By Mike Adams
Sun National Staff
May 26, 2003
FORT APACHE, Ariz. - A stroll along Officers Row of this decaying Army post conjures up images of John Wayne, horse soldiers and Indian bands led by Geronimo.
Made famous by dime novels and Western movies, Fort Apache is synonymous with the Old West. From 1870 until it was decommissioned in 1922, the fort was a powerful symbol of the federal government's military might in Indian country. The fort offered salvation to white settlers fearful of Indian attacks, but to the native people it was the home of an occupying army bent on subjugating them.
In early March, however, a U.S. Supreme Court decision turned the old fort into a victory symbol for the White Mountain Apaches and the rest of the nation's 550 Indian tribes.
The high court ruled 5-4 that the Apaches had the right to sue the U.S. government for millions of dollars for failing to properly maintain the fort, which sits on Indian land. Once the fort is refurbished, the tribe wants to turn it into a tourist attraction, augmenting an Indian cultural museum that has been operating at the site since 1969.
Today, little remains intact from Fort Apache's storied past. The parade ground where soldiers drilled has long faded. Only one of the fort's four stables still stands, and many other buildings are vacant and boarded. The log cabin once occupied by legendary Indian fighter Lt. Col. George Crook is one of the few buildings open to the public.
Dallas Massey Sr., the chairman of the White Mountain Apache tribe, said the high court's decision upheld an important concept of Indian law - the government's promise to serve as the guardian of tribes after they moved to reservations.
"The prayers of our people and of Indian people across this land have been answered in the court's opinion, which reaffirms this nation's longstanding fiduciary relationship with Indian tribes," Massey said.
The tribe's reservation is 200 miles northeast of Phoenix. It has a casino, but its location is too remote to draw heavy action from gamblers. Logging is the tribe's principal source of income, but last summer two fires devastated 276,000 acres of timberland on the sprawling reservation. The White Mountain Apaches also operate a ski area and a thriving big-game hunting business. Hunters, who are exempt from state hunting and fishing regulations on tribal land, pay from $15,000 to $19,500 apiece to bag trophy elk.
The Interior Department has held the fort in trust for the tribe since 1960. In 1999, the tribe filed a lawsuit accusing the government of breaching its "fiduciary duty to maintain, protect, repair and preserve" the fort, which was designated as a historic district in 1976. The tribe wants the government to pay $14 million for the repairs.
The Court of Federal Claims in Washington threw out the case, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled in favor of the White Mountain Apaches. The Bush administration appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that if the government lost, it would lead to an avalanche of litigation from tribes.
Many treaties called for the Indians to cede their ancestral land and to move to reservations, where the land is held in trust by the federal government. In exchange, the government promised to protect the tribes' safety and quality of life.
Under the system, tribes are quasi-sovereign wards of the "Great Father," the federal government, which provides them with health, education, loan and housing benefits. Although these programs exclude non-Indians, they do not violate laws against racial discrimination.
While Indians are a separate racial group, they have a special legal status because the federal government treats tribes as political groups.
A 1974 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Morton vs. Mancari, illustrates this point.
The case arose after non-Indians at the Bureau of Indian Affairs challenged the constitutionality of a federal law that gave employment preference to Indians. In a unanimous decision, the high court ruled that Indians are "separate people with their own ... institutions" and Congress has the power to treat them differently than non-Indians.
During arguments before the high court in December, Gregory G. Garre, an assistant to the U.S. solicitor general, said historic preservation was not the goal in 1960 when Congress enacted legislation putting the fort in trust. Garre said the legislation gave the interior secretary the right to operate the fort for governmental purposes.
"The Department of the Interior has spent more than $3 million over the past decade or 15 years on repair and maintenance projects at the fort," Garre said, adding: "It's also true that the tribe itself has engaged in historic restoration efforts at the fort with the support of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Department of the Interior and with the assistance of private, state and even, in some cases, federal tax dollars."
Garre said the government holds 56 million acres of Indian land in trust, and if the government assumed all the liabilities of a common law trustee, the government would face "enormous potential liability."
Robert C. Brauchli, the tribe's lawyer, challenged the contention that the fort could be used by the government. He said the government had relinquished its property rights when the land was placed in trust. Brauchli described the fort's history this way: "Congress said, 'We're going to take this fort, which we established to kill Apaches and imprison them, and we're going to give it to the White Mountain Apache Tribe.'"
Fort Apache is especially familiar to baby boomers who grew up during the heyday of Western films. Many spent Saturday afternoons munching popcorn as the cavalry charged to the rescue of white settlers on movie screens around the nation. Wayne and Henry Fonda starred in the 1948 classic, Fort Apache.
Over the years, Fort Apache came to symbolize any beleaguered outpost. Paul Newman and Ed Asner starred in Fort Apache, The Bronx, a 1981 film about police officers in one of New York City's toughest precincts.
Like most army compounds in the West, Fort Apache was not ringed by a wall. That's the stuff of Hollywood. The fort was attacked only once during its 52-year history.
The stereotype depicting Apaches as savages persists, although the White Mountain Apaches were quite civil when the soldiers arrived in 1869. But friction developed after bands of Indians were forcibly relocated to reservations. Geronimo, the leader of the Chiricahua Apaches, whose traditional lands were farther south, waged war on settlers after his tribe was pushed onto a barren reservation near San Carlos, about 40 miles southwest of Fort Apache.
From 1870 to 1886, Fort Apache became a key outpost in the Apache Wars, which ended when Geronimo and his followers were captured and shipped to Florida.
The troops at Fort Apache included the black cavalrymen known as the "Buffalo Soldiers." A detachment of Apache scouts cast their lot with the army and helped track down Geronimo, and also served in other campaigns.
With the closing of the fort, the garrison moved from the White Mountains of northeastern Arizona to Fort Huachuca in the southern desert.
After decommissioning the fort, the government opened the Theodore Roosevelt Indian School on the site in 1923. The school is still operating. The first students were Navajo children who were educated in basics - reading, writing and arithmetic. They were also conditioned to reject their heritage so they could be assimilated into white society.
John R. Welch, the fort's historian, said many years ago it was a common practice for the government to send students to boarding schools far from their tribal lands. This was done to wean the students from their native language and culture and to deter them from running away, he explained. Early in the 20th century, the government operated scores of Indian boarding schools, but many were closed as the assimilation policy waned. Today, children from the Apache reservation attend the Theodore Roosevelt school, Welch said.
Welch said it was a difficult decision for the White Mountain Apaches to preserve the fort. The arrival of the settlers and the cavalry forever changed their way of life.
But it became clear to tribal leaders that there was nothing to gain by "bulldozing the fort or blowing it up," Welch said. Historical tourism is a moneymaker, he explained, adding: "Fort Apache is a billion-dollar name."
Copyright © 2003, The Baltimore Sun