1. California Native American History
Hello. My name is Cuauhtemoc Gonzalez. I am the Tribal Outreach Staff Assistant for the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research. I am here to talk about California Native American History. We feel that this is a necessary element to talk about in these trainings because this is a subject that is often overlooked or grossly miss-taught in schools. The history of the treatment of California’s indigenous people by Europeans/Americans is not filled with sunshine and happiness. We are teaching you this history not to make you feel guilty or ashamed of the past but its to let you know this historical mistreatment is part of who the tribes are today.

2. Origins- Native Point of View
Tribal Creation Stories
We have been here since time immemorial
The first people on this land were the animal people
Our people were created from the earth
All stories give us a connection to the land we are from
Here we can see that there are two views of how tribes came to be in California. 1) There are the tribal creation stories and 2) the anthropological view. Creation stories tie tribes to specific places and these places they hold as sacred. In many cases California’s tribes lived near their creation places. In talking with California Indian people you will see similarities in what they say about there traditional lands. They have always been here. They were created from this land. This is their history. It’s only in the last 250 years that tribes have been moved from areas they used to inhabit.
In the anthropological view tribes migrated in over the Bering land bridge. Tribes have only been in the state for the past 15,000 yrs. Creation stories are only myths and legends seen as a way to better understand a culture.
Why is it that people cannot believe a creation story? Isn’t the old testament of the bible a creation story?

3. Origins- Anthro Point of View
Anthropological View
People came across the Bering Land Bridge and settled across the Americas
People have only settled here for the past 15,000 yrs
Creation stories are myths and legend

4. Pre European Contact Population up to 1,000,000 people
Over 500 bands/tribes
People occupied every corner of the state
Cultures and languages as different as English and Chinese
When we talk about California Indians or California Native Americans we are talking about those tribes that are indigenous to the land that is California. There are a few tribes that reside on the border of both California and Arizona and there are also a few tribes that were removed from California and relocated to other states.
This map gives you an idea of the areas that tribes lived in. The boundaries are not static, and this is only what they may have looked like at one point in time.
How did so many people come to be living in California? How can a population of so many people be left out of the history books?
Many if not all California Indian tribes ate acorns as one of their main subsistence foods. Tribes may not have been agriculturalists as we think of the tribes in the Southwest or the East but the landscape was not untouched by Indian people. Many areas were burned regularly, plants and trees were tended to, but none of this was done in a typical farm plot it was done in the forest.
Tribes and Bands- political groups. Control over certain territory and resources.
Society and Culture-

5. European Contact
It is important to remember that tribal history does not begin with European contact. If tribes have only been here for 15, 000 years and Europeans have only been here for the past 250 years then there is a lot of history of Indians in this state. There were great leaders, large urban areas, with such a dense population how could there not be.
The history of Indians changed when Europeans entered the picture. Life would never be what it was like again.

6. Missions 21 Catholic Missions from San Diego to Sonoma
Constructed with the forced labor of California Indians
Were unable to practice their traditions and ceremonies.
Average lifespan of an Indian taken to a mission was less than 10 years.
By the late 1820’s over 100,000 Indians died as a direct result of the missions.
Spanish Missions were the first permanent European settlements in California. Mission took people from their villages, forced them to farm, and forced many to convert to Christianity,

7. Gold Rush Gold “discovered” at Sutter’s Mill in Coloma – 1848
California’s non-Indian population grew by over 100,000 by 1850.
Settlers began stealing women and children for laborers.

8. 1849- Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo 1850- California admitted as a State
1850- Act for the Government and Protection of Indians
: 18 Treaties reserving 8,619,000 acres as Indian land (unratified)
State funded militias and bounties against Indians
Disease
1849- Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo- Mexico cedes California to the United States. Mexican Constitution had reserved rights for Indians to hold land and to vote. These rights were no longer observed once California was handed over.
Treaties- Due to heavy lobbying efforts by the State representatives Congress never ratified the 18 treaties that were negotiated. These were then held in secrecy for the next 53 years, until 1905.
1850 Act – Allowed for the indentured servitude of able bodied Indians. Children were taken from their families. Basically legalized slavery
The state spent over $1 million to fund militia expeditions against tribes.

9. Reservations and Rancherias
Reservations may not be in a tribe’s aboriginal territory.
Southern CA tribes receive Reservations in late 1800’s.
Not all tribes received Reservations
Dispossession of tribal lands
Rancherias were created for “homeless” tribes
Not all landless tribes received Rancherias
Tribes that did not receive land may not be recognized by the federal government as a “Tribe”

10. Dawes Act- 1887 Objective was to assimilate tribes
Allotted tribal members with individual parcels of reservation land
Remaining parcels were sold to non-Indians
Resulted in the loss of thousands of acres of reservation land
Eroded traditional cultural values and life ways

11. Termination Rancheria Termination Act of 1958 terminated 39 Rancherias
Government effort to assimilate Indians
Much of the lands were sold
26 Rancherias have been restored since the early 1980s (not an easy battle).

12. Contemporary California Indians
Tribes are proud of their cultural and ethnic identity
Tribes are protecting their cultural places
Tribes still have their ceremonies, their songs, and their traditions
Tribes are re-telling history

13. Not only are tribes cultural and ethnic groups by they are also political entities as well.

14. American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978
After over 300 years of religious persecution tribes are able to practice their traditional religions without fear.
U.S. federal laws interfered with the traditional religious practices of many American Indians
The purpose is to preserve and protect Native American religions

16. Tribal Governance

17. Tribal Government- 1934 Passage of the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA)
Many contemporary tribes adopted IRA Constitutions
Worked to reduce the privatization of tribes’ common holdings
Eroded many forms of traditional tribal governance
Some tribes that were not previously recognized organized under the IRA

18. Today’s Tribes
109 Federally Recognized and about 50 Unrecognized or Unacknowledged tribes
Reservations and Rancherias may not be in a Tribe’s ancestral territory.
Business Enterprises
Government entities
Cultural entities

19. Tribal Council Sovereign government (Federally recognized tribes)
Jurisdiction over reservation land
Elected officials
May follow more traditional forms of government, ie: hereditary leadership, or specific customs, rules, and laws
Tribal Council members may have fulltime jobs
Soveriegn
Jurisdiction over indian land
Chairperson like president of the country
May still follow more traditional forms of governemnt- hereditary leadership, specific customs rules and laws
Elections

20. Questions?