SOURCE: "A Sophisticated Indian Looks at the Savage Whites," in Christian Science Monitor, April 2, 1970, p. 7.

In the following review, the critic praises Deloria's humor and hopefulness in his presentation of the American government's broken promises to the Indians in Custer Died for Your Sins.

All of Vine Deloria's stylistic limitations, all the lifeless passages which smack of going through the motions in order to get a book-length manuscript, cannot defeat the subject matter of this angry polemic [entitled Custer Died for Your Sins].

The condition of the American Indians is, for the most part, intolerable. In the names of manifest destiny, economic growth, expanding the frontier, laissez-faire capitalism and cultural homogeneity, the original inhabitants of America have been slaughtered, uprooted, swindled, chastised, excluded, and despised.

Mr. Deloria, a Sioux himself, sums it all up unsparingly.

The brutality shown by earlier generations of white Americans was, he suggests, frank...