15, 2018, accessed April 28, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZ7Gih5s4ao.
[14] Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Decolonizing Methodologies, 2nd ed. (London, UK: Zed Books, 2012), 146.
[15] “Vermont’s Native,” video; “The Vermont Abenaki: A Struggle for Recognition,” video, 0:21:44, Town Meeting TV, January 1, 2013, accessed April 28, 2021, https://www.cctv.org/watch-tv/programs/vermont-abenaki-struggle-recognition?fbclid=IwAR2M-zKnQ-VNkdaZ2_zF9f9m5wogStcELOSe1XnuEtQ6Poj2u1wZKVt_gWQ.
[16] Evancie, “What Is the Status,” VPR.
[17] “The Vermont,” video.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Nulhegan Tribe Abenaki Nation Vermont, “Our History,” Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe, accessed April 28, 2021, https://abenakitribe.org/teaching-our-culture.
[21] More information surrounding the controversy can be found in “Vermont’s Native,” video at 7:34.
[22] “Vermont’s Native,” video.
[23] “The Vermont,” video.
[24] Nulhegan Tribe Abenaki Nation Vermont, “Our History,” Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe.
[25] Evancie, “What Is the Status,” VPR.
[26] “The Vermont,” video.
[27] Evancie, “What Is the Status,” VPR.
[28] “Vermont’s Native,” video.
[29] Tuhiwai Smith, “Decolonizing Methodologies,” 146.
[30] Evancie, “What Is the Status,” VPR.