When I came out to California in 2004 to lead PCU, one of the first people to call me was the redoubtable Ramona Ripston, who led the ACLU of Southern California at the time. Ms. Ripston wanted me to join a legal action to force LA County to remove the Christian cross from the county's official seal. I was too new to want to wade right into these troubled waters, but the ACLU did finally prevail and the seal was changed. More recently, in January of 2014, the two conservatives on the Board of Supervisors--Michael Antonovich and Don Knabe--were able to get Mark Ridley-Thomas to join them in bringing the cross back yet again, allegedly in the name of "historical accuracy."
Naturally, the ACLU has sued the county yet again over clearly privileging one religion over others in a way that the courts generally find to be unconstitutional. This time I am participating in the lawsuit as a plaintiff, but in my declaration I do not discuss the preferential treatment of one religion so much as I raise a troubling bit of history.
Yes, these supervisors are correct to say that the historic Mission San Gabriel featured a typical bell tower with a cross on the top. But my question and my objection is this: Why would they want to honor the role of that mission in our county's history or to celebrate the role of the mission system in California's history?
Part of the "lore" of California that is still taught in schools is that the 21 Franciscan missions were benevolent enterprises. Father Junipero Serra is held up as a figure to be revered who may soon be declared a saint by the Roman Catholic Church. But from the point of view of Native Americans, the missions were anything but benevolent, and Fr. Serra was anything but saintly.
The Franciscans may have been sincere about wanting to save souls, but the Spanish were primarily interested in gaining control of the territory by pacifying and subjugating the Native peoples. For this reason the missions were all located in Native population centers. And it is not too strong to say that they operated as concentration camps. Converted Native "neophytes" were made to wear special uniforms and live in sex-segregated barracks. They were fed a very poor diet. They were forced under threat of the lash to attend worship and to break completely with their own customs and communities. Most of all, they had to work, doing the back-breaking heavy work required in Spanish-style intensive agriculture. This was especially true at Mission San Gabriel, the largest and most productive of the 21 missions, which grew and milled much wheat, and grazed over 20,000 head of cattle.
In 1786 Jean Francois de La Perouse visited the California missions and observed in his journal:
"Everything reminded us of a habitation in Saint Domingo, or any other West Indian slave colony. The men and women are assembled by the sound of the bell, one of the religious conducts them to their work, to church, and to all other exercises. We mention it with pain, the resemblance to a slave colony is so perfect, that we saw men and women loaded with irons, others in the stocks; and at length the noise of the strokes of a whip struck our ears."
Not surprisingly, disease, malnutrition, and cruel treatment took their toll. Native Americans died in huge numbers during the 65 years of the Mission period; records show that 81,000 people were baptized at the 21 missions, and 60,000 died within their walls. So many deaths, in fact, that mission cemeteries had to be exhumed periodically to make way for more Native bodies. At least 6,000 "neophytes" are thought to be buried at Mission San Gabriel.
So, back to the LA County supervisors' claim that they are sticking up for "historical accuracy" by featuring Mission San Gabriel on the county seal: what they are actually sticking up for is the historical reality of a significant genocide committed by Christians working in the service of empire. And while it may not be fair to judge the historical actors of 250 years ago by contemporary standards, neither is it right or proper to have this particular legacy honored on the county seal. For California's Native peoples, the coming of the Christian cross was anything but good news. If the supervisors really want historical accuracy, how about portraying the Mission San Gabriel as a heap of bones?
Yours for repentance and humility,
Peter Laarman
Coordinator - Justice Not Jails