The bottom line is that Indian people’s unique political status, their self-determined management of sovereign Native lands, their resurgent demography and culture, and their control over significant natural resources means that Indian people are critical to the past and present of the United States. Native peoples make up 1.7 percent of the population, but Americans don’t often give Indians even 1.7 percent of their attention. That ought to change, and the sooner the better.
