Socialism – the Great Deterrent to Native American Indian Progress

Arizona is home to 23 Indian tribes.  If you drive on most of the reservations, you will find a carpet of broken liquor bottles lining the roads. You’ll find unemployment, poorly maintained communities, despair and broken families. The purpose for raising these points is not to belittle Indians, but to point out the root cause of this depressing story – socialism.The system dominating Indian reservations in Arizona as well as other states is, according to Phoenix Seminary theologian Wayne Grudem, author of “Politics According to the Bible,” a “broken, failed system that traps most Native Americans in perpetual poverty and perpetual alienation from the rest of American society.” That is an apt description of socialism’s end results.Reservation land is owned by the tribes and managed by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. No one is allowed to own land, and no one has responsibility for any land. So there is no incentive for anyone to use the land for economic development.Grudem writes: “The lack of personal property rights is highly significant, because the study of economic development in world history shows that the key to economic growth among any people in any part of the world is enabling individuals to be able to obtain clearly documented ownership to their own property.”Private ownership of land encourages land owners to care for, improve and develop their land. That’s how the economy grows and flourishes. It’s how people escape poverty – by gaining employment, developing opportunities and feeding and clothing their families.“But unless a system of private ownership of property can be instituted, American tribes will simply continue trapping their people in poverty forever,” Grudem wrote.Native Americans overwhelmingly vote in support of the champions of socialism – the Democratic Party. In the 2012 presidential election, President Barack Obama – advancing the socialist tradition of Democrat presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson and Bill Clinton -- won 75 percent of the Native American vote in swing states. Mitt Romney won only Pennsylvania among Indian voters.Yet what has this blind support gained the 4.3 million Native Americans in America?

• Generational poverty; 32 percent living below poverty level
• Unemployment 2.5 times the national rate
• Alcoholism death rate seven times the national average; an estimated 75 percent of suicides, 80 percent of homicides and 65 percent of motor vehicle deaths among Native Americans involve alcohol
• 54-percent high school graduation rate
• 80 percent of fourth-graders unable to read proficiently
• Higher rates of child abuse and battered women

These are just a few of the tragic consequences of a socialistic system that has never been able to justify itself in America’s – and Arizona’s – pockets of poverty.