Danver Steven L. (Edited). Revolts, Protests, Demonstrations, and Rebellions in American History: An Encyclopedia (ENG)
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Further Reading
George-Kanentiio, Doug. “Richard Oakes t he Mohawk and h is Path to Alcatraz Island.”
News from Indian Country, January 2010.
Johnson, Troy R. The Occupation of Alcatraz Island: Indian Self-Determination and the
Rise of Indian Activism. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1996.
Johnson, Troy R., Joane Nagel, and Duane Champagne, eds. American Indian Activism:
Alcatraz to the Longest Walk. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1997.
Termination
During the 1950s through the early 1960 s, the centerpiece of federal American
Indian policy was the idea of termina tion: the ending of the special relationship
between the United States and its American Indian nations. Inclu ded in that was
the dismantli ng of Indian reservations into individual land parcels, the ending of
trib al governments, and the inclusion of all American In dians into the American
body politic as citizens. Proponents of termination, such as Utah senator Arthur
V. Watkins, argued that tribal communities held Indians back from economic suc-
cess and integration into the American “melting pot.”
A large part of the strategy of termination was the relocation, sometimes forced,
of American Indian peoples to America’s urban centers, such as San Francisco.
This relocation policy is largely responsible for the need that San Francisco’s
Native American community had for the San Francisco Indian Center, which
helped ne arly 30,000 newly arr ived Ind ians to fi nd work and commun ity. It was
this idea of moving to urban areas to find work that drove Richard Oakes to leave
the St. Regis Mohawk Reservation in New York and find work in America’s grow-
ing cities.
Although Watkins firmly believed that termination was the best course of action
for the future of American Indians, he was either not in touch with or did not care
about how Indian people themselves felt. Termination was implemented on three
reservations, and the results were disastrous. During 1953–1964, 109 tribes faced
termination, and over one and a quarter million acres of tribal land lost its pro-
tected status. Not only that, but tribal governments lost authority, and the eco-
nomic and cultural lives of the tribes were devastated.
To t h e protest ers who to ok over Alcat ra z Island in 1969, termination was just
another imposed policy from the federal government that did nothing but increase
the hardships that their people faced. Tribal people were subject to state laws and
taxes, and the provisions of the treaties that their ancestors had negotiated with the
federal government were either ignored or repealed outright. Some tribes filed suit
1038 Alcatraz Island Occupation (1969–1971)
in federal court, and although the termina tion policy officially ended in 1964, it
took until 1980 for the U.S. Supreme Court to fully restore t he treaty rights that
had been lost. For many involved with both Alcatraz and other Red Power groups
like the American Indian Movement, termin ation was t he policy that formed the
context into which they expressed their discontent.
—Steven L. Danver
Further Reading
Fixico, Donald. Terminatio n a nd Relocation: Federal Indian Policy, 1945 –1960.Albu-
querque: University of New Mexico Press, 1986.
Johnson, Troy R. The Occupat ion of Alcatraz Island: Indian Self-Determinatio n and the
Rise of Indian Activism. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1996.
Philp, Kenneth. Termination Revisited: American Indians on the Trail to Self-
Determination, 1933–1953. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1999.
Trudell, John (1946–)
Whereas Richard Oakes might have been the most visible leader in the first
months after the takeover of Alcatraz Island, John Trudell would become known
as the “voice of Alcatraz.” Born on February 15, 1946, Trudell grew up in the area
in and a round the Santee Sioux Reservation in Nebraska. He served in the U.S.
Navy du ring the early 1960s and came west to attend college in San Bernardin o,
California, before dropping out in 1969. Not among those who began the occupa-
tion in November, Trudell headed north as soon as he heard about the takeover.
Were it not for Trudell, Alcatraz might only have made a small impression on
the American public, remaining a significant story only in the San Francisco Bay
Area. Trudell’s contribution was significant, in that the main way the occupiers
sought to communicate with the public was through a series of recordings known
as “Radio Free Alcatraz” that were first broadcast by sympathetic radio stations
in Berkeley and Los Angeles before being carried across the nation and throughout
Indian Country. His broadcasts not only contained messages and demands of the
occupiers, but also interv iews with other protesters and descriptions of daily life
on Alcatraz. The broadcasts not only brought notoriety, but also donations of food
and money from ordinary people and celebrities, such as the rock groups Cree-
dence Clearwater Revival and the Grateful Dead.
After Richard Oakes left following the death of his stepdaughter, Trudell’s role
became more prominent. When talks between the occupiers and the federal
government about ending the occupation began in 1970, Trudell was one of the
Alcatraz Island Occupation (1969–1971) 1039
main negotiators. Even the birth of his son, Wovoka, the only child born on the
island during the occupation, was not without significance, as Trudell announced
the birth on a Radio Free Alcatraz broadcast, calling him “the first free Indian born
in the past 500 years, because the government is not going to get him” (“Radio
Free Alcatraz” broadcast, July 1970).
Among the last group of Indians to be removed from Alcatraz in 1971, Trudell
remained involved in the Red Power movement, serving as chairman of the Ameri-
can Indian Movement (AIM) from 1973 until 1979. After his tenure with AIM,
Trudell’s oratory skills took an artistic turn, as he became a successful musician
and poet, always r emaining true to the roots o f his activism , whic h he said were
awakened by Alcatraz.
—Steven L. Danver
Further Reading
Johnson, Troy R., Joane Nagel, and Duane Champagne, eds. American Indian Activism:
Alcatraz to the Longest Walk. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1997.
Nagel, Joane. American Indian Ethnic Renewal: Red Power and the Resurgence of Identity
and Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Winton, Ben. “Alcatraz, Indian Land.” Native Peoples Magazine, Fall 1999.
The Alcatraz Proclamation to the Great White Father
and His People, November 1969
This statement, issued shortly after the takeover of Alcatraz Island on November 20, 1969,
details the plans the “Indians of All Tribes” had for the island, to establish American Indian spiri-
tual, educational, and ecological institutions, and their chief demand, that the United States
government recognize American Indian peoples’ claim to the island in partial compensa tion for
the land taken from them.
Fellow citizens, we are asking you to join with us in our attempt to better the lives of all
Indian people.
We are on Alcatra z Isla nd to make known to the world that we have a right to use
our land for our own benefit.
In a proclamation of Novem ber 20, 19 69, we told the government of the United
States that we are here “to create a meaningful use for our Great Spirit’s Land.”
We, the native Americans, reclaim the land known as Alcatraz Island in the name of all
American Indians by right of discovery.
We wish to be fair and honorable in our dealings with the Caucasian inhabitants of
this land, and hereby offer the following treaty:
We will purchase said Alcatraz Island for twenty-f our dollars in glass beads and red
cloth, a precedent set by the white man’s purchase of a similar island about 300 years
1040 Alcatraz Island Occupation (1969–1971)
ago. We know that $24 in trade go ods for these 16 acres is more than was paid when
Manhattan Isl and was sold, but we know that land values have risen over the years .
Our offer of $1.24 per acres is greater than the $0.47 per acre the white men are now
paying the California Indians for their lands.
We will give to the inhabitants of this island a portion of the land for their own to be
held in trust ...by the Bureau of Caucasian Affairs ...in perpetu ity—fo r as long as the
sun shall rise and the rivers go down to the sea. We will further guide the inhabitants
in the proper way of living. We will offer them our religion, our education, our life-
ways in order to help them achieve our level of civ iliz ation and thus raise them and all
their white brothers up from their savage and unhappy state. We offer this treaty in good
faith and wish to be fair and honorable in our dealings with all white men.
We feel that this so-called Alcatraz Island is more than suitable for an Indian reserva-
tion, as determined by the white man’s own standards. By this, we mean that this place
resembles most Indian reservations in that:
1. It is isolated from modern facilities, and without adequate means of transportation.
2. It has no fresh running water.
3. It has inadequate sanitation facilities.
4. There are no oil or mineral rights.
5. There is no industry and so unemployment is very great.
6. There are no health-care facilities.
7. The soil is rocky and non-productive, and the land does not support game.
8. There are no educational facilities.
9. The population has always exceeded the land base.
10. The population has always been held as prisoners and kept dependent upon
others.
Further, it would be fitting and symbolic that ships from all over the world, entering the
Golden Gate, would first see Indian land, and thus be reminded of the true history of this
nation. This tiny island would be a symbol of the great lands once ruled by free and noble
Indians.
What use will we make of this land?
Since the San Francisco Indian Center burned down, there is no place for Indians to
assembleandcarryontriballifehereinthewhiteman’scity.Therefore,weplanto
develop on this island several Indian institutions:
1. A Center for Native American Studies will be developed which will educate them
to the skills and knowledge relevant to improve the lives and spirits of all Indian
peoples. Attached to this center will be travelling universities, managed by Indians,
which will go to the Indian Reservations, learning those necessary and relevant
materials now about.
Alcatraz Island Occupation (1969–1971) 1041
2. An American Indian Spiritual Center, which will practice our ancient tribal religious
and sacred healing ceremonies. Our cultural arts will be f eatured and our young
people trained in music, dance, and healing rituals.
3. An Indian Center of Ecology, which will train and support our young people in sci-
entific research and practice to restore our lands and w aters to their pure and
natural state. We will work to de-pollute the air and waters of the Bay Area. We
will seek to restore fish and animal life to the area and to revitalize sea-life which
has been threatened by the white man’s way. We will set up facilities to desalt
sea water for human benefit.
4. A Great Indian Training School will be developed to teach our people how to make
a living in the world, improve our standard of living, and to end hunger and unem-
ployment among all our people. This training school will include a center for Indian
arts and crafts, and an Indian resta urant serving native foods, which will restore
Indian culinary arts . This center will display Indian arts and offer Indian foods to
the publi c, so that all may know of the beauty and spirit of the traditional Indian
ways.
Some of the present buildings will be taken over to develop an American Indian Museum
which will depict our native food and other cultural contributions we have given to the
world . Another part of the museum will present some of the things the white man ha s
given to the Indians in return for the land and life he took: disease, alcohol, poverty,
and cultural decimation (as symbolized by old tin cans, barbed wire, rubber tires, plastic
containers, etc.). Part of the museum will remain a dungeon to symbolize both those
Indian captives who were incarcerated for c hallenging white authority and those who
were imprisoned on reservations. T he museum will show the noble and tragic events
of Indian history, i ncluding t he broken treaties, the documentary of the Trail of Tears,
the Massacre of Wounded Knee, as well as the victory over Yellow-Hair Custer and
his army.
In the name of all Indians, therefore, we reclaim this island for our Indian nations, for
all these reasons. We feel this claim is just and proper, and that this land should rightfully
be granted to us for as long as the rivers run and the sun shall shine.
We hold the rock!
Source: Center for World Indigenous Studies, http://cwis.org/fwdp/Americas/
alcatraz.htm (accessed July 21, 2010).
1042 Alcatraz Island Occupation (1969–1971)
Feminist Movement
(1970s–1980s)
The femi nist movement sought to obtain social equality for women. Feminism is
the idea that the structure and institutions of society need to be modified to enable
women to achieve equality with men. The implication behind this belief is that
men and women have equal abilities. The second feminist wave crested in
the 1960s and 1970s. Unlike the first wave, which peaked in 1920, it lacked the
single unifying theme of suffrage. Historians still debate such fundamental factors
as the second wave’s beginning and end, goals and philosophy, activities and
major milestones, and successes a nd failures. Some scholars find the origins of
the women’s movement in World War II. This view holds that labor force partici-
pation rates of married women led to changes in women’s ro les in society. Other
historians suggest that a multitude of reasons sparked the second wave.
The earlier women’s rights movement that began at the S eneca Falls Conven-
tion in 1848 focused on legal rights, such as the right to vote and the right to
own property. With those goals achieved by 1920, the women’s movement entered
an era of doldrums. The organizations that had focused on the suffrage battle dis-
banded, and ac tivist wo men scattered into a range of ot her organizations with
goals that generally did not expressly include the promotion of women’s rights.
Alice Paul of the National Woman’s Party wrote the Equal Rights Amendment in
1923, but she could find few individuals willing to promote it outside of her small
association.
Meanwhile, women conti nued to su ffer from oppression. Some women who
married, notably teachers, were automatically dismissed from t heir jobs. In the
Great Depression, women lost jobs to men because they were viewed as only
earning “pin money,” whereas men had families to support. While women w ere
encouraged for t he first time by the government to get in to the workforce durin g
World War II, they were also pressured to get out of the workforce at the war’s
end to make room for men. Throughout the deca des, employed women did no t
make as much money as men in the same jobs because their efforts were not
valued as much. Women, though, rarely held the same jobs as men. Most educated
women became secretaries, teachers, or nurses because they were not welcome d
into other jobs such as lawyer, doctor, or business leader. The “cult” of
1043
domesticity, a dominant American idea since the early 19th century, continued to
stress that women were temperamentally suited to be nurturing and lacked the
toughness to succeed in the worlds of business and politics. Women who sought
outside employment were made to feel guilty about abandoning their families.
Society at large expected a woman to find all of her fulfillment through
marriage and motherhood. The media, especially women’s magazines, empha-
sized that a woman’s real job involved pleasing her husband and raising children.
Her needs did not count. As one example of this type of thinking, the Eternal
Woman ideology, which identified the ideal Catholic woman as pious and suffer-
ing, dominated the American Catholic popular and clerical imagination in the
1950s and 1960s. The man led the family, and the woman stood behind him.
Domestic violence shelters did not exist, because a man’s home was his castle
and he could do what he pleased within it. Women could not obtain loans from
banks without a man cosigning. Many universities had graduate school quotas
for women because women would only become wives and mothers, thereby wast-
ing their education. Girls had few opportunities to play sports. They could become
cheerleaders, a socially acceptable activity because it involved being supportive of
male athletes, but most high schools did not offer anything more. In every avenue,
women received the message that they were s econd-rate to men. In the 1960 s,
large numbers of women protested against this diminished status.
The Branches of Feminism
The feminist movement that burst into full flower in the 1960s has three branches.
The first section consists of women who did not expressly identify as political. By
working through the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s in women’s organizations to achieve
narrow goals, t hese activists helped set the stage for the rise of feminism. They
acted as a bridge between militant feminists and more conservative women,
thereby helping to make feminism socially acceptable. The liberal wing of the
feminist movement is composed of women who wanted to work through existing
political channels to achieve change. The radical wing viewed the existing politi-
cal structu res as intrinsically hostile to women’s concerns. Th ey sought t o estab-
lish new ways of governing, doing business, and living.
Most of the feminist organizations have been predominantly white and middle
class, with the result that some feminists have struggled to understand the impact
of racism and class oppression. Black feminism is different from white feminism
in that it emph asizes the freedom of people of color. African American feminists
stress the interactive effects of race, sex, and class as well as the error of analyzing
the oppression of women in isolation from their race.
This Africa n A merican strain of f eminism has been labeled “ womanism” by
author Alice Walker and others. In her 1983 book In Search of Our Mot her’s
1044 Feminist Movement (1970s–1980s)
Gardens, Walker coined the term from the folk expression, “You are acting wom-
anish .” The term applies to women who behave in a bold and responsible way to
promote the liberation of black people and the rest of humanity. Black women
generally are more supportive of feminist issues than white women but have been
hesitant to embrace a feminist movement that defines the experience of white,
middle-class women as universal. They have also noted that feminism seems to
be anti-male and that, as black women, they have more in common with black
men than white women.
The Rise of Feminism
The birth of the feminist movement is typically identified with the publication of
Betty Friedan’s The Feminine M ystique in 196 3. Friedan, a labor journalist who
had graduated from Smith College, lost her job in 1952 because she was pregnant
with her second child. Friedan’s experiences of sex-based discrimination com-
bined in 1957 to lay the groundwork for The Feminine Mystique. Friedan felt
guilty that she had not lived up to the glorious future forecast for her, and she
sought a reason as to why so many of the best and brightest women of her gener-
ation felt dissatisfied. She gathered masses of information and realized that she
had been asking the wrong question. Rather than disprove the popular notion that
education had failed to train women for lives as wives and mothers, Friedan now
began to argue that domesticity did not suit all women. Friedan provided a coher-
ent explanation for the routine belittlement that women had experienced al l their
lives. She argued that the feminine mystique required women to renounce their
brains and deny their senses, retreat to a childlike state, and immolate themselves
on the altar of their family’s needs to find satisfaction in life. The book became an
instant best-seller.
In TheFeminineMystique, Friedan had argued that cultural attitudes were
ephemeral and that women could be a force for change. Partly as a result of
the book, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received a flood of
job discrimination complaints from women. The EEOC simply ignored women’s
problems, continuing to permit such practices as categorizing help wanted adver-
tisements by sex. Activists planning a civil rights organization for women invited
Friedan to the 1966 conference of state women’s commissions. Friedan gave the
most significant feminist group of the latter part of the 20th century its name
when she described the fledgling organization’s goals as “to take the actions
needed to bring women into the mainstream of American society—now, equality
for women, in fully equal p artnership with men.” Membership of the new
National Organization for Women (NOW) reached 1,200 by the end of its first
year, in 1966.
Feminist Movement (1970s–1980s) 1045
The Liberal Wing
NOW became the largest organization in the liberal wing of the feminist
movement. Typi cal of liberal wome n’s groups, it focused on working within the
system to change laws to be nefit women. I n 1968, much to the consternation of
its conservative members, NOW called for the reform of laws restricting abortion
and supported the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. A number of members
left NOW in response to these demands, including the women who would establish
the Women’s Equity Action League (WEAL). The Ohio-based organization
focused on legal and economic issues, especially in the areas of employment and
education. WEAL sought to achieve success through legislation and lobbying
rather than more direct pressure tactics s uch as picketing. Lacking a large me m-
bership, WEAL could not employ tactics that required much grassroots participa-
tion. By 1972, WEAL had dropped its opposition to a woman’s right to choose
abortion and had declared itself in favor of “responsible rebellion.”
Other organizations that formed part of this liberal wing include the National
Woman’s Party (NWP), National Black Feminist Organization (NBFO), the
Combahee River Collective, the National Women’s Political Caucus (NWPC),
and the Older Women’s League (OWL). The NWP is the only feminist organiza-
tion of the 1960s with strong ties to the feminists o f the first wave. Alice Paul, a
suffrage lead er, founded the group to continue feminist activities a fter suffrage
had been won. It soon became a one-issue organization, with the Equal Rights
Amendment as that issue.
The other liberal feminist groups were much larger and much stronger than the
tiny NWP and its elderly members. NBFO, begun in 1973, could never escape the
shadow of white women. The members tried to appease black women as well as
white women, and the organization soon fell apart. Some of the members formed
the Combahee River Collective in 1974. The collective argued that the major sys-
tems of oppression were interlocking but did not embrace separatism. The NWPC
started in 1971 when 300 women met in Washington, D.C., to mobilize the politi-
cal power of women. The group addressed women’s concerns in every state and
also promoted women for political offices.
Like WEAL, OWL grew out of NOW. Tish Sommers, a mother, housewife, and
longtime civil rights activist as well as a NOW member, found herself without any
means of support upon her divorce in 197 3. A no-fault divorce reform left many
other longtime housewives, who lacked a traditional work history as well as few
marketable skills, without financial support. Sommers formed a NOW task force
called Older Women’s Liberation to link issues of aging with feminism. Older
women were those over 30 years of age. Sommers, who coined the term
“displaced homemaker,” used OWL to obtain job training and counseling for older
women. Sommers founded the Older Women’s League in 1980. By the mid-1980s,
1046 Feminist Movement (1970s–1980s)
OWL had succeeded in defining the discrimination faced by older housewives as a
feminist issue.
The Radical Feminists
Radical feminist organizations, which appeared about 1968 and died off around
1975, did not believe that the existing system could be perfected through political
action. They saw the system as being inherently sexist. They aimed to expose this
sexism by attacking the patriarchal perceptions at the heart of every relationship,
be it work or family. To these feminists, no separation existed b etween the per-
sonal and the political. Radical organizations lacked a strong structure and banned
men from membership, since men were the agents of oppression. The members
were generally in their 20s, often younger than liberal feminists Many radicals
were lesbian.
The best known of the radical groups were the New York Radical Feminists, the
Feminists, Redstockings, and WITCH. The New York Radical Feminists famously
engaged in guerrilla theater. In 1968, they held a torchlight parade, the Burial of
Traditional Womanhood as a means of protesting the Vietnam War. They viewed
the submission of the traditional woman as supportive of the aggression of the sol-
dier. Older, more traditional activists found the New York Radical Feminists to be
insulting and bizarre, reflecting a generational clash. The Feminists, founded by
Ti-Grace Atkinson after she denounced NOW, also specialized in guerrilla theater.
Atkinson became a media star with her flair for phrases such as “Marriage means
rape.” The Redstockings, based in New York City like many of the radical organ-
izations, focused on abortion law reform. It held spea k-outs in which women
related tales of their illegal abortions. WITCH changed the meaning of its name
to reflect whatever it chose to protest. As the Women’s International Terrorist Con-
spiracy from Hell, it hexed Wall Street.
The Hidden Feminists
When the feminist movement is defined, liberal and radical women ’s g roups are
always acknowledged. However, feminists can sometimes be found in unexpected
places. Members of long-established women’s groups helped sell feminism to a
mainstream audience. These traditional women are the hidden feminists.
Few members of the American Nurses Association (ANA), t he American
Association of University Women (AAUW), Alpha Kappa Alpha (AKA), and
Church Women United (CWU) in the 1950s and 19 60s would have called them-
selves “feminists,” yet they acted to advance feminist goals. Other groups that
comprised this traditional women’s wing would include long-standing and large
women’s organizations such as the National Council of Jewish Women, the
National Council of Negro Women, the Women’s Division of the United
Feminist Movement (1970s–1980s) 1047