the exercise or practice of traditional American Indian religion. It would further provide United States district courts with the authority to issue such orders as may be necessary to enforce this requirement.

Ten years ago, Congress enacted the American Indian Religious Freedom Act which sets forth the policy of the United States to protect and preserve for American Indians, Eskimo, Aleut, and native Hawaiians, their inherent right of freedom to believe, express and exercise their traditional religions.

Pursuant to its provisions, Federal agencies are required by law to respect the customs, ceremonies and traditions of native American religions. The act also provided that within one year of enactment, Federal agencies would be required to examine their policies and procedures and work with native traditional and tribal leaders to assure minimal interference with the religious practices of Indian people.

In August of 1979, the Federal Agencies Task Force charged with this responsibility submitted its report to Congress. That report concluded that due to ignorance and attitudes, Federal policies and practices were directly or indirectly hostile toward native traditional religions, or simply indifferent to their religious values.

The report found that native American people were denied access to sacred sites on Federal land for the purpose of worship and, in cases where they did gain access, they were often disturbed during their worship by Federal officials and the public. In addition, some sacred sites were needlessly put to other uses which desecrated them.

Although the various recommendations regarding legislative action went through a review process under the Carter Administration, no action was taken to remove barriers to Indian religious freedom identified in the 1979 report.

In 1982, oversight hearings conducted by my fellow Californian, Representative Don Edwards, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights of the House Judiciary Committee, revealed that abuses of the religious freedom rights of native Americans continue despite the policy delineated in the American Indian Religious Freedom Act.

Ten years have passed since passage of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act. Yet, Federal land management policies remain insensitive to Indian religions and cultural traditions, and American Indians lack a mechanism to enforce their rights to religious freedom.

Congress must take affirmative steps to halt the increasing infringement on the religious prerogatives of American Indians. I believe it is imperative that we establish a clear standard of review to guide the courts in interpreting the purpose and policies of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act.

S. 2250 would provide this much needed standard of review. It would make the rights of practitioners of traditional American Indian religions under the American Indian Religious Freedom Act enforceable in court.

Ten years ago, Congress made a commitment to protect the rights of American Indians to practice their traditional religion. We must make sure those rights are a reality.

I look forward to working with you, Mr. Chairman, and with the other members of this committee, and other interested parties to ensure that the rights of Indian people to practice their traditional religion without the interference of Governmental agencies-rights taken for granted by most other Americans-are adequately protected.

Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your support of S. 2250 and for your commitment to work toward its passage.

[Prepared statement of Senator Cranston appears in appendix.] The CHAIRMAN. I thank you very much, Senator Cranston.

There is a special relationship between our Government and Indian tribes, a relationship that is often described as a trust relationship.

Do you believe that, as part of this trust relationship we, as a Nation, should be obligated to make certain that those who rely upon this relationship can feel secure that their religious rights are protected?

Senator CRANSTON. I most certainly do.

The CHAIRMAN. I thank you very much, sir.
Senator CRANSTON. Thank you very much.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator McCain.

Senator MCCAIN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. No questions.
Thank you, Senator.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator DeConcini.

Senator DECONCINI. Mr. Chairman, I do not have any questions of the distinguished Senator from California. I do want to commend him for his leadership in this area which is very important to native Americans in recognition of their rights and freedoms to practice their religion on lands managed by the Federal Government.

Like anything else, the ability of a community of people to live together depends on the intent with which they mutually accommodate each other. I think the Senator's bill here can be crafted in such a way for that mutual accommodation. When this does not happen on its own, then there is a very difficult task which someone must assume to bring the parties together to find a way to achieve. What we all want here, I think, is mutual accommodation. In this case that someone, of course, is Senator Cranston. I am committed to working with him and you, Mr. Chairman, on finding this accommodation in the non-Indian community and the Federal lands.

I will ask unanimous consent that the balance of my statement appear in the record. I have no questions, Mr. Chairman.

[Prepared statement of Senator DeConcini appears in appendix.] The CHAIRMAN. Without objection, so ordered. Once again Senator, thank you very much.

Senator CRANSTON. Thank you very much. I appreciate this positive reception and response. I feel we're off to a good start. Thank

Our first panel this morning will consist of the following: The Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indians, Ms. Suzan Harjo; the Executive Director of the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions, Monsignor Paul E. Lenz; Native American Rights

Fund, Mr. Steve Moore, Esquire; and a Professor of Anthropology at the University of Colorado, Dr. Deward E. Walker, Jr. Shall I call upon the Monsignor first? Welcome, sir.

STATEMENT OF MONSIGNOR PAUL A. LENZ, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, BUREAU OF CATHOLIC INDIAN MISSIONS, WASHINGTON, DC

Monsignor LENZ. Thank you Senator. Good morning.

My name is Monsignor Paul Lenz, Executive Director of the Bureau of Catholic Indian Missions located here in Washington, D.C. Father Ted Zuern, S. J., pastor of St. Issac Joques Parish and the Mother Butler Center, Rapid City, South Dakota, is the Associate Director of the bureau of Catholic Indian Missions for legislation. This statement has been researched by him. I want to make it clear at the outset that we support S. 2250, which was introduced by Senator Cranston.

S. 2250 is an amendment to the 1978 American Indian Religious Freedom Act. It ensures that Federal lands are managed in a manner that does not impair the exercise of traditional American Indian religions. It specifically places all Federal property under mandate to be managed in a way that does not impair a traditional American Indian religion exercise in areas that have been historically indispensible to rituals and rites.

To many Americans, knowledge of any religion outside the bounds of the Judeo-Christian tradition or the Moslem tradition is minimal at best. It is not taken seriously. It is never given the respect that it deserves. It is something that people follow for lack of anything else to believe.

We must always realize that the American Indians were a very spiritual people, probably more spiritual than we are today. In our age, we have so many benefits of science to provide conveniences for us that we do not realize how ultimately we are dependent on the basic provisions that God gives to us in this life.

The American Indians of this country achieved remarkable heights of development in some few instances, but for the most part lived lives close to the elements and with little conveniences. They lived a life close to God, or the Great Spirit, or the Great Mystery, as they called him in their own tongues.

The American Indians were a people of prayer. They allowed most of the actions of their lives to be blessed by the utterance of a prayer to the Great Creator of all things. They lived a life that interjected prayer into so many of their actions.

Unlike Christians or Jews or Moslems, they did not need a church or synagogue or mosque for their prayers. They had the whole realm of God's creation. They worshipped outdoors. They were close to their Creator. They were surrounded by the gifts that he gave them.

They were liturgists. Their sense of appropriate actions united with song of all nations and stillness of silence or with the spoken word, were part of the worship they gave to the Great Spirit.

They included dance in their worship; it was a very prominent part of their liturgy. Sometimes they used horses in carrying out their actions of prayer, of worship, of their liturgy. With our strict

traditions we never allowed dancing in the worship of God. We found it was not respectful, not becoming to so great a being. The American Indians found all graceful actions to be worthy of a part in the liturgy, in the worship of the Almighty Creator.

The graceful movement of their bodies satisfied themselves and all who looked on in reverence. Their whole physical being pulsed with the act of adoration as they moved in the rhythm of the dance. We must not look on dancing as something that is totally removed from worship. The Indians, with their theology of Creation used all things to worship God.

Their whole being was employed in the act of worship. It was not a rite of pagan excess; it was a rite of human worship. It is something that most Americans have never understood, nor in which they participated. It is a response to the Great Creator, the One who gives all.

Before Columbus came to this hemisphere, American Indians worshipped God. Their worship had none of the accepted ceremonies of Judaism, Christianity or Moslem traditions. But, it was a true worship. There are many accounts of revelation to tribes to direct them in their rituals and rites. American Indians had only the experiences that were known to them. They were profoundly reverent and respectful in all they did in their worship.

They worshipped God in the only way they could, with the full exercise of their bodies, with songs, with silence, with liturgy that might make us pause and wonder at the reverent way it was performed. We are not of that tradition and we are caught in our inability to fully understand the sincerity with which they publicly worshipped God.

Probably in the worship of God, which is at the heart of every culture, we are most different from people of another culture. Something that is most sacred to us is the very point at which we look askance on those of other cultures. But it is at this very point that we have the greatest unity with those of other cultures. Respect for the worship of others, even when it differs considerably from the patterns of worship we know, is a sure sign of our maturity in a culture. We must feel at ease in our own culture, but we must also feel respect for the cultures of other peoples, especially the American Indian who at such a great price, welcomed our ancestors to this land. We are not here by any right of our own. This whole country belonged to the American Indians before our ancestors took it by force.

How unthoughtful it is for us to disregard the religious practices of the American Indian and suspect that they performed pagan rituals that were to be merely tolerated, at our best response. The American Indians were very sincere in worshipping God according to their traditions. We should not consider it beneath us what is not of our tradition.

In the First Amendment, the free exercise of religion clause is composed in terms of what the government cannot do to the individual. It is not an expression of what the individual can extract from the Government. Surely, the American Indians join all of us in the right to have the Federal Government acknowledge their right to worship God according to the dictates of their consciences.

One of their basic rights as American citizens is the right to the practice of their religion.

American Indians accepted all people into their land. Those people placed in their charter of government the freedom that all persons have to worship in their own way. That guarantee must extend to the American Indians above all others.

There should not be any need for Senator Cranston to introduce S. 2250. It should be readily understood, but it is not. So, the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978 must be amended to inIclude all the Federal land that this Nation owns. Where that land is used by American Indians in their rituals and rites of worship, nothing should be done to deprive them of that right. All of us would be better men and women if we recognized what they are doing, worshipping God rather than performing some strange ceremony which we see as a curiosity.

The expression of a people who humbly perform in the open air, removed from all human habitation, their worship of almighty God, is always deserving of respect from other people, especially those who have benefitted so deeply from the American Indians.

I think it appropriate that Father Zuern and I, as Catholic priests, make a petition for the American Indians in the use of land for their worship of our Creator. They use the areas away from the beaten track. They perform liturgical rituals that are elaborate and extensive. The fact that they do not perform in a church, synagogue or temple does not make their ritual any less valid. The fact that they dance does not take away from their liturgical prayer. They perform a public act of worship that is equal to that of any religion.

If all religions do not stick together and support the acts of worship performed by each other, we run the risk of having all-out acts of worship hampered by the government for one reason or another. An attack on one religion is an attack on all religions.

American Indians need the right to perform their act of worship to express their inner feelings to God. If they are denied that right, all religions are in danger of being denied that right.

We urge you to support S. 2250. I thank you very much for this opportunity.

[Prepared statement of Monsignor Lenz appears in appendix.] The CHAIRMAN. On behalf of the committee, I thank you very much, Monsignor.

There are moments in one's life after having heard a beautiful statement when you find yourself saying, "I wish I had said that.' I will now call on Mr. Moore.

STATEMENT OF STEVEN C. MOORE, ESQUIRE, STAFF ATTORNEY, NATIVE AMERICAN RIGHTS FUND, BOULDER, CO

Mr. MOORE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. Good morning.

I first want to extend my thanks for this opportunity to testify before the committee this morning. I am a senior staff attorney with the Native American Rights Fund, a national legal Indian legal rights organization which has been in existence for 18 years.