“A cold wind blew on the prairie on the day the last buffalo fell. A death wind for my people.”

Every seed is awakened, and all animal life.

In my early days, I was eager to learn and to do things, and therefore I learned quickly.

Therefore, I do not wish to consider any proposition to cede any portion of our tribal holdings to the Great Father.

You think I am a fool, but you are a greater fool than I am.

I am here by the will of the Great Spirit, and by his will I am chief.

I am nothing, neither a chief nor a soldier.

What white man has ever seen me drunk? Who has ever come to me hungry and left me unfed? Who has seen me beat my wives or abuse my children? What law have I broken?

Is it wrong for me to love my own? Is it wicked for me because my skin is red? Because I am Sioux? Because I was born where my father lived? Because I would die for my people and my country?

Our religion seems foolish to you, but so does yours to me. The Baptists and Methodists and Presbyterians and the Catholics all have a different God. Why cannot we have one of our own?

He put in your heart certain wishes and plans; in my heart he put other different desires.

The life my people want is a life of freedom. I have seen nothing that a white man has, houses or railways or clothing or food, that is as good as the right to move in the open country and live in our fashion.

You come here to tell us lies, but we don’t want to hear them. If we told you more, you would have paid no attention. That is all I have to say.

What does it matter how long I pray, so long as my prayers are answered?

This nation is like a spring freshet; it overruns its banks and destroys all who are in its path.

It is through this mysterious power that we too have our being, and we therefore yield to our neighbors, even to our animal neighbors, the same right as ourselves to inhabit this vast land.

If we must die, we die defending our rights.