Cobell v. Norton: Elouise Cobell's letter to Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell
April 14, 2004
Honorable Ben Nighthorse Campbell
Chairman
Committee on Indian Affairs
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Senator Campbell:
This letter is in response to the April 6, 2004, letter to you from U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton. It is unfortunate that Secretary Norton’s letter has many serious misstatements and inaccuracies. I am writing to set the record straight.
As we both agree, reform of the individual Indian trust and the provision of an accurate and complete historical accounting is one of the biggest challenges facing Indian Country today. Sadly, Secretary Norton’s actions thus far are ensuring that trust reform and the historical accounting will never be accomplished on her watch.
Throughout her letter, Secretary Norton tries to convince you that the Cobell case is resolved and therefore should be dismissed by the courts. Her statement would be laughable had we not devoted decades to seeking justice for 500,000 trust beneficiaries. Resolved? All indications are that the individual Indian trust is today in far worse shape since she began her tenure as Trustee-Delegate. Sadly, we’ve only just begun. A little over six months ago, the Cobell court noted that
Interior has cried wolf over and over and over again to the Indians, to Congress, and to the courts. To be sure, there has been some activity – most notably, the creation of a new alphabet soup of bureaucracies. But activity is not the same thing as progress. And Interior has not demonstrated that it has made any progress, either in complying with its obligation to conduct an accounting for the IIM beneficiaries or in complying with its other fiduciary obligations.
In addition, Secretary Norton claims that many accounts are “fully reconciled” – this too is a fabrication, and her own experts testified under oath that those “reconciliations” did not constitute an adequate accounting. The court agreed. It is curious that hundreds of thousands of accounts have supposedly been reconciled, yet not a single beneficiary has received an accounting. Not one. This speaks volumes as to the effectiveness and sincerity of Secretary Norton’s “accounting” effort.
Finally, Secretary Norton’s statements regarding P.L. 108-108 have totally distorted the truth. Ms. Norton was not even around when the American Indian Trust Management Reform Act of 1994 was passed. We both were, and we know what happened. The notion that the 1994 Act created the Trustee-Delegates’ historical accounting obligation is just plain false. It has been clearly established by the U.S. Court of Appeals that the 1994 Act only reaffirmed a pre-existing duty to perform an historical accounting. It is notable that the Court of Appeals relied, in part, on the Trustee-Delegates’ own statements to support their opinion. Most importantly, the Secretary of the Interior never appealed this ruling. It is settled law. No off-hand reference in the conference report to P.L. 108-108 can relieve the department of its well-established legal duty.
Senator, it is wrong for a cabinet official to send such a misleading letter to you. We cannot tolerate any more lies. You deserve better—and so do 500,000 individual Indian trust beneficiaries who don’t have the option of taking back their trust assets, despite more than a hundred years of abuse. We all deserve candid and forthright information from Secretary Norton, but this is obviously not going to happen.
This is a property right, not an entitlement. Secretary Norton is not doing us some sort of favor by providing an accurate and complete accounting of our assets – it is her duty.
Cobell v. Norton is a case about justice. For the first time, beneficiaries are finding out the truth about how their trust assets have been managed, and it is not pretty. Secretary Norton is misleading you because she has lost every court decision on the merits in Cobell, and her best hope is for Congress to bail her out—or at least delay a resolution until she is out of office. She doesn’t want the truth coming out because it exposes her failure to do justice for 500,000 individual Indian trust beneficiaries.
As you know, the plaintiffs in Cobell agreed to enter into mediation of the case. While I am ever-hopeful that the selection of two mediators represents a positive step toward resolution, I want to caution you that I have not yet seen anything to suggest that there is much to be hopeful about. And if Secretary Norton’s April 6, 2004 letter is any indication of the level of truthfulness she intends to bring to the mediation, I can guarantee you this will have been a colossal waste of time and a profound disappointment for both you, your fellow member of Congress and your respective staffs who have worked so hard to see justice done.
Secretary Norton says that she “strongly support[s]” the mediation effort. She ought to start demonstrating her strong support by telling the truth, lest this mediation come unraveled before it begins.
Sincerely,
/s/ Elouise Cobell
Elouise Cobell
To view the latest information concerning this case, please go to: http://www.indiantrust.com
April 14, 2004
Honorable Ben Nighthorse Campbell
Chairman
Committee on Indian Affairs
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Senator Campbell:
This letter is in response to the April 6, 2004, letter to you from U.S. Interior Secretary Gale Norton. It is unfortunate that Secretary Norton’s letter has many serious misstatements and inaccuracies. I am writing to set the record straight.
As we both agree, reform of the individual Indian trust and the provision of an accurate and complete historical accounting is one of the biggest challenges facing Indian Country today. Sadly, Secretary Norton’s actions thus far are ensuring that trust reform and the historical accounting will never be accomplished on her watch.
Throughout her letter, Secretary Norton tries to convince you that the Cobell case is resolved and therefore should be dismissed by the courts. Her statement would be laughable had we not devoted decades to seeking justice for 500,000 trust beneficiaries. Resolved? All indications are that the individual Indian trust is today in far worse shape since she began her tenure as Trustee-Delegate. Sadly, we’ve only just begun. A little over six months ago, the Cobell court noted that
Interior has cried wolf over and over and over again to the Indians, to Congress, and to the courts. To be sure, there has been some activity – most notably, the creation of a new alphabet soup of bureaucracies. But activity is not the same thing as progress. And Interior has not demonstrated that it has made any progress, either in complying with its obligation to conduct an accounting for the IIM beneficiaries or in complying with its other fiduciary obligations.
In addition, Secretary Norton claims that many accounts are “fully reconciled” – this too is a fabrication, and her own experts testified under oath that those “reconciliations” did not constitute an adequate accounting. The court agreed. It is curious that hundreds of thousands of accounts have supposedly been reconciled, yet not a single beneficiary has received an accounting. Not one. This speaks volumes as to the effectiveness and sincerity of Secretary Norton’s “accounting” effort.
Finally, Secretary Norton’s statements regarding P.L. 108-108 have totally distorted the truth. Ms. Norton was not even around when the American Indian Trust Management Reform Act of 1994 was passed. We both were, and we know what happened. The notion that the 1994 Act created the Trustee-Delegates’ historical accounting obligation is just plain false. It has been clearly established by the U.S. Court of Appeals that the 1994 Act only reaffirmed a pre-existing duty to perform an historical accounting. It is notable that the Court of Appeals relied, in part, on the Trustee-Delegates’ own statements to support their opinion. Most importantly, the Secretary of the Interior never appealed this ruling. It is settled law. No off-hand reference in the conference report to P.L. 108-108 can relieve the department of its well-established legal duty.
Senator, it is wrong for a cabinet official to send such a misleading letter to you. We cannot tolerate any more lies. You deserve better—and so do 500,000 individual Indian trust beneficiaries who don’t have the option of taking back their trust assets, despite more than a hundred years of abuse. We all deserve candid and forthright information from Secretary Norton, but this is obviously not going to happen.
This is a property right, not an entitlement. Secretary Norton is not doing us some sort of favor by providing an accurate and complete accounting of our assets – it is her duty.
Cobell v. Norton is a case about justice. For the first time, beneficiaries are finding out the truth about how their trust assets have been managed, and it is not pretty. Secretary Norton is misleading you because she has lost every court decision on the merits in Cobell, and her best hope is for Congress to bail her out—or at least delay a resolution until she is out of office. She doesn’t want the truth coming out because it exposes her failure to do justice for 500,000 individual Indian trust beneficiaries.
As you know, the plaintiffs in Cobell agreed to enter into mediation of the case. While I am ever-hopeful that the selection of two mediators represents a positive step toward resolution, I want to caution you that I have not yet seen anything to suggest that there is much to be hopeful about. And if Secretary Norton’s April 6, 2004 letter is any indication of the level of truthfulness she intends to bring to the mediation, I can guarantee you this will have been a colossal waste of time and a profound disappointment for both you, your fellow member of Congress and your respective staffs who have worked so hard to see justice done.
Secretary Norton says that she “strongly support[s]” the mediation effort. She ought to start demonstrating her strong support by telling the truth, lest this mediation come unraveled before it begins.
Sincerely,
/s/ Elouise Cobell
Elouise Cobell
To view the latest information concerning this case, please go to: http://www.indiantrust.com