That Time Conservatives John Wayne and Clint Eastwood Had to Repel a Liberal Indian's Surprise Attack in the Middle of the '74 Oscars
As another year comes to a close, it behooves us to remember conservative heroes past and present. John Wayne and Clint Eastwood certainly manage to fit those bills, respectively.
And, on one decidedly woke Academy Awards night in 1974 — back when the word woke literally meant “to arise from slumber” — the two Hollywood cowboys managed to provide a bit of sanity to the most farcical moment in Oscars history.
Yes, that’s even counting Chris Rock getting slapped by Will Smith or “Crash” winning Best Picture. That’s how bad the 1974 ceremony was.
For those of you who weren’t alive then, Marlon Brando was pretty much a shoo-in for Best Actor for his role in “The Godfather.” Except, Brando didn’t want to accept the award.
In his place was Sacheen Littlefeather, a Native American activist who decided to use the occasion to get up on her soapbox about Wounded Knee, the site of a showdown between the militant American Indian Movement, which seized the South Dakota town, and federal law enforcement.
“My name is Sacheen Littlefeather. I’m Apache and I am president of the National Native American Affirmative Image Committee. I’m representing Marlon Brando this evening and he has asked me to tell you in a very long speech, which I cannot share with you presently because of time but I will be glad to share with the press afterwards, that he very regretfully cannot accept this very generous award,” she said in her remarks.
“And the reasons for this being are the treatment of American Indians today by the film industry – excuse me – and on television in movie reruns, and also with recent happenings at Wounded Knee,” she continued.
“I beg at this time that I have not intruded upon this evening and that we will in the future, our hearts and our understandings will meet with love and generosity. Thank you on behalf of Marlon Brando.”
This became one of the most infamous moments in the history of the Academy Awards — although more famous than infamous as time went on, alas:
As Rolling Stone pointed out, a few cowboys had the right response at the time:
Littlefeather’s moment in the spotlight drew a mix of cheers and boos, and she later claimed that none other than on-camera cowboy John Wayne was itching to storm the stage and remove her himself; thankfully, he was ultimately restrained by security guards. Later in the ceremony, Clint Eastwood tried a little counterprotest himself, quipping, “I don’t know if I should present this award on behalf of all the cowboys shot in all the John Ford westerns over the years.”
Touché.
Naturally, as the years passed, Littlefeather went from being a farcical footnote to a veritable hero to the Hollywood left. Before her death in 2022, the U.K. Guardian described Littlefeather as “one of the elders transmitting knowledge down generations … where she mentors young Native American people.”
“I’m going to another place,” she told the paper. “I’m going to the world of my ancestors. I’m saying goodbye to you… I’ve earned the right to be my true self.”
As it turned out, her “true self” was, to quote the San Francisco Chronicle on the matter, “an ethnic fraud.” Her biological sisters told the paper after her death that she was actually of Mexican heritage with a father born in Oxnard, California.
“I mean, you’re not gonna be a Mexican American princess,” her sister Trudy Orlandi said. “You’re gonna be an American Indian princess. It was more prestigious to be an American Indian than it was to be Hispanic in her mind.”
And as for the American Indian Movement — a vicious, nefarious domestic terrorist organization which counted convicted FBI-agent murderer Leonard Peltier among its activist ranks — it lost at Wounded Knee and has never regained the minatory aura it held in the turbulent 1970s. Turns out that John Wayne and Clint Eastwood were the guys in the white hats after all, even with woke Hollywood’s attempted retconning of Sacheen Littlefeather’s fatuous display.
And rest assured, if something as ridiculous as this happens again, you ain’t going to see Timothee Chalamet and Pedro Pascal stepping up the way John and Clint did.
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
Advertise with The Western Journal and reach millions of highly engaged readers, while supporting our work. Advertise Today.
