#217 iChange Justice Podcast - The Seeds of Sovereignty: A Lifetime of Indigenous Advocacy with Beth Brownfield
In this special Happy New Year broadcast, host Joy Gilfilen welcomes her longtime mentor and community icon, Beth Brownfield. As we step into 2026 and our fifth season, this episode serves as a masterclass in how one person’s "seeds of justice" can ripple across a nation to change laws, denominations, and heart-centered community policies.
The Seed of a 12-Year-Old: Beth shares the origin of her activism—a seed planted at age 12 after reading a heartbreaking paragraph of contaminated smallpox blankets sent by the U.S. Army, especially Plains groups, to control the Indian problem. Years later she takes her heartbreaking first response through her journey from the Pine Ridge Reservation to the Pacific Northwest, sharing the heroic stories of Sue Ann Big Crow, who transformed racial tensions through a Lakota shawl dance on a basketball court, and the losing fight of Alex White Plume to grow hemp under the protection of native sovereignty.
The Principles of HONOR: Beth details her work with HONOR (Honor Our Neighbors, Origins, and Rights), an organization that worked, at the invitation of Tribes and Nations to: Honor government to government relationships and tribal sovereignty; Affirm Indian treaties; Honor and protect the Earth; Conduct Ourselves in a manner which is respectful of all people; Promote intercultural understanding and awareness. She explains how these principles were practiced in collaborative work to save Whatcom County from the proposed coal terminal, and why the first official acknowledgment of the "first inhabitants of these lands and waters" was an essential first step to restorative justice.
The Doctrine of Discovery: One of Beth’s most significant legacies is her work inspired by the work of Lummi, Jewel James and Shawnee, Lenape, Steve Newcomb to repudiate the Doctrine of Discovery. Beth recounts her campaign to move the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) to pass a national resolution repudiating this archaic legal framework used to dominate the Original Nations and Peoples, their lands, and resources.
Beth describes her methodology as being a "Johnny Appleseed" for justice—planting seeds and letting them take root through the work of community action. She leaves us with a powerful call to action for 2026: "If everyone plants “seeds” as they pass through the world, and picks up the garbage in front of them, we could change the world."