In the Black Hills of North Dakota, an Indian war rages on.<\/p>\n
Since 1930, the University of North Dakota has been the “Fighting Sioux.”\u00a0 The nickname was a reference to the local native culture, and was resonant with another, more famous UND, “The Fighting Irish.”\u00a0 It has proven useful in songs and chants, since it rhymes with lots of everyday words like “Screw” and “You.”\u00a0 (Rowdy students love that.) The Fighting Sioux have lived up to their name, at least in hockey; they have skated to seven NCAA Division 1 national championships.<\/p>\n
But then, in 2000, the war drums of political correctness started thumping.\u00a0 In that year, 21 Native American-related programs and departments at the school issued a statement denouncing the name.\u00a0 They were supported by the Standing Rock Sioux, one of the two largest native councils in the state.\u00a0 In response, the next year, UND alum Ralph Engelstad donated $100 million – one of the largest donations ever made to a university – for the construction of a new hockey arena.\u00a0 His one condition:\u00a0 that the University NEVER change the school nickname.\u00a0 The school took the money and built “The Ralph,” perhaps the finest hockey venue in North America, complete with leather seats, granite walls, and thousands of Fighting Sioux logos and references that would be almost impossible to remove.<\/p>\n
That didn’t impress the NCAA.\u00a0 In 2005, it declared that schools could no longer use Indian names or imagery, unless they gained consent from the tribe. UND protested the decision, lost, and then sued.\u00a0 In 2007, UND and the NCAA settled out of court, with UND getting a three-year extension to gain native support.\u00a0 And they got it, sort of.\u00a0 In April of 2009, the state’s OTHER native council, the Spirit Lake Sioux, voted in favor of keeping the name.\u00a0 But their fellow Sioux at Standing Rock refused to call a new vote.\u00a0 In November, a judge ruled that the North Dakota Board of Higher Education could force a name change.\u00a0 But then, the Spirit Lake Sioux appealed to the State Supreme Court, a process which usually takes seven months.\u00a0 So, just last night, the Board of Higher Education requested the State Supreme Court rule on the appeal within 30 days.<\/p>\n
And so we come to the final battle.\u00a0 Can the folks from Spirit Lake move Standing Rock?\u00a0 Or will Standing Rock live up to its name?\u00a0 Either way, after 80 years, the fate of the “Fighting Sioux” will ultimately be determined by the fighting Sioux.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the Black Hills of North Dakota, an Indian war rages on. Since 1930, the University of North Dakota has been the “Fighting Sioux.”\u00a0 The nickname was a reference to the local native culture, and was resonant with another, more famous UND, “The Fighting Irish.”\u00a0 It has proven useful in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[432,576,863,1014,1158,1166,1278],"class_list":["post-789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-5","tag-fighting-sioux","tag-hockey","tag-ncaa","tag-ralph-engelstadt","tag-spirit-lake","tag-standing-rock","tag-university-of-north-dakota"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/789\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}