Treaty Shirts. Gerald Vizenor

past three centuries. No national separation strategy, treaty deceit, constitution, dominion, tiresome overcompensations of monotheism, or the romantic tread of enlightenment could absolve the outright cruelty and slaughter of animals for felt hats and furry fashions in Europe.

      Our new totems and the constitutional associations that were founded in the name of wolf spiders, coywolves, bats, bobcats, deformed fish, and moccasin flowers, would never reconcile the native cruelty to the great spirits of the animals, and the mass murder of beaver, bear, marten, ermine, and deer in centuries of the fur trade. Some city squirrels, raccoons, caged birds, and most mongrels continue to trust humans, even after dogs were banished from the federal sector, but the spirits of the beaver and other animals remain forever distant and deny humans the right to hear their remarkable stories of survivance. Truly the spirits of the animals await the tragic outcome of human civilization.

      Justice Molly Crèche protected the rights of animals in the courtroom, and she was the only jurist who honored the memory of the animals murdered in the fur trade. She argued that because so many animals were brought close to extinction, “necrostories, the testimony of native totemic associations, and hearsay of animal genocide were accepted as evidence in the courtroom.” Crèche continued to hear testimony in exile, and the court stories of exile were broadcast on Panic Radio.

      Our totemic associations and heartfelt observance of natural motion were clearly a philosophy of bimaadiziwin, but the beaver would never again enable humans to stand in their daily presence and survivance culture or participate in their trust and natural duty.

      The pushy game hunters resented the new totems of spiders, birds, bats, insects, and wild flowers, and at the same time they protected timber wolves. The poseurs were furious that the word wolf was specifically used in the constitutional totemic association of the coywolves and wolf spiders. The outward manly totems correlated directly with metal clamp traps, heavy weapons, bright lights, snow machines, and giant pickup trucks.

      Mostly the catcalls, curses, and politics of resentment were concentrated on the actual constitution, the very ethical provisions of governance that denied the easy dominance of the tradition fascists and Midewin Messengers. The fascists favored a circular patriarchy, a fishy patchwork tradition of absolute authority, and conspired against the constitutional elections. They continued to undermine every practice of egalitarian governance. The fascists harkened to invented traditions, and perverted the sacred midewiwin, an obscure medicine dance, and an association of healers and great visionaries. So, the heavy hunters and traditioneers were eager to join the faction of authoritarian managers in the new federal sector. The blood count connivers emerged to reign over native identities a second time in reservation history.

      No, we were not romantic utopians, crazed, or wanton state criminals. The national reports that we had committed a murder, violated the federal charter of sector migration, or simply traveled without permission, and disabled the drone monitors were not true. Our inherent and constitutional liberties were denied, and we were brazenly threatened by the new governor to vacate the old reservation and the new federal endorsement sector.

      The Constitution of the White Earth Nation clearly prohibited banishment, yet we were ousted and our rights violated by a corrupt autocrat and private security agents twenty years after the constitution was set in motion with native citizens.

      Precisely, we were removed, as our ancestors had once been ordered by federal agents to leave the treaty boundary of the reservation more than a century earlier for publishing the Progress, the first independent native newspaper critical of federal policies.

      Paradoxically we were banished at the very same time that native children were taught the ethics and principles of the democratic constitution in nearby public schools, and many citizens carried a miniature copy of the egalitarian document as a native prompt of liberty. The dubious ethics of federal policies had actually advanced to a new level of hypocrisy. Native sovereignty and the doctrine of reserved rights were never mentioned or considered in the political conversion of treaty reservations and counties into federal trust endorsements sectors.

      Waasese created marvelous laser holoscenes, lively and magical light shows, and the radiant scenes easily diverted the drones and distracted the sector security agents. The Specter Drones, aerial monitors, and miniature digital cameras were everywhere, mounted in trees and beams, at the casino, underwater, and in books, tablets and toilets, and managed by private surveillance agencies to detect and track human motion in the sector, but the silent drones could not always detect an actual native from a laser scene.

      Yes, we rightly teased, tormented, and menaced but never murdered the first governor of the White Earth Sector of the National Sectors and Trust Endorsements. Godtwit Moon had already earned three descriptive nicknames, Mosey, for his casual manner when he was paroled to the casino, Husky for the color of his eyes that changed from luminous blue to amber, and Miskojaane for his bulbous red nose. He was a poseur, boozer, and vicious conniver who concocted native traditions in a federal prison, and was secretly paroled to the reservation through a new and ironic rendition strategy of generous treatment.

      Godtwit Moon was released from federal prison in the last three months of his criminal sentence for larceny, extortion, possession of narcotics, and weapons violations, and moved to the new Saint Cloud La Maison de Torture Extraordinaire. The new regime of empathy and solicitude was a complete reversal of earlier torture and security rendition programs.

      The French academies had prescribed more humane remedies, care and compassion, and Rendition de Gentillesse to counter the previous abuses and extreme renditions of narcotic, electric, digital, radiance, audio trauma, and the notorious torture of waterboarding.

      Godtwit Moon and other poseurs extraordinaire learned how to practice a perverted and concise version of the native midewiwin, a sacred, obscure, and traditional dance. The new rendition prisoners were otherwise placated, exploited and completely overcome with daily doses of sincerity, shrewdly soothed and stupefied with praise, sympathy, tolerance, and manly candor, the four cardinal principles of the new state strategy of moderate corrections and Rendition de Gentillesse.

      Gentle, meditative music was transmitted throughout the day and night in the rendition prison. Enya was the most common music of the night, the merciful music of solemnity. “Thank Heaven for Little Girls,” by Maurice Chevalier, “You’re Nobody till Somebody Loves You,” by Dean Martin, crooner of the casino Rat Pack, the resonance of violins by Mantovani, and Yanni compositions were selected for new affect encounter sessions on ordinary care, the tender touch and gaze, tease of truth and trust, notable pleasure words, cautious generosity, and other soothing music and meditative cues and voices were broadcast in distinct sessions on leadership styles and legal sexuality.

      The alterable prisoners who completed the program were frequently hired by social services agencies to soothe the many worries of the elderly in sector hospitals and nursing homes, an ironic and creepy continuance of the extraordinary rendition instituted in France.

      Godtwit Moon completed the rendition program, an anxious but clever softhearted poseur, and he was released early to the custody of the corporate manager of the White Foxy Casino on the White Earth Nation.

      Godtwit chased the casino money, an easy maneuver, and was promoted for his gentle poses of native culture and compassion as a supervisor of the bars, restaurants, and slot machines. Strategically he devised a way to decrease the payout to gamblers, aerate the daily entrée at the three restaurants, water the drinks, and was promoted regularly by the casino management company. Some four years later he was nominated, for no other reason than his native poses and simulated casino compassion, to serve as the first governor of the new federal endorsement sector.

      The native outrage over the conversion of the treaty reservation to an entitlement sector was only equal to the contempt for the arbitrary promotion of the new rendition parolee Godtwit Moon. The poseur never hesitated to simulate his praise of the heartfelt constitution and at the same time revel in the very ruins of an established and representative native government.

      Godtwit arbitrarily retired seven dedicated casino employees, and the very next day he hired five parolees from Saint Cloud La Maison de Torture Extraordinaire as personal security