EUGENE–Charles Wilkinson, one of the nation’s leading authorities on Indian Law, contends more of us should be heeding the words of Billy Frank Jr. of Washington’s Nisqually Tribe. Wilkinson wrote them down so we could, and on Nov. 8 he is bringing the Northwest Native American leader to the University of Oregon campus so more can hear him.

Frank, chairman of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission and recipient of the prestigious Albert J. Schweitzer Award for International Humanitarianism awarded by Johns Hopkins University, will join Wilkinson on the UO campus in a discussion of Wilkinson’s latest book.

The pair will read and discuss passages from "Messages from Frank’s Landing, a Story of Salmon, Treaties, and the Indian Way," at a public reception honoring UO Native American law and graduate students at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 8, in the Fir Room at the Erb Memorial Union, 1222 E. 13th Ave.

The reception is jointly sponsored by the Office of the President and the Indigenous Cultural Survival Program, part of the UO’s Native American Initiative that includes construction of a Many Nations Longhouse at the UO, a core of strengthened or new academic and research programs, and enhanced recruiting of Native American students and faculty.

Wilkinson’s book largely tells the story of Billy, his 95-year-old father and their Frank’s Landing–six acres along the Nisqually River that became the focal point in the Fish Wars of the 1960s and ‘70s. The Northwest fish harvest dispute was settled in 1974 when Federal Judge George H. Boldt issued one of the most sweeping rulings ever made in the Pacific Northwest, affirming historic treaty rights of tribal fishermen to 50 percent of the Northwest salmon and steelhead catch.

Confrontations between tribal fishermen and state game wardens became world news headlines in the ‘60s and early ‘70s. Like the schoolhouse steps at Little Rock or the bridge at Selma, Frank’s Landing came to signify a threshold for change, and Billy Frank Jr. became a leading architect of consensus. He continues in that role as head of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission and as one of the most colorful and accomplished figures in the modern history of the Pacific Northwest.

Wilkinson, the Moses Lasky Professor of Law at the University of Colorado and a former member of the UO law faculty, is the award-winning author of many law journal articles and 11 books including standard law texts. He wrote, for example, "Public Land Law," "Indian Law" and "Land and Resource Planning in the National Forests" used as basic texts in law schools across the nation.

In recent years, he also has written for a general audience about society, history and land in the American West. The University of Washington Press recently published his latest book, "Messages from Frank’s Landing."

In 1992, in its 10-year anniversary issue, Outside Magazine named Wilkinson one of 15 "People to Watch," calling him the "West’s leading authority on natural resources law." Over the years he has taken on many special assignments for the Departments of Interior, Agriculture and Justice, completing tasks that included drafting the presidential proclamation establishing the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah and serving as an expert witness in an Idaho case involving federal reserved water rights. He also has served as a facilitator in negotiating disputes between tribes and the United States over land claims.

In 1977, Wilkinson was appointed to the Committee of Scientists charged with reviewing U.S. Forest Service planning regulations.

"The sixties and seventies were tumultuous times in the Pacific Northwest. Violence abounded on the waters of the Puget Sound as Indian fishermen sought to exercise the rights secured to their tribes in treaties with the United States," observes U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye, vice chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Indian Affairs. "Fresh from his service in the U.S. Marine Corps, Billy Frank Jr. returned to the Nisqually Valley only to find another war of sorts being waged in his traditional homeland.

"This (Wilkinson’s book) is the true story of a peaceful warrior who knows that his way of life and the life of all living things is precious," says Sen. Inouye.

"The Boldt decision profoundly changed natural resource management in the Pacific Northwest," explains Daniel J. Evans who was Washington state governor at the time. "This book clearly builds an historical base to help guide us today. The wisdom and patience of Billy Frank fill virtually every page. It is required reading for anyone interested in salmon preservation."

Wilkinson is also a keynote speaker at the "Ridgetop to Ridgetop" joint conference of the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board and the Oregon Association of Conservation Districts, meeting Nov. 6—9 at the Eugene Hilton Hotel.

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