PEYOTE THRIVES IN SOUTH TEXAS

Native Americans Use It During Religious Ceremony

MIRANDO CITY, Texas -- Salvador Johnson heads out before dawn on a
recent winter morning, traipsing through cactus and mesquite brush
with a shovel and a gunny sack, searching for peyote.

He is one of five licensed peyote dealers in the nation, and has spent
most of his life searching for peyote in the wild brush country
between Laredo and Hebbronville.

He sifts dried peyote buttons -- small rounded pieces of light brown
cactus -- through his fingers on a table behind his frame house in
this town of 300, located halfway between Hebbronville and Laredo.

It is a town where cowboys still drive horses across the highway,
which leads past Laredo and into Mexico.

"It is a good life," he said.

"You don't have a boss looking over your shoulder," Johnson said. "You
spend most of your time outdoors. It is a great joy for me."

Four South Texas counties -- Webb, Zapata, Jim Hogg and Starr --
comprise an area known as the "peyote gardens" to Native Americans,
and it descends into the Sierra Madre of Mexico.

To many Native Americans, South Texas is a holy place, Johnson
said.

"Coming here is like a pilgrimage to the Holy Land for them," he
said.

Native Americans belonging to many tribes from throughout the country
make pilgrimages to South Texas at least once a year, often in
February to see the tiny cactus, which they believe to be sacred,
growing wild.

In February, at an annual festival, they pitch their tepees in
ranchers' nearby pastures and hold all-night peyote ceremonies.

Although Johnson, 53, is a Baptist, he also is active in the Native
American Church, which is based on the peyote religion that has been
part of indigenous life for 10,000 years. The church, with about
400,000 members nationwide, combines elements of Christianity with the
worship and consumption of peyote.

In the Native American Church, peyote has the same place as the
communion sacrament in Christianity, said Lourdes Jiordani, a
professor of anthropology at Albright College in Pennsylvania, who
studies the peyote religion. Only those who are at least one-quarter
Native American can legally purchase peyote, although many non-Native
Americans take peyote at church ceremonies.

The ceremony is led by a roadman, who is similar to a priest or
minister. The title of roadman comes from his role of leading people
on a journey through peyote visions. This leadership role is passed
down through an apprentice process from one generation to another.

Johnson said that the Native American Church has helped
him.

"It is just like the Baptist or the Catholic Church," he said. "All
religions are basically the same. What peyote does is give me a clear
mind to go to my Creator. The way I look at it, I am Mexican-American,
and my ancestors were more Native American than anybody else."

The Effects Of Peyote

Peyote, a small, round cactus with fuzzy tufts instead of spines,
produces about 50 chemically related compounds. Its effects can range
from bursts of physical energy to producing visions, due largely to
the presence of the chemical mescaline.

"It makes me able to communicate with the Creator," said Jerry
Etcitty, 64, a Navajo roadman from Aztec, N.M., who has been coming to
Mirando City to buy peyote from Johnson for about 40 years. "I have
been eating it since I was a teen-ager."

When Etcitty takes peyote, he sees visions of God, of the moon and
stars, and of the creation of Earth itself, he says. Some of his
visions have been life-changing, he says.

"Once, I saw this light shining from heaven into my heart," he said.
"I couldn't think of any words that matched what was happening. But
after that, I wanted to take care of my life and my children. I quit
drinking. I can still see that light shining."

More To Life'

Lillian Etcitty, the Navajo roadman's wife, said peyote cured her and
her husband of alcoholism, and that it is widely used as a treatment
for alcoholism among Native Americans. After she became sober, she
took a job as an alcohol counselor in Gallup, N.M.

"I respect it and take care of it," she said. "I don't misuse it. Some
people take too much or misuse it, and that is wrong because it is
sacred. It wakes up Spirit in our hearts and minds. It makes us
realize that there is more to life than drinking and partying."

Lillian Etcitty said that children in the tribe are given small
amounts of peyote and allowed to attend meetings.

"We would never give our children something that would hurt them," she
said. "It helps them develop their spiritual life. We also look at it
as medicine. It can cure things ranging from cancer to tuberculosis,
if you have faith. My husband even gives it to our little dogs and
cats when they are sick. That is how much love he has in his heart."

Governmental Concerns

Jane Maxwell, a researcher with the Texas Commission on Alcohol and
Drug Abuse, said that the use of peyote among Native Americans is
dangerous, and she fears its acceptance among them will make it spread
to those of other cultural backgrounds.

She said she has received no reports of overdoses, deaths, or
illnesses caused by peyote.

"It is classified with hallucinogens, and we have had significant
problems with hallucinogens, including convulsions and bad mental
trips," Maxwell said. "Deaths have been reported with some of the
native hallucinogens, but not with peyote."

She said she doesn't like the drug being touted as cure for
alcoholism.

"It is substituting one psychotropic substance for another," she said.
"Everything came about as a cure for something. Heroin was meant to be
a cure for opium addicts."

Creativity Enhancer

The DEA classifies peyote as a drug with no medicinal value but not as
an addictive drug.

"A lot depends on if you take it in a ritual context," said Jiordani,
the anthropologist. "If you take it by yourself, there is the danger
of a bad trip. But if you have someone to guide you through and do it
in a sacred context, it isn't dangerous."

Lillian Etcitty said she has suffered no ill effects from peyote, and
it has helped her artistic work.

"Mother Peyote enhances creativity. Some people are born artists or
silversmiths. For those who aren't, peyote helps us see in a new way
and be more creative."

Legislative Hurdles

For years, it was difficult for Native Americans such as Etcitty to
obtain peyote, which they refer to as medicine. They had to be careful
to drive with their peyote supplies through states where peyote was
legal. In 1990, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment
did not protect the use of peyote by Native Americans for religious
purposes.

In 1994, however, Congress voted to allow the use of it for religious
purposes and kept states from cracking down on transport of peyote by
Native Americans. The legislation also allowed the peyote dealers of
South Texas -- three in Rio Grande City, one in Oilton and Johnson in
Mirando City -- to stay in business.

"It has always been a big part of the culture of this town," Johnson
said. Many residents, he said, treat him with all the friendliness and
respect of any other local businessman.

"I served on the school board for six years," he said.

"Around here, harvesting peyote is a respected way of making a
living."

Finding The Cactus

It is growing increasingly difficult, though, as supplies deplete and
many ranchers won't allow Native Americans or peyote harvesters, known
locally as peyoteros, on their land. The ranchers who do allow them on
their land charge them between $1,500 and $2,000 a month for a peyote
lease, in an arrangement similar to a hunting lease.

"It is getting harder and harder to get on the ranches," Johnson said.
"They don't want to be associated with peyote, and the ones that are
don't want it publicized. A lot of them have had nieces and nephews
die of drug overdoses, and they think all drugs are bad."

Since Mexico doesn't allow the harvest or possession of peyote,
Johnson and other peyote dealers can't look south in Mexico for
increased supplies, even as the demand from the Native American Church
increases.

The use of peyote is traditional among some Hispanics in South Texas,
too.

"When I was younger, you could buy it at the market in Nuevo Laredo,
or at any of the local yerberias (herb shops)," Johnson said.

His wife, Vicenta, said that elderly Hispanics still use the drug as a
cure for a variety of ailments, including as a rubbing lotion to treat
arthritis when it is mixed with alcohol.

Picking The Peyote

Despite shortages, Johnson said he is sure there will always be enough
peyote for the needs of Native Americans.

"The Creator put peyote on the earth for the people," Johnson said. "I
think that the peyote reveals itself when it is ready. Some days I
won't find any, and some days a lot. I think it communicates with us,
and lets us know when it is ready to be harvested."

Johnson prays to the peyote before he and his crew of 15, which often
includes his six brothers and a group of out-of-work roughnecks, go
out into the fields to harvest it.

The peyote that he harvests on 30,000 acres lies close to the ground,
and he slices the buttons from the roots, keeping them intact. The
plant takes about 20 years to mature.

He can pick as many as 1,000 buttons in an hour. He sells them at $150
for 1,000 fresh buttons and $170 for 1,000 dried buttons. He makes
about $30,000 a year, and must give copies of his receipts to the Drug
Enforcement Administration and the Texas Department of Transportation,
which oversee peyote sales in the state.

DEA officials said that anyone without a criminal background is
eligible to distribute peyote. Peyote distributors don't have to come
from a Native American background. They must be licensed through the
Texas Department of Public Safety.

The Ceremony, History

The peyote meetings begin with the erection of a tepee, Etcitty said.
Then, members of the congregation smoke corn shucks like a cigarette
and begin the prayer service.

"When we have finished praying, we pass the medicine," she said. "We
talk about our wishes and our prayers, and if we are sick, ask for
healing. The medicine is usually passed in a powder form, and then if
they can handle it, people drink peyote tea afterward. Then some mix
up the powder and the tea into a mulch and eat it."

The use of peyote spread from Mexico, where it was popular among the
Huichol Indians, to tribes in the Great Plains in the late 19th
century, Jiordani said.

Medicinal Value

Many believe strongly in the plant's value as a medicine, Jiordani
said.

"It literally has saved many from alcoholism," she
said.

"It seems to act like methadone to those who have drug dependencies.
It helps them through the transition. There is quite a bit of research
on treatment of alcoholism among Native Americans, and it is
considered a positive avenue of treatment."

Peyote serves other purposes, too.

"Some say the peyote acts as teacher and that people are told things
to do, and given moral precepts," she said. "Some are able to see the
future."