A letter to Barack Obama

To the editor:

This is a letter to Mr. Barack Obama. I am a traditional Navajo sheepherder. The traditional Navajo people believe that we are Nature, Earth and Universe, and that our culture, values, history and philosophy are Nature, Earth and Universe.

When in the course of Native American cultural events, does it become necessary for Native Americans to dissolve the political bands, which have disconnected them with one another and non-Native Americans in North America. To assume among the powers of the Earth, Nature and Universe (sacred mountains), the separate and equal station to which the laws of Nature and of Nature's Creator, a decent respect to the opinions of Native Americans requires that they should declare the cases which impel them to the separation.

The United States Declaration asserts not only that all men are created equal (equal as creatures in the eyes of their Creator), but also that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights - the Native Americans' interpretation of inalienable rights.

We have already observed with respect to our equality that the attribution of it to divine origin makes the proposition asserted less than self?evidently true. It becomes self?evidently true and thus undeniable only if we attribute the equality of all Native Americans to their equality as true first Americans, as having the same specific nature, one Native American neither more nor less human than another.

If all United States citizens are equal by virtue of their having the same nature, and if they possess certain rights by virtue of their having that nature, then it follows that they are all equally endowed with those rights.

If the rights are conceived as natural or human rights, it becomes easier to explain what we, Native Americans mean when we call those rights inalienable, which comes from Earth, Nature and Universe (sacred mountains, values, culture and sacred Native American Language). Navajo Code Talkers used sacred Diné language to win World War II.

Native American citizens living in organized societies under civil government have many rights that are conferred upon them by the laws of the state, and sometimes by its constitution.

These are usually called civil rights, legal rights or constitutional rights. This indicates their source. It also indicates that these riots, which are conferred by constitutional provisions or by the positive enactment of white man made laws, can be revoked or nullified by the same power or authority that instituted them in the first place. They are alienable rights. The giver can take them away.

What the state does not give, it cannot take away. If Native American rights are natural rights, as opposed to those that are civil, constitutional or legal, then their being rights by natural endowment makes them inalienable in the sense indicated by our Native American ancestors' belief in their culture, values, history and philosophy of Nature, Earth and Universe. In the beginning of time, we, Native Americans come from Universe, Nature and Earth.

The Native American culture, values, history and philosophy are Nature, Earth and Universe - our life. Their existence as natural endowments gives them moral authority even when they lack legal force or legal sanctions. Their moral authority imposes moral obligations, which may or may not be respected by non?Native Americans.

A given state or society may or may not, by its constitution and its laws, attempt to secure these rights or to enforce them. It may even do the very opposite. It may violate these inalienable natural Native American rights. When it fails to enforce these rights, or worse, when it violates them, it is subject to condemnation on moral grounds as being unjust according to our ancient Native American ancestors of North America (Native American Sacred Land).

We, Navajo medicine men and other Native Americans, are thankful for the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court's ruling in Native Americans' favor to keep our sacred mountain San Francisco Peaks clean from waste and pollution.

If you were elected the President of the United States of North America, how would you help Native Americans to protect our Mother Earth, Mother Nature and Father Universe from polluted destructions by big corporations with big money?

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