Chief Seattle

I agree Chief Seattle’s speech to Governor Stevens was very sad. Chief Seattle was very passionate about his people, the land, and the injustice his people were being subjected to. There is such hopelessness as he says, “It matters little where we spend the rest of our days. They are not many.”

Although this was a very serious topic for him to speak on, somehow I appreciated his facetiousness. I don’t mean to minimize the awfulness of the experiences he was referring to. It took boldness to speak so plainly, yet his personality and emotion came through in his speech. He expressed his passion for his people, using examples of men, women, and children being affected. He talked about the land in a way that expressed his people’s reverence for it.

Chief Seattle’s faithfulness to his people was very clear. He wanted both the living and the dead to be treated with respect. He talked about God loving the white man but abandoning His red children. The way I see it, the white man overlooked an incredible opportunity to show the very love they were professing.

Chief Seattle said, “So let him be just and deal kindly with my people.” I wonder how things would have been different if that would have done in the beginning of their interactions.