To Be Called A Tribe - Snoqualmies' Dream Coming True

CARNATION - Jerry Kanim, a Snoqualmie Indian unable to read or write English, had a dream. He died almost 40 years ago, the dream unfulfilled.

Ed Davis had the same dream. He died six years ago at the age of 110, the dream still unrealized.

Evelyn Enick, the last princess of her Snoqualmie lineage, had the same dream. Just before "passing to the other side" two years ago, she tearfully told her niece she was tired and could wait no longer.

Today the dream of those three, who figure prominently in the history of the Snoqualmie Indians, is close to becoming reality.

In the next day or so, the Federal Register in Washington, D.C., will record a document signed by Eddie Brown, assistant secretary for Indian Affairs in the Department of Interior, stating that the Snoqualmies "exist as an Indian tribe."

Other Western Washington tribes seeking recognition include the Duwamish, Cowlitz, Chinook, Steilacoom, Samish and Snohomish. Those claims are still pending.

An elated Art Freese, vice chairman of the Snoqualmie Tribal Council, yesterday described Brown's statement as "an exciting wildfire."

"We are happy, not for ourselves, but for the elders of the tribe," he said. "That's the happiest thing. . . . It should have been their honor years ago."

The Bureau of Indian Affairs finding is based on an evaluation by a team of researchers, most of them anthropologists, genealogists and historians. BIA officials said the action came as the result of renewed White House interest in such issues.

Official recognition would bring a number of benefits to the Snoqualmies - fishing rights, federally funded programs for health care, housing, education and other types of support for their governing council.

AS MANY AS 800 MEMBER

The BIA acknowledges 313 existing tribal members today, although tribal officials estimate the figure could be as high as 800.

A 120-day public comment period will start when the decision is published in the Federal Register. During that time, opponents and supporters can offer evidence on the final decision.

In 27 cases over the past 15 years, only one BIA finding has been reversed.

The Tulalip Tribes of Marysville already are on record opposing recognition of the Snoqualmies, said Holly Reckord, acting chief of the BIA's Acknowledgment and Research Branch.

In part, the Tulalip Tribes argue that the Snoqualmies are not a real tribe but merely an "ethnic organization." They contend that the real Snoqualmie Indians, along with other tribes, settled on the Tulalip Reservation in the 1930s.

Further recognition would mean dividing the BIA budget among more tribes.

GOVERNMENT PROMISES

The Snoqualmies have waited 138 years for the federal government to give them what was promised - a separate reservation and rights as a tribe - when they ceded hundreds of square miles of land to the United States in the Point Elliott Treaty of 1855. The Snoqualmie lands at that time extended from Snoqualmie Pass through the Snoqualmie Valley and as far north as Everett.

Chief Pat Kanim, who was the second signatory of the treaty, following Duwamish tribal Chief Sealth, tried unsuccessfully for years to obtain his tribe's legacy.

After he died, Jerry Kanim, his nephew, took up the gauntlet and for decades fought for the Snoqualmies' land. A turning point came in 1934 when the tribe chose not to take part in the Howard Wheeler Act, under which Indian tribes could organize and establish constitutional governments.

This was done on the advice of BIA officials who told the Snoqualmies to wait until they had a reservation.

In 1937 the government proposed a reservation at the mouth of the Tolt River near Carnation, the traditional home base of the Snoqualmie Indians.

But World War II changed everything. The tribe offered to delay negotiations until after the war, but in 1952 the Congressional Record listed the Snoqualmies as an unrecognized tribe. Later the Indian Claims Commission paid the Snoqualmies $159 each for Eastern King County. A tribal member recalls that when Jerry Kanim died in 1956, his property was seized for nonpayment of a water bill.

Before Kanim's death, his daughter, Evelyn Enick, became his spokeswoman. She handled all correspondence with federal officials in the nation's capital. Among those receiving her letters - and responding - were Democratic Sens. Warren Magnuson and Henry Jackson, who supported the tribe.

Enick worked even harder after her fatherdied, trying to make his dreams come true.

Davis was the oldest living tribal member when he died at 110 and was often described as the "conscience of the tribe."

Shortly before his death, Davis said: "They have taken our land, our fish, our right to be called an Indian. They promised us 40 acres of land and a bucket of gold if we would not make war any more. I have waited for a hundred years and have gotten nothing."

Early in the 1970s, tribal leaders began a more earnest effort to gain recognition and the land they believed they deserved. That effort continued to the present.

"It just shows our perseverance," Freese said yesterday.