The legislator who wrote Maine’s new ban on American Indian school mascots has acknowledged the need for one exception: public schools with tribal ties or federal funding.
“It would depend per state and per tribe,” said state Rep. Benjamin Collings, Portland Democrat. “But we’re sensitive to that.”
Maine Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, last week signed a bill prohibiting American Indian mascots, letterhead and logos at state-funded schools and colleges. The Pine Tree State’s last state-funded high school with such a mascot, Skowhegan High School, dropped its “Indians” namesake this spring after a contentious school board vote.
But three Maine public schools funded by the federal Bureau of Indian Education won’t be forced to change mascots. Indian Island Middle School on the Penobscot reservation, funded by BIE grants, will keep its “Warriors” mascot and logo of an American Indian man with a feather.
Mr. Collings said he doesn’t see a double-standard.
“I talked to the tribe, and they’re not a state-funded school,” he said, citing historical accuracy as a key difference between tribal and nontribal schools.
“Had some of these [nontribal] schools come and worked with the tribe and done something historically accurate, it could’ve been workable,” Mr. Collings said Thursday in a phone interview. “But it [Skowhegan’s logo] really was a racist mascot.”
Should Maine’s first-in-the-nation ban spread to other states, as supporters advocate, the state-funded caveat could avoid the sticky situation of a governor telling a tribal school to scrap its mascot.
Of the few public schools nationwide with significant American Indian populations and tribal mascots, most are BIE-funded institutions in reservation communities.
Pine Ridge High School on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, for example, adopted its “Thorpes” mascot after the legendary Olympian and Sac and Fox nation member, Jim Thorpe.
But not all such schools are federally funded. In Browning, Montana, headquarters of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, where more than 90% of residents claim American Indian ancestry, the state-funded high school has the “Indians” as its mascot.
Another state-funded school, Red Lake Senior High School on the Red Lake Indian Reservation in northern Minnesota, uses the Ojibwe words for warriors (Ogichidaag) and lady warriors (Ogichidaakwag) as its mascots.
The North Dakota-based Native American Guardians’ Association aims to “educate, not eradicate” American Indian imagery, symbols and school names. Earlier this year, the advocacy group urged a Utah school board to retain its “Redmen” mascot. The organization cites Florida State University and the University of Utah for their relationships with the Seminole and Ute tribes, respectively, as models of respectful use of mascots.
Mr. Collings said the problem is that nontribal schools — knowingly or unknowingly — continue a cycle of discrimination in using American Indian caricatures as mascots.
“For a lot of people, tribes don’t exist,” said Mr. Collings, who is not an American Indian but said he has worked in tribal-governmental relations for 20 years. “Through history books and movies, people see tribes as something from the past, they romanticize it, and these mascots demean and mock [American Indians], creating an image of these red people with big noses and war paint and fighting pilgrims or cowboys, and there’s a gap of a hundred or more years.”
The National College of American Indians reacted to Maine’s announcement with cheers. The District of Columbia-based organization has long has called for the local professional football franchise, the Washington Redskins, to rescind its name.
“NCAI applauds the recent signing of a bill making Maine the first state to ban the use of Native American mascots and imagery in public schools, colleges, and universities,” a spokesperson said via email. “We look forward to more states standing with Maine on the right side of history.” The American Psychological Association issued a 2005 report condemning the display of 2005 Indian imagery and names as mascots, calling such usage derogatory and harmful to persons with Indian identity, especially children.
A 2010 report by the Maine Indian Tribal State Commission called for a ban on the use of names, mascots and imagery that reference American Indians, and dozens of schools have since retired such namesakes.
Last year, Wells High School in Maine voted to drop its detailed logo of an American Indian man with a headdress but kept the team name “Warriors.” The school did not respond to questions about the team name, given the state’s new ban.
However, Superintendent James Daly last year told the Portland Press-Herald that the school would begin removing likenesses painted in the lobby and on the basketball court.
“The committee and the community have done the right thing,” Mr. Daly said. “It’s just going to take time for the transition and I want people to know that.”
Four federally recognized tribes — the Aroostook Band of Micmac Indians, the Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians, the Passamaquoddy and the Penobscot Nation — reside in Maine. Tribal members surrounded Ms. Mills at Thursday’s bill signing.
• Christopher Vondracek can be reached at cvondracek@washingtontimes.com.
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