Elizabeth Peratrovich deserves the limelight she is now placed in. The 1945 Equal Rights law in the Territory of Alaska is Alaska Native history, not included in the “Lower 48” Texas-controlled curriculum for public schooling. And, as Elizabeth Peratrovich pointed out to the all-white male Alaska lawmakers of the time, laws of larceny and murder do not prevent such actions, but: “…at least you as legislators can assert to the world that you recognize the evil of the present situation and speak your intent to help us overcome discrimination.”
Public education has not put Alaska Native history properly “in our place,” any more than it has for the ugly colonial history of “I see, therefore the land and you are now mine.” There is a wide history of untold past and living stories of human “extermination” and “trafficking.”
There are three primary land ownerships in Alaska: federal, state and Alaska Native. The state initiates blatantly discriminatory laws against us as if they are our landlords, as if Alaska Natives are not sovereign unto themselves as equally as white America. Alaska Native substandard living conditions are the same as those on Indian reservations — as if we have no land base or capital worth.
Real history is that there is no republic governing, nor a democratic process in place for Alaska. Industrial corporations control Alaska’s state government. There are no protection provisions set up for Alaska residents or the people who live here, invest their lives here and greatly contribute to Alaska’s economy and spirit.
Martin Luther King’s loud, resounding voice of peaceful resolve to the horrendous treatment of their previous “owners” also deserves the limelight and magnifying. Close examination is needed by all of us who care about the atrocities happening to Alaska women, village communities and the poorest “nuisance communities” of America’s people of color. Then look what is happening globally.
Wanda J. Culp
Hoonah
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