Amid protests against police brutality and racism after George Floyd’s death in Minnesota, the Mississippi Legislature voted to remove the confederate battle emblem from the state flag.
Among those chosen to help redesign the flag is Cyrus Ben, chief of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians. A proposed new flag design will be on the ballot in November.
Jean-Luc Pierite, president of the board of directors for the North American Indian Center for Boston, says he sees other states give way to calls for change and wonders why similar bills in Massachusetts have stalled in the Legislature.
“Massachusetts has not yet taken the step of changing their flag that’s been pointed out to them for 35 years as being racist,” said Pierite, a member of the Tunica-Biloxi tribe of Louisiana who lives in the Boston area. “Massachusetts has not taken the step of getting rid of those racist team names and mascots.”
Pierite and indigenous leaders across Massachusetts say they’re hoping to pass a bill to create a commission to review and recommend changes to the seal, which a growing coalition of Native Americans and white allies call racist and emblematic of the genocide of indigenous people. The Senate passed the proposal, but it sits in the House.
“Part of the pushback from legislators is they’re saying, ‘well, we have all of these different priorities,’” Pierite said, referring to the Black Lives Matter movement, the coronavirus pandemic and the recession triggered by the public health crisis. “Yes, we have the same priorities as well, but that does not take the focus away from current advocacy efforts.”
As the extended session wanes, the bill seems increasingly likely to join other proposals backed by indigenous people that have languished this session. The Joint Committee on Education favorably reported S.2593, prohibiting the use of Native American mascots by public schools in Massachusetts. The bill is in the Senate Ways and Means Committee. Another bill that’s in the Senate Ways and Means Committee is S.1811, a proposal to make museums, libraries and other entities getting state funding send indigenous funerary objects and relics back to their communities instead of auctioning them.
The bills to change the seal and motto, eliminate mascots that are considered caricatures of Native Americans and protect relics of indigenous communities are all “central to the campaign for structural change that Black, indigenous and communities of color are calling for at this time,” Pierite said. Still, he said, indigenous leaders are hopeful the seal and motto bill can pass.
A bill to observe Indigenous People’s Day on the second Monday of October, in lieu of Columbus Day, was sent to study. It has gained support from the coalition of legislators backing the other bills, including Rep. Tami Gouveia, an Acton Democrat. Senate President Karen Spilka Also voiced her support of the proposal.
Northampton, Cambridge, Brookline and other communities in Massachusetts observe Indigenous People’s Day, but the commonwealth officially observes Columbus Day in light of Italian sailor Christopher Columbus. The legacy of the Italian explorer, who ordered the rape, mutilation and servitude of indigenous people in the Caribbean, has been called into question.
It’s not the narrative schoolchildren have been taught in Massachusetts, said Rep. Jack Lewis, one of the lead sponsors of a bill to observe Indigenous People’s Day statewide.
“We only have to hold him to standards of the 1490s and early 1500s to know that judged by his own standards of his own day he was not someone that we should be celebrating 500-plus years later,” Lewis said.
Lewis, a Framingham Democrat, said he is preparing to re-file the Indigenous People’s Day proposal next session.
“I am not surprised that the first time this bill was filed as a conversation stater, we had 17 co-sponsors and I’m definitely confident that moving into next year, we will continue to gain support,” said Lewis. “This will definitely be one of our top priorities into next session.”
The series of bills regarding indigenous history and symbols coincides with a national conversation about how to address stereotypes that have been ingrained in the American consciousness, Lewis adds.
The proposal to change the state seal has seen the most movement this session. The bill filed by Rep. Lindsay Sabadosa, a Northampton Democrat, and Rep. Nika Elugardo, a Boston Democrat, ultimately aims to usher the redesign of the seal and motto. The seal that shows a hand holding a sword over the head of a Native American, who has features from a hodgepodge of tribes. The state’s Latin motto translates to, "By the sword we seek peace.”
The sword symbolizes the sword of Myles Standish, an English militia leader in the 1600s who attacked Native American settlements.
Mahtowin Munro, co-leader of United American Indians of New England and leader of IndigenousPeoplesDayMA.org, said proponents of the bill are hopeful the House will bring the seal and motto bill on the floor to a vote.
“We appreciate that Karen Spilka and the Senate brought forward the flag and seal bill. They passed that unanimously," Munrow said. "It’s unfortunate that the bill is languishing on the House side. We’ve made it clear that we’ve come forward with multiple bills that include basic human rights and civil rights issues.”
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