Secretary of the Interior Cecil D. Andrus today announced two top Indian Affairs appointments in the Department of the Interior.
George Vincent Goodwin, Jr., a member of the White Earth Chippewa Tribe now a Bureau of Indian Affairs Area Director at Minneapolis, was named Deputy Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, and Thomas w. Fredericks, a member of the Mandan-Hidatsa Tribe, was appointed Associate Solicitor for Indian Affairs.
"Mr. Goodwin and Mr. Fredericks have outstanding experience and background for the positions they will fill," Andrus said. "They are among the Nation's most highly qualified Indian leaders and I am pleased they will be with us."
Goodwin, 35, has been a BIA Area Director at Minneapolis since December 1975. He previously was Executive Director of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and then Director of the Indian Community Action Program at Bemidji State College, from which he graduated with a B. J,. degree in 1964.
He also attended the University of New Mexico, the University of South Dakota, and the University of North Dakota Law School. He was Director of the White Earth Community Action in 1965-66, a Program Analyst for the Office of Economic Opportunity 1966-67, and Director of the Leech Lake Community Action 1967-68.
Fredericks at present is Executive Director of the Native America Rights Fund, with which he has been associated since 1971.
The Associate Solicitor for Indian Affairs is the Department's principal lawyer who is responsible for legal matters involving Native Americans.
Fredericks, 34, graduated from the University of Colorado School of Law in 1972 and Minot State College in North Dakota with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1965. He was one of the original founders of the Native American Rights Fund, which has represented numerous Indian Tribes on major issues, including land claims of the Passamaquoddy and Penobscot Tribes in Maine.
Between 1970 and 1974, Fredericks was a management consultant to several Indian tribes and tribal organizations, and from 1966 to 1969 was Administrator of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe at Fort Yates, North Dakota. Prior to then he was a high school teacher one year at Bowbells, North Dakota. A member of the Colorado State Bar, North Dakota State Bar, and American Indian Lawyers Association, Fredericks is married and has two children.
