Black Snake: Standing Rock, the Dakota Access Pipeline, and Environmental Justice

by Katherine Wiltenburg Todrys

Overview

2022 High Plains Book Award Winner for First Book
2022 Eric Hoffer Award Grand Prize Short List
2022 Eric Hoffer Award Honorable Mention in Culture
2022 IPPY Gold Medal in Environment/Ecology
2022 Next Generation Indie Book Award Finalist in Regional Nonfiction
2022 Montaigne Medal Finalist
2021 Foreword Indies Honorable Mention for History

The controversial Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) made headlines around the world in 2016. Supporters called the pipeline key to safely transporting American oil from the Bakken oil fields of the northern plains to markets nationwide, essential to both national security and prosperity. Native activists named it the “black snake,” referring to an ancient prophecy about a terrible snake that would one day devour the earth. Activists rallied near the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota for months in opposition to DAPL, winning an unprecedented but temporary victory before the federal government ultimately permitted the pipeline. Oil began flowing on June 1, 2017.

The water protector camps drew global support and united more than three hundred tribes in perhaps the largest Native alliance in U.S. history. While it faced violent opposition, the peaceful movement against DAPL has become one of the most crucial human rights movements of our time.

Black Snake is the story of four leaders—LaDonna Allard, Jasilyn Charger, Lisa DeVille, and Kandi White—and their fight against the pipeline. It is the story of Native nations combating environmental injustice and longtime discrimination and rebuilding their communities. It is the story of a new generation of environmental activists, galvanized at Standing Rock, becoming the protectors of America’s natural resources.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781496227614
Publisher:	UNP - Bison Books
Publication date:	06/01/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	336
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Katherine Wiltenburg Todrys is a human rights lawyer and former researcher at Human Rights Watch. She specializes in health and human rights issues.
 

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Introduction
Lisa
1. Oil Production in the Bakken
2. Pipelines and POWER on Fort Berthold
Jasilyn
3. Origins of the Camp at Standing Rock
4. Seventh Generation Rising
LaDonna
5. Militarization of the Response
6. Victory on the Heels of Violence
Kandi
7. From Victory to Eviction
8. The Standing Rock Legacy
Epilogue
Afterword
Acknowledgments
Notes
Index

Editorial Reviews

"An important work of environmental and legal reportage on a contest that will likely continue for years."—Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

Katherine Todrys has written an important book. For all of us who have been rooting for Native Americans in their fight to stop the building of oil pipelines across Native lands and important ecological landscapes, it is a welcomed history. Black Snake is not only exhaustively researched but also masterfully written. It is a must-read for grasping the history of Native Americans’ tragic relationship with the U.S. government and out-of-control capitalism.”—Dan O’Brien, author of Great Plains Bison
 

Dan O’Brien

Black Snake draws on firsthand interviews to tell an important history from the perspective of those who lived it. Thank you for this book.”—Madonna Thunder Hawk, Lakota civil rights activist

Madonna Thunder Hawk

Black Snake is a necessary book, something that Indigenous history needs right now; it is an absorbing story of Native American resilience, protest, and agency. It is a book that should be on reading lists across the United States and beyond.”—Pekka Hamalainen, author of Lakota America: A New History of Indigenous Power
 

Pekka Hamalainen

Todrys tells the story of the people in this fight, of their heartening advances and demoralizing setbacks, in a textured, personal way that brings to life their mistreatment and their inspiring response. This book is a dramatic illustration of how to stand up to powerful interests that are long used to simply casting aside the people in their way.”—Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch
 

Kenneth Roth

I’m so happy this book exists—it tells much of the backstory behind an absolutely epic environmental drama, and it highlights some of the remarkable women who led the fight. If you didn’t get a chance to join the encampment at Standing Rock, this account will put you there!”—Bill McKibben, author of Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?
 

Bill McKibben

04/09/2021

Researcher Todrys documents the protest movement against the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL), which has spent years in the headlines as a pivotal fight for clean water and environmental protection on Indigenous land. Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Chairman Dave Archambault and Tribal Council member Dana Yellow Fat brought a civil lawsuit against Dakota Access LLC, to stop the pipeline's construction; the suit was part of an entrenched battle regarding sovereignty, land rights, and the upholding of environmental protections. For the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, the case is about the Black Hills and the treaties not honored by the U.S. government. Todrys skillfully explores the stories of four Indigenous women in the anti-DAPL movement: Lisa DeVille, Jasilyn Charger, LaDonna Allard, and Kandi (Mossett) White. Their strength and resilience built and fostered the nonviolent community of protestors (numbering over 10,000 people at times) fighting the "black snake" of the pipeline. Chapters bring readers into the heart of the movement, its triumphs, and the undeniable violence and pain the protestors endured for the Mní Wicóni ("water is life") movement. VERDICT A humanistic investigative documentation of the legal and political battle of DAPL. It will appeal to readers interested in Indigenous movements, environmental movements, and the historical significance of this protest.—Angela Forret, State Lib. of Iowa, Des Moines

Library Journal

2021-04-28
Searching account of Native resistance to the oil pipeline that has steadily invaded their homelands.

Dakota Access, a company specializing in transporting oil from the vast Bakken fields of North Dakota and points beyond, had long had its way in securing easements for its pipeline across multiple states. Then, writes human rights lawyer Todrys, they ran into the Standing Rock Sioux, “who would not be bought off.” Indeed, the leadership of Standing Rock had allowed an escrow account meant to compensate the tribe for the loss of the Black Hills to reach $2 billion and go untouched: “The Sioux don’t want the money; they want the Black Hills.” Todrys examines the paths by which Native “water protectors,” many of them teenagers, and non-Native allies came together to resist Dakota Access’ legal onslaught. Not all of the Native people in the pipeline’s path joined in that resistance: She portrays one politician who made a fortune with an energy subcontracting firm of his own, which secured jobs for “oil companies that ostensibly operated under his tribe’s regulation” but pretty much did what they pleased. Those companies scored an early victory with the Trump administration. As it greenlighted the abrogation of tribal sovereign rights, it also relaxed environmental regulations and cheered the arrests of some 600 water protectors. Many Republican-led states, meanwhile, promulgated bills “aimed at restricting the right to peaceful assembly” so that similar protests could not be mounted again. Yet, as Todrys writes in this wide-ranging account, the legal wheels turn slowly. In March 2020, a federal judge demanded that the Army Corps of Engineers conduct the complete environmental review that Trump officials had dispensed with—a review that is ongoing under a new administration and that may close the pipeline, which has since leaked nearly 600,000 gallons of crude oil across the Dakotas.

An important work of environmental and legal reportage on a contest that will likely continue for years.

Kirkus Reviews