Penobscot Chief: Columbus Day “irrelevant”

Portland, Ore.; Albuquerque, N.M.; St. Paul, Minn.; and Olympia, Wash., are a few of the cities that have made a decision to include Indigenous People’s Day in their celebrations on Monday.

The argument for Indigenous People’s Day is that due to previous mistreatment of Indigenous American People’s, they should be commemorated, instead of the man who enslaved others. “We actually have something”, Estes said. “It says, ‘We are no longer going to celebrate a time of genocide, but instead we will honor the land we live on and the people who have been here since the beginning”.

The U.S. Census Bureau reports that the Native American population in the U.S.is the lowest of all major demographics at under 2%.

“We are trying to spearhead this movement on campus first and then hopefully make it up to the city so that way we can get this change implemented”, Renz said.

Congress originally designated the second Sunday in October as Columbus Day in 1934.

Many Italian-Americans see Columbus, born in Genoa, as a source of pride, and oppose any efforts to do away with the holiday. The goal of the holiday is to promote Native American culture and to honor the history of Native American peoples. “Columbus Day is the only day on which the nation recognizes the heritage of an estimated 26 million Italian-Americans”. A few holiday, right? The overwhelming majority of people will be at work or school on Monday, including Spokane Public Schools’ students, which does not observe the holiday by taking the day off. After that, the parade wasn’t held again until 2000, and it has been hard to make it the draw it once was, she said. Anna Vann told USA Today, “It’s a celebration of when the Europeans came over and started their lives here”.

Minneapolis and Seattle gave Indigenous People’s Day a big push in becoming a holiday and now there are many cities that participate.

“They really didn’t prove anything”, Rey Garduno, an Albuquerque city councilman and longtime community organizer, said of the confrontational protests. Tuesday, they will take up the resolution again.