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EL: The best attitude is look to the future and live the way you
want to. Our way of life, the Dakota way
of life is gone, it’s gone forever. It’s
never coming back. The attitude is go on
and be thankful that we’re still here.
We have a life. Some people don’t
have what we have today. I see this in
prison. [Mr. LaBelle works in food service at the Stillwater Correctional
Facility.] I see these guys sit there, some of them doing double life. They have no future. I compare that to the Indian cause. It’s not good to dwell on but still it’s
there, it’s there. It happened and it’s
there. I speak to some of the native
boys in there. They hate white
people. The [prison authorities] took a
whole bunch out of there a month ago called the Native Mob. Every prison in the State went on
lock-down. Federal Marshals came in and
took out over 200 of them. {They} took
them to Federal Prison because they were a bad influence on the other natives
in the prison system. But it’s still
there. They still talk about it. Some of these young kids come in there and
they have bad feelings. There’s fights
in there all the time. Not good. But
fighting in prison, you’re never going to get away from it. There’s so many thoughts and actions and
black people against the whites, the Indians against the whites, the Indians
against the blacks. It happens every
day, not good.
Cite
Ed LaBelle. "." https://www3.mnhs.org/usdakotawar/stories/contributors/2202
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