08/30/2026
History should never forget this. In 1879, following the death of his eldest son after forced removal to Oklahoma, Ponca Chief Standing Bear walked six hundred miles on foot through winter blizzards back to Nebraska to bury his boy in ancestral soil. Arrested by federal troops for leaving the reservation, Standing Bear stood in a federal courtroom and delivered a speech that brought spectators to tears. Judge Elmer Dundy ruled for the first time in US legal history that an Indian is a 'person' within the meaning of the laws and possessed constitutional habeas corpus rights.
