More than a fish: stories of salmon and sovereignty in the PNW

But that relationship has been tested, encroached upon by governments with little regard for tribal sovereignty or environmental justice, limiting indigenous peoples’ access to historic waterways, while salmon numbers dwindle. 

University of Idaho Professor of Law, natural resource rights advocate, and Cherokee Nation citizen Dylan Hedden-Nicely brought his wisdom to the Columbia Center for the Arts on Jan. 21, unraveling how the Northwest’s greatest gilled icon became sacred and ignited centuries of cultural and legal history.

Curated and moderated by Sarah Fox, the Q&A-style lecture was the fourth presentation in Mt Adams Institute’s Sense of Place Season 16 and included insights from Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla members Terrie Brigham and Buck Jones.

Since time immemorial, indigenous peoples along the Columbia River have relied on fish for survival. The river’s most prolific creature, the salmon, became inextricably bound to their existence, both culturally and economically. “It was the first food for our people. The salmon gave up its life for us,” Jones said. “In doing that, we had to become good stewards of the land, good stewards of the water.”

Long ago, the mid-Columbia was one of the most bountiful fisheries on the planet, boasting salmon populations astronomical by today’s standards. For millennia, Celilo Falls was the Northwest’s central indigenous trading hub, where tribes met to exchange goods from across the continent, later earning the nickname “The Wall Street of the West.”

To put Celilo’s commercial scale into perspective, salmon populations in the mid-19th century exceeded 16 million. Today, only 2.5 million inhabit the region.

In 1855, years of fishing without hindrance came to a close, as the United States entered into a series of treaties — the Stevens treaties — with the four largest tribes in the area: the Nez Perce, Umatillas, Warm Springs, and Yakamas, whose collective sovereign control totaled approximately 39 million acres, including land along the Columbia River. 

In exchange for grand expanses of each tribal territory, opening up the area for non-Native settlement, sovereignties received varying sums of money. For example, the Yakamas were paid $200,000 for 12 million acres of land (1.5 cents per acre), whittling their control to 1.4 million acres, miles away from the river.

“I don’t raise that to point out how unconscionable that is; I raise that because money was obviously not the basis of the bargain for the tribes,” Hedden-Nicely said. “They were trying to reserve a homeland; they were trying to reserve a way of life.”

In their purchase of land along the Columbia, launching a systematic exclusion of indigenous people from historic waters, the U.S. additionally promised tribes a perpetual right to fish within reservations and off-reservation usual sites — places where citizens of each territory were accustomed to.

But more settlers quickly moved to the Northwest to become fishers, implementing technology to monopolize the resource, including hundreds of fish wheels: massive funnels that scooped up entire salmon and steelhead runs.

Non-Natives began patenting land along and around the river, including the Winans brothers, whose property was located at a historic Yakama fishing station. Refusing to grant tribal members access to the river, the Winans became entangled in a Supreme Court case, United States v. Winans, claiming the Stevens treaties’ ambiguous language shouldn’t grant tribal members exclusive access rights — that all should have to acquire a license and follow state regulations.

However, the judge decided the Winans’ wishes reflect an “impotent outcome for a nation that promised more and a tribe that expected more,” Hedden-Nicely explained, and ruled that ambiguities in treaties are to be resolved as tribes would’ve understood them, thereby retaining their right to fish without interference. 

Issues persisted, however, as non-Natives refused to recognize the scope of treaty rights. During the allotment era, 1887-1934, the U.S. forced tribes and tribal members to assimilate into the broader Euro-American culture. “The idea was that these treaties were not meant to be permanent, but a placeholder until tribes disappeared,” Hedden-Nicely said. “States began pushing for more control over things they viewed as a part of their own sovereign prerogatives.”

States pushed for taxes and license requirements on tribal fishing. Denied. “It was like whack-a-mole,” Hedden-Nicely said. “Every time a state tried something, tribes saw a successful outcome, forcing them back to the drawing board.”

Thus began the termination era, the mid-20th century, when the U.S began severing its relations with tribes, capitulating to states trying to assert control of tribal fishing. Simultaneously, the arrival of dams saw a precipitous decline in salmon numbers. Oregon, Washington and Idaho quickly blamed the drop on Natives and initiated a violent crackdown on tribal fishing, spawning an era of civil disobedience known as “The Fish Wars.”

Tribes held fish-ins and continued to practice traditional fishing. Although they had different reasons to engage in protest, many drew inspiration from African Americans who, during this time, were actively working to abolish segregation in the American South.

Law enforcement officers began ticketing and confiscating equipment, and as protests continued to spread, they began implementing more draconian tactics. Everyday citizens joined the fight to exclude tribal members from fishing, Brigham explained, sharing how her uncle’s net was cut and her dad’s boat was shot.

Lawsuits hit, namely U.S. v. Oregon and U.S. v. Washington, and in the 1980s, the Supreme Court again ruled in favor of the tribes, recognizing that treaties entitled them to a sufficient amount of fish, 50% of the catchable harvest.

Today, the Stevens treaties remain in place, shifting the focus to sustaining fish populations and improving relationships with state governments. Tribes now regulate their own numbers, police themselves and determine when their harvest has been exhausted.

These efforts require significant financial investment and, in proportion to their budgets, vastly outspend states’ initiatives — despite socioeconomic issues on reservations. “The Nez Perce employs 200 people dedicated to this work and spends between $20-30 million dollars a year,” Hedden-Nicely said. “Since 2008, the Yakama Nation has improved 1900 miles of stream riparian habitat and reconnected fish passage for 557 miles.”

Still, climate impacts and federal intervention yield problematic numbers nonetheless. “States ought to be doing more,” Hedden-Nicely said. “Another thing tribes are doing is creating political pressure to encourage some of these larger systematic changes that need to happen for fish to have a sustainable future.”

Suffice it to say, this is a story that’s still being written. As tribes of the region continue to fight for their sovereignty, the future of the Columbia River salmon population may well depend on honoring the knowledge long carried — and too often ignored — by its first peoples.