Tribal grievances need Maine’s attention

When I was a child, my father taught me how to can vegetables using a pressure cooker. He placed glass jars with rubber gaskets and clamp covers in a steel pot with a lid and a steam valve. He explained to me that there was an optimal amount of steam necessary to preserve the vegetables.

Too little pressure and the canning process would not work. Too much pressure and the glass jars in the cooker would explode.

I recalled this canning lesson when I read the Oct. 10 BDN article titled, “Land Claims Revisited.” At the very end of the struggle, in 1980, just before the affected governments agreed on the settlement, someone decided that the proposed agreement should include “a safety valve,” a mechanism designed to release pressure caused by the Settlement Act’s imperfections.

That mechanism was the Maine Indian Tribal State Commission (MITSC), comprised of eight members chosen by the tribes and state of Maine. MITSC meets six to eight times a year to consider the state of the relationship between the tribes and the state. MITSC makes recommendations and it attempts to find common ground between parties.

The drafters of the Settlement Act believed that there needed to be a forum to which the state and the tribes could take grievances and have them discussed by knowledgeable people in an atmosphere of mutual respect.

Over the past 25 years, the state of Maine has been content to let MITSC manage tribal discontent with Settlement Act outcomes all by itself. No longer is there a State Bureau of Indian Affairs to meet the social welfare needs of tribal members. No longer is there a legislative committee whose responsibility is to oversee the relationship between the tribes and the state. No longer is there a cabinet-level official whose primary responsibility is to advise the governor and Legislature on issues of importance to the tribes. MITSC stands alone: eight volunteers organized by a part-time executive director and a neutral chair.

I have served as a state representative to MITSC since 1998. It has at once been a rewarding and frustrating experience. Tribal representatives on the commission are passionate when they speak to the need for state recognition of tribal sovereignty. MITSC representatives often have difficulty getting the executive and legislative branches of state government to devote enough time and thought to the issues of greatest concern to the tribes.

In many instances, the attorney general’s perspective on Indian issues differs from that of the governor and the legislative leadership. It has been difficult for state government to speak with one voice.

Periodically pressure builds within MITSC itself. This happened in 1999 when tribal representatives were upset with state representatives who spoke directly to a legislative committee instead of through MITSC’s chair.

It happened again in 2003 when the voters of Maine rejected a tribally organized casino, and on the same day approved a non-Indian, privately organized “racino.” In both instances, it took many months to re-establish effective relationships between tribal and state representatives on MITSC.

Maine’s leaders would be wise to recognize that a failure to deal effectively with tribal grievances ultimately will result in an inability to promote mutual shared interests that enhance both tribal and non-tribal communities.

The governor and Legislature elected in 2006 have the opportunity to begin a serious process of reconciliation by recognizing the pre-eminence of tribal sovereignty, rejecting the notion that tribes should be treated like towns, endorsing federal court jurisdiction over disputes between tribes and the state, and declaring in strong terms that the state of Maine respects the tribes and honors efforts to preserve tribal culture.

Men and women of good will, acting reasonably, could accomplish all of these actions within the broad, existing framework of the Settlement Act.

Are we prepared to face these issues head-on, or will we evade them, and in the act of doing so, further alienate those who are the least alien among us?

Michael Hastings lives in Hampden.