Native American Religious Freedom, Peyote, and the US Government

Drew Hoyt

Native American Religious Freedom

October 28, 2014

Native American Religious Freedom, Peyote, and the US Government

Since the inception of the United States government, conflict has been present between the US and the Native American tribes that originally resided on this continent. In many instances, such as the Trail of Tears, Native Americans have been systematically forced to abandon the lands and traditions that once defined their culture. In the case of their religious freedoms, Native Americans have fought incessantly to preserve their rituals and traditions. These efforts, at first, proved futile, sometimes ending in violent confrontations like the Massacre at Wounded Knee. However, in the last thirty years, laws have been passed which allow Native Americans to worship more freely, and to preserve the traditions that have defined their culture for centuries.

Peyote, a rare cactus that grows in the wild only in a small area of Texas, is a crucial element of the religion of many Native American tribes. It is known for its hallucinogenic properties, and many tribes have used these effects for religious rituals for centuries. This has drawn a large point of contention with the government, as its properties have defined it as a dangerous, potentially addictive drug by the DEA. The government was adamantly against the use of peyote for any reason, religious or otherwise, until the second half of the twentieth century. Proponents of Native American religious use of the cactus argue that, without the use of peyote for some religious rituals, members of the affected tribes could never be spiritually satisfied. They state that they look to the peyote, or “medicine”, as many refer to it, for guidance and spiritual fulfillment. They viewed the legal restriction of their use of peyote as systematic oppression, and stated that they deserved the same freedom of worship as other religions, such as Christianity.

In 1978, a major turning point for Native Americans occurred that would change the way Native American religion was treated by the US government. That year, President Jimmy Carter signed the American Indian Religious Freedom Act, or AIRFA. The most important element of this act was the legalization of peyote use and transport for religious purposes. For the first time in decades, Native Americans were finally free to practice their rituals the way they had for hundreds of years. This was not the end of the Native Americans’ struggle for complete religious freedom, for at the end of the twentieth century an event occurred that would again shake the Native American people to their core.

In the 1990 legal case of Employment v. Smith, the Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment does not protect religious users of peyote from being fired from their jobs for the use of the cactus, religious or otherwise. This caused a resurface in the tensions between Native Americans and the US government. In 1993, President Bill Clinton signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. This act would have overturned the Employment v. Smith case, but it was struck down by the Supreme Court before it could be passed. In 1994, Clinton signed a law that exempted the religious use of peyote from all controlled substance laws. Laws about the use of the cactus are still quite strict, as one must take a course in the religion, and be able to produce proof of ancestry, in order to be permitted to use peyote. In addition, only three people in the US are permitted to legally harvest the cactus. It has also been quite difficult for incarcerated Native Americans to gain the ability to practice the use of peyote, as well as other traditions such as sweat lodges, while imprisoned. Finally, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 awarded these rights to imprisoned Native Americans.

The road to religious freedom for indigenous  has been a long and arduous one, but in the last thirty years, Native Americans have finally been given the rights to practice their religion as they had for centuries prior to the inception of the United States.

Peyote Cactus Plant http://thesaharadesertfordummies.weebly.com/african-peyote-cactus.html

Peyote Growth Range in the US http://lophophora.blogspot.com/p/geographic-distribution-of-lophophora.html

Mescalero Apache, one of the main user tribes of peyote in the US http://vintagephoto.com/collection/collection.html

Incarcerated Native Americans http://blog.thomsonreuters.com/index.php/in-south-dakota-prisons-indian-inmates-get-to-smoke-for-religious-reasons/

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