For more than 100 years Lakota children have been taken from their homes.
It began in the 1880s under the U.S. Government policy of forced assimilation: children as young as 5 years old were removed from their homes, shipped to boarding schools, and instructed in the ways of white culture. Then came the Indian Adoption Project, with more than one quarter of all Native American children being placed into white adoptive care, foster homes and state-run orphanages. In 1978 Congress attempted to remedy the situation by passing the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). But for the most part states ignore the law, and the problem persists to this day.
In South Dakota—one of the worst ICWA violators—more than 3,000 Lakota children live in non-native foster care settings. Frequent victims of abuse and neglect, statistics show that by the time these children reach 20 years of age the majority will be homeless, in prison, or dead. The only sustainable solution is to begin the renewal of Lakota culture and society. But to achieve this the state must release a generation of children and return them to their relatives. Any genuine attempt at justice begins there.
As we say in our language: wakanyeja ota wokakijapi kiksuapo… the children are suffering, remember them!
Learn more about what the Lakota People’s Law Project is doing to rescue Lakota children on the following pages.
Lakota Child Rescue Project
For more than 100 years Lakota children have been taken from their homes.
It began in the 1880s under the U.S. Government policy of forced assimilation: children as young as 5 years old were removed from their homes, shipped to boarding schools, and instructed in the ways of white culture. Then came the Indian Adoption Project, with more than one quarter of all Native American children being placed into white adoptive care, foster homes and state-run orphanages. In 1978 Congress attempted to remedy the situation by passing the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA). But for the most part states ignore the law, and the problem persists to this day.
In South Dakota—one of the worst ICWA violators—more than 3,000 Lakota children live in non-native foster care settings. Frequent victims of abuse and neglect, statistics show that by the time these children reach 20 years of age the majority will be homeless, in prison, or dead. The only sustainable solution is to begin the renewal of Lakota culture and society. But to achieve this the state must release a generation of children and return them to their relatives. Any genuine attempt at justice begins there.
As we say in our language: wakanyeja ota wokakijapi kiksuapo… the children are suffering, remember them!
Learn more about what the Lakota People’s Law Project is doing to rescue Lakota children on the following pages.