Joe Baca was a U.S. Representative in, D-Calif. He sponsored House Resolution 76 to establish a legal holiday recognizing Native Americans’ contributions.

Roberta Combs is president of the Christian Coalition, a political action organization that describes itself as “pro-family.” According to news releases on its website, the coalition has several times agreed with statements made by Mitt Romney.

Read “non-observance” for an idea of which states have opposed celebration of Christopher Columbus and why the holiday has become increasingly unpopular.

John Ankerberg is president of the Ankerberg Theological Research Institute in Chattanooga, Tennessee. He has a daily radio and television show.

In response to Berkeley’s Indigenous Peoples’ Day in place of Columbus day, Yale raised awareness of the holiday’s brutal origin and history in 2009.

Read an article about how Berkeley changed the Columbus Day holiday into Indigenous Peoples’ Day in 1992, after the city declared Columbus not a hero. 

Montana, in addition to Columbus Day, celebrates American Indian Heritage Day on the fourth Friday of September. Read a column published Sept. 23, 2005, by the Billings Gazette.

Jonathan Batkin directs the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian in Santa Fe, N.M. He has been published widely on Pueblo Indian pottery and the Native American curio trade, including From the Railroad to Route 66: The Native American Curio Trade in New Mexico (Wheelwright Museum of the Amer, 2008).

Joe Shirley Jr. of Chinle, Ariz., is president of the Navajo Nation, which includes portions of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. Contact George Hardeen.