FIRE ON THE PLATEAU

Conflict and Endurance in the American Southwest

Charles Wilkinson

Island Press, 1999

ISBN 1-55963-647-5

For those wishing to delve into the background of the situation at Big Mountain, this book has several things to offer. The author, Charles Wilkinson, is a lawyer specializing in Native American Law and Water Law. This book is a personal, legal, and historical account of the Colorado Plateau.

Perhaps the most relevant information contained within the book is the story of his research assistants discovery of the files that finally provided irrefutable evidence of John Boydens links to Peabody Coal Company, while at the same time serving as lawyer for the Hopi Tribal Council. It can be said, that Boyden is the individual most responsible for the creation of "The Navajo-Hopi Land Dispute", and supporters of the traditional Hopi and Navajos have always maintained that Boyden was working both sides of the fence, something called in legal terms a "conflict of interests". The U.S. government, Peabody Coal, and the Hopi Tribal Council have always maintained that such an accusation was unfounded. A research assistant of Wilkinsons discovered the original evidence of Boydens ties to Peabody, but 2 years later, another assistant found much more damning evidence. "I spent the next evening going over the file, and it was a sickening, depressing experience. It literally caused my stomach to hurt and I've had that same feeling every time I have returned to that file." Since the discovery of real evidence, those corporate interests continue to deny or downplay the evidence. Incidentally, Boyden did the same thing with the Ute tribe on another resource issue. Wilkinson also explains in some detail how Boyden went about creating the "Hopi Tribal Council" to rubber-stamp his own plans for the development of resources lying under Indian land.

The author also spend a good deal of time explaining the background to what he calls "The Big Buildup", the expansion and dvelopment of the cities surrounding the Colorado Plateau, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tucson. Salt Lake City, and how that development was tied into and dependent upon the "resources" (water, coal etc) of the Plateau, and how the coal of Black Mesa was crucial for this development and expansion. A point he raises several times, and one that I am in whole-hearted agreement with, is how every single one of us who lives in the Southwest must ultimately bear some measure of responsibilty for the shameful situation on Black Mesa, as it is our lifestyle and economy that are the ultimate cause. If we didn't buy the electricity made from Black mesa's coal, the corporations would have no profit in its extraction. Profit being corporations sole raison d'etre. "The power companies contribute plenty of the pollution on their own, and there's no doubt they helped generate the urban growth that causes much of the rest, but we can't rightly put the whole blame on the utilities. The sources are many and diffuse. The answers will lie in some new government regulations, yes, but also in new social and personal ethics." And later....."....the answers, if they come, will be due less to laws than to personal responsibility. And laws are easy compared to personal responsibility."

There are two areas of the books content that I take issue with. The first is that when covering the so-called "land dispute" he does not seem to have taken into account any Navajo viewpoint. This comes as no surprise when one realizes that his main informant on the issue was Vernon Masayesva, a former Hopi Tribal Chairman. Wilkinson goes so far as to claim that Masayesva is a spokesman for the Tradional Hopi, something vehemently denied by Hopi people I have spoken with. He also paints a picture of the modern Tribal Council as being far more benevolent towards the traditional hopi than earlier Tribal Councils. This is something that I have also found strongly denied by many Hopis.

The second misgiving I have about the book is most probably linked to the first..... . The version of native history of the region follows "the Party line", that is to say its a version of history that supports the agenda of those in power. History is not a science, it is opinion, and the version of southwestern history portrayed in this book omits much evidence that contradicts the mainstream simplistic description of Hopi residency and Navajo migration. ( a good book on the bias against athapaskan people in archeological and historical studies is David Brugges "The Navajo Hopi Land dispute: an american tragedy." For an alternative view of southwest history, see "Apache, Navajo & Spaniard" by Jack Forbes)