Ada Deer
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| 6th Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs | |
| In office 1993–1997 | |
| President | Bill Clinton |
| Preceded by | Eddie Frank Brown |
| Succeeded by | Kevin Gover |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1935-08-07)August 7, 1935 Keshena, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Died | August 15, 2023(2023-08-15) (aged 88) Fitchburg, Wisconsin, U.S. |
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| Political party | Democratic |
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Ada Elizabeth Deer (August 7, 1935 – August 15, 2023) was an American scholar and civil servant who was a member of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin and a Native American advocate. As an activist she opposed the federal termination of tribes from the 1950s. During the Clinton administration, Deer served as Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Indian Affairs. Due to all of her advocacy and organization on behalf of Native people, she was recognized as a social work pioneer by the National Associate of Social Workers in 2010. [1]
Deer was born in Keshena, Wisconsin, on August 7, 1935,[2] and grew up living on an Indian reservation.[3] Deer was an active member of the Menominee tribe, which is located in the northeast part of Wisconsin. Deer's mother was an advocate for Native American rights, and Deer followed in her mother's footsteps.[4] As the oldest of five children, Deer helped take care of her siblings. Deer's mother began taking her to Menominee council meetings when she was four.[1] These meeting stuck with her and were influential for her later career. She felt that she was more exposed to the world around her because of it and it was her first exposure to politics.[1] Later in life, as a high schooler, Deer visited the University of Wisconsin-Madison as part of a government and leadership program known as Badger Girls State. This gave Deer the opportunity to meet people all across the state and visit the capitol.[1] Deer later returned to the campus, but this time as a student where she obtained a bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1957, being the first Menominee to do so, and later obtained a Master of Social Work from the New York School of Social Work (later Columbia University School of Social Work) in 1961.[5][6][7] She subsequently served in Puerto Rico with the Peace Corps for two years. Deer later went on to become a Menominee social worker.[8]
Following the completion of her graduate work, Deer returned to the Midwest to be closer to the Menominee Nation, settling in Minneapolis. She found few local services in place for Native Americans living in urban settings. Due to her background in social services, Deer worked to advocate on their behalf with federal authorities. Under the Menominee Termination Act of 1954, Congress ended the special relationship between the Menominee tribe of Wisconsin and the federal government, and the Menominee tribe had been governed by a corporate body called Menominee Enterprises, Inc (MEI).[9] MEI was controlled by a voting trust and Menominee tribal members had no shares in the corporation. Four of the voting trust members were Menominee; however, five votes were required in order for the trust to take action. In the 1960s and 1970s, there was renewed Congressional involvement in rebuilding tribal infrastructure, both socially and economically.[9]
Deer and Jim White became leaders of an organization, Determination of Rights and Unity for Menominee Stockholders (DRUMS), formed in 1970 in opposition to a proposed land development of Legend Lake, a non-Indian owned artificial lake and housing property plan on Menominee land.[10] The selling of land as an economic stimulus to non-Indians was a direct result of poor economic conditions that the Menominee had been living in since termination. DRUMS members gained two seats on the MEI Board, and by the end of the following year had obtained a majority of MEI Board seats.[9] After successfully stopping the land development in 1972, DRUMS later began the fight to reverse termination and regain status as a federally recognized and sovereign Indian tribe. Originally in opposition to MEI, members of DRUMS eventually gained positions in MEI offices where they began lobbying the United States Congress for Menominee restoration.[11] As part of these efforts, Deer directly engaged with Senators and Representatives in Congress and crafted legal briefs advocating for Menominee sovereignty.[8]
Her efforts, along with many other Menominees, played a part in bringing the Termination Era to a close. Due to the oppressive legislation of the Termination Era, Deer lobbied on behalf of the Menominee people and was able to cultivate a grassroots campaign to help the Menominee people.[6] Due to her advocacy, on December 22, 1973, President Richard Nixon signed the Menominee Restoration Act.[12][8] This legislation restored official federal recognition to the Menominee tribe. Because of her active participation in changing the legislation, Ada Deer was the first woman to chair the Menominee tribe in Wisconsin.[8] From 1974 to 1976, Deer served as chair of the Menominee Restoration Committee. Before and after her term in the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), Deer served on the National Support Committee (NSC) of the Native American Rights Fund (NARF). She has served as chair of the NSC and chair of the NARF board of directors.[13]
In 1992, Deer ran for Congress. She almost became the first Native American woman elected, but narrowly lost her race to Republican Scott L. Klug.[6] In 1993, however, Deer was appointed Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs at the Department of the Interior by President Bill Clinton, serving as head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs from 1993 to 1997. She was the first woman to hold this position. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt praised her for her "lifelong commitment to American Indian rights, to improving the lives of American Indians, and to the strengthening of tribal governments".[14]
During this period, she was a delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee. From January to May 1997, she served as Chair of the National Indian Gaming Commission.[15]
Deer was involved in electoral politics beginning in the 1970s. In both 1978 and 1982, Deer ran for Secretary of State of Wisconsin, losing both elections.[8] In 1984, Deer served as vice chair of Walter Mondale's 1984 presidential campaign.[3]
In 1992, she ran for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, mounting a campaign in Wisconsin's 2nd congressional district. She won the Democratic primary without "soft money" funding from political action committees. Following her primary win, a local newspaper ran a photo of Deer proudly holding a sign reading "Me Nominee" in a reference to her tribal membership. Ada Deer became the first Native American woman in Wisconsin that ran for U.S. Congress. However, she lost the general election to incumbent Scott Klug, a Republican.[8]
In 1993, Deer was appointed assistant secretary of the U.S. Department of Interior of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. While in office, she helped create a federal policy for more than 550 federally recognized tribes. When Republicans won a majority in the 1994 United States House of Representatives elections, Deer was successful in preserving federal funding for the Bureau of Indian Affairs, as part of their promised Contract with America proposing to decrease the size of the federal government.[8]
In 2020, Deer was a Joe Biden delegate at the 2020 Democratic National Convention (DNC).[16] Deer endorsed State Treasurer Sarah Godlewski's campaign for Senate in the 2022 election.[17]
Deer taught in the School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin–Madison from 1977 until 1993,[1] holding the title of Distinguished Lecturer. Beginning in 1977, she was also a lecturer in the American Indian Studies program and from 2000 to 2007 was the program's director.[1] During her tenure, she co-founded Milwaukee's Indian Community School. She also created the first program at the university to provide social work training on Native American reservations. In addition, she was a fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government.[18]
Deer died at a hospice of natural causes in Fitchburg, Wisconsin on August 15, 2023, at age 88.[8][19][20]She was surrounded by loved ones, and was remembered as a calming presence.[21]
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