4BI CHRONICLESnto find out that it does — againstnyou — if you are white. Rizzo couldnnever articulate this very well, and thenmedia would never discuss it. But thenfrustration was real, and since Goodencouldn’t live up to his fairy-tale medianimage, this instance of reverse discriminationnonly deepened it.nDespite any number of opportunities,nRizzo committed no suicidalnblunders to speak of—a major newsnstory in itself Wilson Goode ploddedneasily along, and some took to callingnhim the “Teflon Mayor” because thenMOVE disaster counted little againstnhim.nThe campaign was almost entirelyndevoted to endless dissections of thencandidates’ respective records in ofiEce,nso that it was easy to forget that anothernmayor — Bill Green — held office betweennRizzo and Goode. Talk of thenfuture was largely limited to whether antrash-to-steam plant should be built innSouth Philadelphia (Goode said yes,nRizzo said no).nShortly after the election, MayornGoode began a “housecleaning” innwhich a number of high officials werenreplaced, and the outlines of the newnliberal consensus began to form. Wenwill be increasingly hearing how thenmayor has learned from past mistakesnand is at last growing into the office,nand how the time has come to forgetnpast differences and unite for the commonngood.nIn much of South Philadelphia,nthough, this blather will be dismissed,nand city government will remain annobject of bemused scorn. They wouldnhave preferred Rizzo in office, but, innthe end, it makes no great difference.nHere, the difference between politicsnand governance is well understood,nand the latter is self-administered asnmuch as possible. The inherent distrustnof government in South Phillynmay be the counterpart to the intellectualnmood of the men who met in thisncity 200 years ago to insulate governancenfrom rogue politics — an experimentnthat, in Philadelphia at least,nseems to have failed.n/. Michael Bolinski, a ghostwriternbased in Devon, PA, is also groomnand herbal consultant to T.P. Sheridan,na standardbred racehorse.nLetter From thenSouthwestnby Odie FaulknBurying the HatchetnWhat now are called “the Indian wars”nended about a century ago, and thenparticipants in those battles are deadnwithout exception. After 1886, whennGeronimo and his band surrendered,nthere were no more off-reservation wildnIndians. Native Americans had becomenan administrative, not a military problem.nThe reservations would become anpolicing system where the Indians werenfed and where halfhearted attemptsnwere made to teach them to farm.nGood intentions were the vehicle fornpassage of the Dawes Severalty Act ofn1887. According to the do-gooders whonpushed this measure, the best future fornIndians was assimilation, which meantnmaking them become like all othernAmericans. To accomplish this, Indiansnwere encouraged to take up a homesteadnof some 160 acres. In short, thenintent was to break up Indian tribalngovernments, dissolve the reservations,nand force each Indian head-of-family tonaccept a homestead and send his childrennto a white school. Indians clearlynwere to be forced to forget their tribalncustoms, religion, and heritage.nYet the tears of the living minglednwith the blood of the dead and formedna fertilizer that fed an enduring cropnof hatred and misunderstanding — onnboth sides. Despite the efforts of men ofnreason, red and white, the Indian warsnhave continued into the 1980’s, and nonend is yet in sight. In 1924 Indians werengiven citizenship, but today a debatencontinues about what type of citizensnthey should be.nThe fundamental cause of this continuingnwar between the two races is thensame that caused the conflict when thenweapons were arrows and bullets, notnclenched fists and hard words: twonphilosophies of life in direct opposition.nThe sons of Spain, France, and Englandnwho came to the New Worldnthought they had a right to this landnbecause of their superior civilization.nThey were unwilling to allow a fewntribes of what they thought to be “uncivilizednnatives” to have domain over ancontinent of fertile acres, good grass,nand mineral wealth. The old order, saidnnnthe newcomers, had to give way.nYet these Americanized Europeansnbrought with them the intellectual baggagenof their ancestors, including thenGhristian emphasis upon the sacrednessnof life and the sanctity of property. Tonsalve his conscience, this newcomernhad to convince himself somehow thatnthe Christian ethic and the Anglo-nSaxon common law on property pertainednonly to “humans”; if Indiansnwere something less than human, theyncould be robbed and killed with impunity.nFrom the time of Jamestown andnPlymouth Rock to the third quarter ofnthe 19th century — a quarter of anmillennium — whites told each othernthat Indians were murderers of men,nrapers of women, kidnappers of children,nand thieves without peer. GeneralnPhilip Sheridan encapsulated this philosophynin his famous comment, “Thenonly good Indian is a dead Indian,”nwhich at once became both justificationnand inspiration for further killing. GeneralnJohn Pope, commanding the Divisionnof the Missouri, wrote in Januarynof 1880, “Everybody knows beyond thenprobability of dispute that the Indiansnon this reservation (like all the Apaches)nare a miserable, brutal race, cruel, deceitfulnand wholly irreclaimable —nalthough for years they have been fednby the government and ‘civilized’ byntheir agent, they are in no respectndifferent from what they were when thenprocess began.”nWith officials in high places expressingnsuch sentiment, little wonder that itnfiltered down to become ingrained innthe hearts and minds of those whonsettled the West. Benjamin Butler Harris,nbound for the gold fields of Galifornianin the spring of 1849, was told by ansettler on the banks of the Brazos Rivernin Texas, “Shoot at every Indian younsee and save them a life of misery innsubsisting on snakes, lizards, skunks,nand other disgusting objects.” In ThenDevil’s Dictionary, Ambrose Biercendefined “Aborigines” as “Persons ofnlittle worth found cumbering the soilnof a newly discovered country. Theynsoon cease to cumber; they fertilize.”nMany frontier Americans agreed withnthis definition and did their best tonmake it come true.nSimultaneously the Indians needednno propaganda to ready themselves tonkill and take property. In most tribesn