Laurence Marc Hauptman. In the Shadow of Kinzua

From his first visit to the Seneca Nation territories in 1972 and through his continuing contract work for the Nation beginning in the 1990s, Laurence Marc Hauptman has documented Iroquois struggles with colonists, unscrupulous land companies, New York state, and the federal government. In this, his most recent contribution, the focus is on the Seneca Nation of Indians (SNI) from World War II to 2012, a period dominated by the shadow of Kinzua Dam, which despite valiant efforts by the Senecas and their Indian and non-Indian allies, resulted in the loss of a third of the Allegany Reservation in the early 1960s. This loss of land and the social, cultural, and political disruptions that accompanied it became a reference point and rallying cry for subsequent generations on both Seneca Nation of Indians territories. Hauptman focuses on two themes, the diverse cultural reality of the SNI and its ability to adapt to change. The first he ably documents as a result of Seneca history and the different groups that formed the core of the two residential territories of the nation, the Cattaraugus and the Allegany. He argues that this diversity necessitated a federated political system that resulted in “a permanent condition of shifting alliances based on kinship, locality, and other factors” (p. xxiii). This system began formally in 1848, when the Senecas at Allegany and Cattaraugus replaced their traditional government led by chiefs with an elected system in which the presidency (by custom) alternated every two years between the two territories. Hauptman further suggests that this type of government is responsible for the Senecas' remarkable adaptability and decries the use of the term factionalism to describe the political functioning of the SNI. Though it is not clear how his description differs other than in terminology. Because families are divided in their allegiance to the different parties, at least some members always have access to those in power and harassment by government agencies is used by SNI officials to focus attention on outside threats, rather than internal disagreements.

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