Side 1 (labeled with blue sticker):

Woman: ...by whatever means this comes about, now you might not feel that's adequate, but it's the very very best that I can do, and that we can do. And after that, what more?

Mary: Yes, but all I'm telling you folks is your not, if you're perfectly honest, and you have not been, and if you are not going to be, you're in bad trouble. And years ago, in the 1600s, a leader talking to Indian people said, "The problem with you Indians today is that you continue to look for faith among the faithless." We continue to expect you whites to be honorable, and you're not. Well, isn't that? Well, how good you not? With your action, just your action now.

Woman: That we're filling in the gap the best that we can.

Mary: Yeah. Here's your gap, right there.

Woman: I know.

Mary: But you didn't take that.

Woman: Filling in for her...

Mary: No, you didn't. You never will.

Woman: Oh, not replace, only fill in the gap.

Mary: No. You never will. There's your gap right there. Your ignorance of this mother makes you a danger to those youngsters. You're dangerous. That's not funny. Ignorance is more expensive than anything else you could have, and that's what you are. And you're taking up a job that an Indian should have. There's no unemployed Indians here? Then why suck off the Indians?

Woman: I really don't think my employment history or my reasons for being here is part of what I'm talking about.

Mary: It is, because if there was an Indian here...

Woman: I don't care to discuss that issue.

Mary: If there was an Indian here those children may have been safe.

[people talking in background, unintelligible]

Mary: Your work is harder than you show me to be. Your a little bit Indian. That shouldn't give you a carte blanche to be white, to act white.

Man: We have some rule and regulation that we have to live by...

Mary: That rule gives you the opportunity to ignore your first source?

Man: That was out of my hand, I had nothing to do with it.

Mary: Yes you did, because you could have called her, or you could have said to those people, I will go with you to the mother. Just like you're saying now to us, we'll go with you to the fort.

Man: We were informed, maybe...

Woman: Which side are you on?

Man: I'm not taking any side!

Mary: You must!

Man: I'm not taking any side!

Mary: You are on the children's side.

Man: I'm just telling it like it is. [...] at the school became invoved in this. I'm on the side of the children, yes. I want the kids to go home to go home to their parents, because I think that's where they belong.

Woman: Well if it doesn't stop right now, and if I do decide to stay here in this town, it's just going to happen many months from now, even though those white people say, "No, it's not going to happen, it's going to be the end of it."

Man: Well why's it going to happen?

Woman: Because they don't like me, they're prejudiced, and they really want to take my kids away from me because they're very beautiful and very adoptable.

Mary: It's as crazy as that, believe us. There's no way that we could have been rational about this. I went to the kids' lawyer, the kids' lawyer hung up the case, and he said that he was using a thing between the two judges to keep them riled up, and he said, "Of course, this is Judge Coles big problem." And I said, "What do you mean, big problem? I happen to know that it was you report," and he smiles and he looked down at his feet, and said "Well, I guess you caught me in one of my latest ego-trips." And I said, "An ego-trip is supposed to be your impartial and competent handling of my children?"

Woman: You want this to keep on happening, you want me to come up here crying around...

Man: No, I wish we could settle it right now, I wish there was something I could do.

Mary: Well you could have done...

Man: I wish I could say, "Take your kids home with you." You know, that's how I feel.

Woman: How about tomorrow in court so this could all be over with, cause it's been going on for seven years, and they can keep it going on as long as they like it, cause they make a big federal case and orgy out of my case.

Man: I can't promise you anything, like I said, I'll go up there and tell them how I feel.

Woman: I really don't want to move from this country, but if I have to just get away from the court, because when I first moved here in January I had no trouble in Seattle and Olympia, nothing in Bellingham, and I come back here and all of a sudden everyone knows that I'm back again, they locked my files and it should have been dismissed right then and there when they knew that it was locked. And then the closed it on the 29th of July, it was dismissed, it was all over with. And then, without me knowing it, seven days later Judge Cole re-opened it and I still have no legal notice that it's re-opened. [...] crazy, the insane, heartless part of this, this is what I'm dealing with.

Mary: This is what white schools have done. When Indian children have problems in schools, they never [...] them back to their Indian parents. I get calls daily about children who have disappeared from the school. And we find them in institutions, we find them in foster care, we find them up for adoption, we find them in any kind of a thing you can think of, illegally. Kidnapping! I think you have to think seriously that you allow a kidnapping here of an Indian child. Your Indian! That has to mean something to you! It has to. And if it doesn't, Indians are going to have to clean up their ranks, because, mark my word, when whites get our children, aggregation of the treaty is imminent. And they have 800 like this case in courts. Hung up in courts year after year after year. Incompetent caseworks. There's one mother that told us that she was removed from a home where there was allegedly incest. When she got into this supposedly Christian foster home, her foster father, two grown sons, friends and relatives used her like a slut. Years, she'd try like we're trying to tell you, we're trying to tell you! You're not letting us! Your face, you're face and all you've done this morning indicates that you are listening for what they are saying, not what we're saying. And they're two different things. This girl said for years those people mishandled it, she said it would have been easier to work through the alleged incest with my father, at least I could have overcome that. She says, "I've overcome it since I've been married and with my children," and she said, "I have to be honest with my father, and we have to talk about the relationship we had, as it has to do with the safety of my own children." These are the kind of things that if somebody can walk in with no more notice, no more planning than what they did with you, and have you sucked up into that, we're in danger, and you might as well be white, because that's what the white are doing to us just like this woman who finally got emotion, finally kicked something in her. And if you let her she might have cried really, which may have done more good than everything you said this morning.

Woman: [asks question, inaudible]

Mary: There's some information now that Indian children are much more helpful to their parents, their families, than white children are. White children have become an economic fodder of the family. Indian children are still children, they still help their elders, they still respect and honor their parents. But if you hear what these whites are telling Steven, I can't believe it because I've seen these kids with their mothers, I can't believe that they're having a grand old time. I know Steven...

Woman: [inadudible]

Mary: Because they were told not to. See this is the same thing, we brought them up to the foster home, and knowing that Debbie didn't have transportation, put them 40 miles away. So I came from Bellingham, it's almost 200 miles, and we went up. The first time, they were just as happy and loving and caring. We had a real nice visit, we went down and had some lunch downtown. The second time, they were hesitant. The third time, they hung onto their foster mother's coat. The fourth time, she had them calling their mother Deirdra, and calling her Mommy. That's the kind of thing those kids have gone through.

Woman: [Question concerning laws about who is allowed to take a child's clothes off in a foster care environment. Mostly inaudible]

Mary: That's why the kids are here, supposed to be under your protection.

Woman: [inaudible]

Man: How many times did this happen?

Woman: Well, just before I got here from seattle, they took them away from me for five, six days, seven days, I had no idea where they were, and [...] went into the hospital, [...] and I had no other babysitter except for the so-called friend of mine, Debbie. And I knew from the time [...] and going into the hospital, I'd have to end up asking Debbie after all these other people. I knew she was going to have them taken away from me, I knew she was going to have them picked up by the police, and I knew something was going to happen, I knew she was going to be down at [...], and Iknew it, they were taken away from me, she promised would bring them up on friday, [...], and she called me up and said, "Sorry Betty, they're taken away." [...]

Mary: See, this kind of pattern, what you went through is not [...]. You're a woman in a hospital delivering a child and they come in...

Woman: We were excited to see [...]'s baby boy. We wanted to see him really bad, [...]. And I didn't know I was going to leave Seattle, I had already payed for my house before I had even came here from Seattle, I paid for my house a half a year in advance. My rent, my bills, [...], we were all ready to go, and seven days later when we got on the bus, Steven finally [...].

Mary: If they would have gone down, and had a case, and talked with the parents, they could have had their clothes, they could have had a good time. There was no reason why they couldn't be with their friends! But they would have be [...] if honesty was part of the legal system. I don't know, I never dealt with people, like I say, I worked for the state for 40 years, I never had to lie to people.

Man: Well, I really feel bad that this has to happen this way. I can see your point, I wish I would have...

Mary: If it doesn't stop now, it'll just continue again.

Man: I'll tell you what, you know, this is something new for me, that never happened, I think in the future, maye if asked by the law that they're going to take some kids out of my school, I'm definitely going to make a point to talk to the parents if possible.

Mary: I think I would like to talk with that school board, because I think this is going to be more and more a problem.

Man: I think maybe you should.

Woman: [inaudible]

Man: [inaudible]

[High-pitched buzz becomes to loud to hear conversation at this point].

Side 2: Blank.