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I was wondering where to go next in the discussion. A couple of possibilities occurred to me.

While I was thinking about which of the two to ask, a third question came into view. I opted for the latter.

Feeling somewhat like I was assuming the role of a devil's advocate, I proceeded to raise a potentially volatile question. "Brian, this may be rather impolitic of me, but there is a question concerning Native peoples that I've wondered about from time to time."

Brian rolled his eyes in a way that suggested: oh no! what now? Then, he smiled and said: "Will I be able to get out of this alive?"

There was a slight hesitation, and, then, a mischievous look came over his face. He added: "That stuff about my innocence was just greasing the pole, wasn't it?"

I felt a little embarrassed despite the fact I knew he was just kidding. In reality, the embarrassment was because I didn't know how he actually would react to my question.

I went ahead anyway. "I've read about some of these land claim disputes which take place between various levels of government and different Native nations or tribes. What I don't understand is this: if native peoples traditionally have not had any notion of ownership of the land, then on what are they basing their land claims?"

Brian arched his eyebrows and smiled briefly. His eyes, and an ever so slight motion of his head, suggested he found the question to be an interesting one.

Brian's smile turned to a grin. "Now, you've gone and done it," he said. "You've managed to open a real can of worms. I hope you're satisfied," he said in mock disgust and with a twinkle in his eye.

I sucked air in through a grimaced mouth and opened my eyes wide in a display intended to convey both a sense of pseudo-alarm and pseudo-regret. I waited for Brian to say more.

He looked at me with a somewhat somber expression. "Do you think you're up to a little in-your-face history lesson?" he inquired. He quickly went on: "Because if you are, you may find the answer to your question to have an educational, as well as, perhaps, an unsettling quality to it. I warn you, in all sincerity, you might not look at your country in the same way after the explanation as you do now." The look in his eyes seemed to ask: 'Are you ready for this?'

I responded to the challenge by saying: "Maybe I'm already a lot less enamored with my country than you suppose is the case." I paused slightly before adding: "I once felt strongly enough about the injustices being perpetrated by my country that I left it during the Vietnam war."

A mild look of surprise flashed across his face. He pursed his lips in a way that suggested he was mulling over something.

Finally, he said. "You know, David, there are certain Native peoples with a warrior tradition. During the Vietnam war, quite a few individuals from these warrior traditions enlisted in the armed services and sought one, or more, tours of duty in Vietnam."

His eyes were looking at the wall behind me, but his thoughts seemed to be far away. Gradually, he came back from wherever he had been and looked at me. There was a mixture of puzzlement and pain in his eyes and his voice when he spoke.

"I'm sure those young men had many reasons for doing what they did. I'm also quite certain some, maybe even many, of their reasons for going to Vietnam were noble ones.

"For example, some of them may have wanted to show the rest of America that Native people could be counted on to stand shoulder to shoulder with other Americans in times of difficulty, as had been the case during the Second World War or Korea. Maybe, some of them reasoned that fighting in Vietnam might be a way of earning a certain sort of credibility which could be drawn upon later, in some fashion, to help Native peoples.

"Yet, I've always had difficulty in understanding why these youngsters would allow themselves to be used to go and do to the Vietnamese what had been done to our own people by the same United States of America. One is neither helping oneself, nor one's people, if benefit only can be gained at the expense of the lives and suffering of other people."

Brian looked away at some of the other people in the room, and then his gaze returned to me. "Well, given your rebellious background, maybe there is hope, yet, for an unbelieving heathen such as yourself."

For a few seconds, he lightly drummed on the table top with his fingers. He seemed to be thinking while drumming. He stopped the movement of his fingers and asked, in a somewhat rhetorical fashion: "So, may I assume you are prepared to face the relentless onslaught of my history lesson?"

In my most formal manner, I responded: "You may so assume." I followed with: "Lead on, Macduff...."

Brian briefly reflected on what I had said, smiled and nodded his head, as if silent acknowledgment of the rest of the literary allusion.

"Due to time constraints," Brian began, "you will be getting the abridged version of An Introduction to Native Affairs 101. So, please buckle your seat belt and keep your arms inside the moving vehicle at all times." Brian tugged at the brim of an imaginary conductor's hat, as if to pull it tighter over his head, and, then, he flicked his right wrist and hand a few times like he was revving up an engine of some sort.

"The first stop on our mini-tour is the year 1887. During that year, the US Congress passed what is known as the Dawes Act, or, alternatively, The Allotment Act.

"On the surface, this Congressional bill seemed to give expression to the best qualities of a democratic system in which the notion of personal property played a fundamental role. More specifically, the Dawes Act established provisions for dividing up most of the lands of Native peoples into 160 acre packages. Furthermore, the Act required individual Native families to apply for these parcels, and, once the application was approved by the government, the families in question would own the land outright.

"To a non-Native, such an act of Congress would appear to be a godsend and one of the things that makes this country of ours so great. Apparently, people are being given something for nothing. Seemingly, people are being offered a golden opportunity to help build America and to help contribute to increasing the 'wealth of nations' through their own individualistic efforts."

Brian made some motions as if he were casting with a fishing rod and then reeling in the line. "The offer of ownership of land was the bait. The hook was this: what is owned can be sold."

Brian gave a quick shake of his head. There was an expression on his face which appeared to be displaying a sort of admiration of something or other.

He continued on. "The logic of the strategy underlying the Dawes Act was elegant simplicity. (a) The government wanted access to, and control of, the lands and the resources on which Native peoples lived. However, they needed a means that appeared to be democratic, legal and just.

"(b) Traditionally, among indigenous peoples, land does not belong to individuals but was collectively owned. Decisions concerning the use of that land were decided communally. In addition, whatever decisions were reached had to be done through a process of consensus. This meant that in the end, everyone had to agree about what to do. As long as unanimity had not been achieved, deliberations and discussions would continue.

"(c) Native tribes and nations considered all land to be sacred, and, therefore, it could never be sold. Moreover, because land is sacred, one should not dig into it and remove things such as gold, iron, coal and so on.

"(d) By divvying up land which didn't belong to them in the first place and giving it "freely" to individual Native families, the federal government was able to get rid of the two obstacles that stood in the way of their gaining access to Native lands and resources. In other words, they were able to circumvent the problem of collective ownership, and, as well, the government was able to undermine the Native method of consensual decision making."

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