MN Honor Tax

11/04/2025

Look what a friend of the Honor Tax found in the St. John the Evangelist Episcopal Church bulletin in St. Paul. Pidamaya St. John's!

09/30/2025

Today is Orange Shirt Day, a day of truth and remembrance. The day started in Canada, but is just as relevant in the United States. A July 2024 report from the U.S. Department of Interior detailed the 417 institutions that operated in 37 states and identified 973 Indigenous children who died while attending the schools. Innumerable more remain unidentified, including in at least 74 unmarked burial sites in at least at least 65 different institutions. It also details that the U.S. spent $23.3 *billion* inflation-adjusted dollars at these institutions to, as the policy's architect Captain Richard H. Pratt said, "Kill the Indian in [the children], and save the man." Whether we talk about this history or not; whether we scrub it from museums, tear that page out if the textbook; that past lives in every Native person you meet. Every. Single. One. May we be good relatives who learn instead of hide. Check the comments for resources about Orange Shirt Day and our Boarding School history.

Image credit: Sweetgrass Inspirations

09/30/2025

08/08/2025

05/01/2025

To our relatives, families, and communities:

12/26/2024

December 26, 1862.

Look at the edges of the crowd. Look at the families, dressed for the cold but with coifed hair and top hats. Eager to celebrate the day after Christmas with death.

It was the largest ex*****on in US history, and it was ordered to appease Minnesota's settler colonizers. Of the 319 Dakota tried under conditions that fell well short of due process, 303 were sentenced to death. President Lincoln, always the pragmatist, knew the tribunal was not just. He wrote, "Anxious to not act with so much clemency as to encourage another outbreak on one hand, nor with so much severity as to be real cruelty on the other, I ordered a careful examination of the records of the trials to be made, in view of first ordering the ex*****on of such as had been proved guilty of violating females." That would track the rules of war, punishing for war crimes, but not for participation in war. But all the evidence that even arguably pointed to such war crimes only implicated 2 men, and Lincoln knew that would not satisfy the colonizers' blood thirst. He expanded the criteria to sweep in more men. Then expanded it again. In the end, Lincoln ordered the hanging of 38 men. And on the day after Christmas in Mankato, 4,000 men, women, and children watched and cheered.

This is Minnesota history. And it is Minnesota present. In the months that followed, the US rescinded every treaty promise it had made for Dakota land. But it kept the land. That land became, that land is, Minnesota. If you live in, work in, or visit Minnesota, today is an important day to recognize that now is always. U.S. theft and Dakota blood bought your entry. And. Tomorrow starts today. Learn more and chart your own path. Mnhonortax.org

12/10/2024

As we look toward the end of the calendar year and the return of the sun after the solstice, we are grateful. To each of our contributors from Mankato to Norway and back to Le Roy, pidaunyanpi!

11/28/2024

11/25/2024

Yard signs are headed out to the 1851 Treaty Territory today. If you're in the western Twin Cities, Mankato, Northfield, Owatonna or Le Roy, keep an eye out for Honor Tax volunteers!

11/20/2024

When we launched the Mni Sota Makoce Honor Tax in 2023, we had no idea how it would be received. 323 supporters and 1667 transactions later, we can confirm: y'all showed up. From the Twin Cities to Helsinki, Finland (!!) and back, y'all showed up. And we're so very grateful. If you are a contributor who lives on Dakota land, check your email to claim one of these limited-edition signs. And if you're not a contributor yet, join us. We're at mnhonortax.org.

10/24/2024

Have you heard about hempcrete at Cansayapi? Patagonia has a new video that will show you around!

Can you build affordable housing, cut greenhouse gas emissions and bootstrap a strapped community all at once? On the plains of Minnesota, the Lower Sioux In...