1854 Oration on Environmental & Tribal Sovereignty
Delivered in 1854 during treaty negotiations with Isaac Stevens, Governor of Washington Territory, expressing profound indigenous philosophy regarding land, ancestry, and human coexistence with nature.
Full Transcript
Yonder sky that has wept tears of compassion upon my people for centuries untold, and which to us appears changeless and eternal, may change. Today it is fair. Tomorrow it may be clouded with clouds.
My words are like the stars that never change. Whatever Seattle says, the great chief at Washington can rely upon with as much certainty as he can upon the return of the sun or the seasons.
Every part of this soil is sacred in the estimation of my people. Every hillside, every valley, every plain and grove, has been hallowed by some sad or happy event in days long vanished. Even the rocks, which seem to be dumb and dead as the swelter in the sun along the silent shore, thrill with memories of stirring events connected with the lives of my people.
The white man will never be alone. Let him be just and deal kindly with my people, for the dead are not powerless. Dead, did I say? There is no death, only a change of worlds.
Defining Key Excerpts
"Yonder sky that has wept tears of compassion upon my people for centuries untold... may change. Today it is fair. Tomorrow it may be clouded."
"Every part of this soil is sacred in the estimation of my people."
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