To a US Senator: support the Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding Schools

Personalize. If you have family or community connection to the boarding school era, naming that is appropriate and powerful. If you’re a constituent in a state with significant tribal population or substantial historical involvement in the boarding school system, your senators have particular constituency interest.

Dear Senator [Last Name],

I’m writing as a constituent in [city/town] to ask you to support the Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding School Policies Act and to advance it for floor consideration in the current session.

The Indian boarding school system, operating from the late 19th century into the late 20th century, was a federal policy designed to assimilate Native children by removing them from their families, languages, and cultures. The Department of the Interior’s 2022-2024 investigation documented hundreds of federally funded boarding schools, the deaths of thousands of Native children at those schools, and the institutional patterns of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse that affected generations of Native families.

The Truth and Healing Commission Act would establish a federal commission to:

1. Investigate the boarding school era comprehensively, including federal records that have not yet been fully made public.

2. Document survivor testimony and create a permanent historical record accessible to affected communities, scholars, and the broader public.

3. Identify burial sites and support tribal communities in addressing them with appropriate ceremony, repatriation, and ongoing care.

4. Recommend specific federal actions for accountability, repair, prevention of similar harms, and support for affected communities.

5. Coordinate with parallel work in Canada (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, completed in 2015) and with Indigenous-led work elsewhere.

The bill has been reintroduced in multiple Congresses. The political case rests on bipartisan recognition that the United States has not produced a comprehensive accounting of a federal policy that affected hundreds of thousands of Native families. Comparable commissions in Canada and Australia have produced substantial public records and policy responses; the US has not.

[Personalize: name a specific connection if applicable. Examples: “My family has [specific connection to the boarding school era]”; “I work with tribal communities in [specific role]”; “Our state has [specific historical involvement / current tribal nations whose history includes the boarding schools]”; “I’m a constituent who has followed the Department of Interior investigation and supports the federal commission”.]

The substantive case is well-established. The political and emotional weight of acknowledging a federal policy that produced multi-generational trauma is significant. The legislative bandwidth and political prioritization have been the constraint.

I’d appreciate knowing your position on the Truth and Healing Commission Act.

Thank you for your service.

Sincerely,

[Your name] [Your address]