If the cornerstone of sound public policy is enlightened self-interest, then perhaps Maine officials ought to rethink Indian affairs. Marked by a continuing string of federal court suits, the recent history of Maine-Indian relations remains one of confrontation. Maine spends hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars to convince the courts to limit the scope of tribal autonomy and sovereignty.

Maine’s Indians fight back saying that the Settlement Acts may have applied state laws in Indian country but also protected the traditional rights of tribes to self-government free of state interference. As an underlying issue, this dispute could play out in the courts for decades to haggle over all kinds of regulations from including industrial permitting to zoning and an endless list of others.

It is hard to see how this policy serves Maine citizens. Some of the battles may support the special interests of paper companies or extend the turf of Maine bureaucrats, but the costs to Maine are way out of line. Despite millions in tax breaks and an almost free hand to pollute all of Maine’s major rivers and many minor ones, the paper companies are leaving. Paper is the past. Like the manufacturing and farming jobs that left in the last century, paper will not benefit Maine much in the new century. The future of the Maine economy is in its natural resources, clean air and water, pristine shores and forests and in new, creative economic initiatives.

Maine’s Indians are eligible for millions of dollars of special federal contract preferences, grants, loans and tax incentives for economic development. Typically, Indian economic programs produce benefits well beyond tribal lands. So Maine has a real interest in supporting Indian economic development in the same way it supports any business that agrees to set up new operations here. Especially in isolated reaches of rural Maine, these programs can bring much-needed jobs, health care benefits and an influx of local spending.

The irony is that for tribes to apply for these projects and succeed in them, the state and tribes need to stop fighting and start cooperating. According to the prestigious Harvard Project on American Indian Economic Development, “sustainable economic development on reservations begins and succeeds when tribes take matters into their own hands and create their own solutions to local problems. There is not a single example of a sustainable economic development on a reservation where the tribe has not exerted their rights of sovereignty.”

Maine’s choices are stark. Denying Indian self-rule has well established and tragic consequences. Breaking the will of American Indians and meddling in internal tribal affairs is not only un-American, it is unenlightened. Destitute reservations all around the country prove that only grinding poverty, social ills and family tragedy lie down that road. With state domination come the burdens of welfare spawned by social failure. The path of pride, encouragement, cooperation, and independent self-government leads instead to success.

These are not mere theories. The Harvard Project has analyzed substantial data from around the country that proves tribal “self-rule brings decision making home, that local decision makers are held more accountable to local needs, conditions and cultures than outsiders … prior to the present era of Indian self-determination, decades of distant decision making by federal and state authorities accountable to non-Indian constituents and masters had shown little discernable ability to break repeated patterns of poverty and social disarray.”

Throughout the 1990s, many tribes assumed independent responsibility to develop all kinds of new enterprises. The success of tribal gaming, though often exaggerated, is well known. But many nongaming tribes also made huge economic strides in the 1990s that far outstripped national averages for non-Indians.

The Sunrise ski resort founded and operated by the White Mountain Apache Tribe of Arizona contributes substantially to the entire winter economy of that area, including restaurants, motels, ski shops and other tourism. In Washington state, the Tulalip Tribe operates a major regional shopping center that provides over 2,500 jobs, most held by non-Indians. It generates $26 million a year in taxes for local and state governments. The Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska has established Ho-Chunk, Inc., a widely diversified company with subsidiaries in cattle ranching, Native American product distribution, marketing and advertising, computer hardware and software, telecommunications, office products and furniture and order fulfillment.

If Maine Tribes could join that boom, it could greatly benefit their people and the non-Indians who live and work in rural Maine. First, they must free up tribal and state resources and attention from expensive litigation and devote that energy into cooperative economic development planning. Maine officials need to take a long, hard look at their enlightened self-interest. Litigation to subdue Indian sovereignty is a lose-lose imperial gesture with no upside. Current policy creates work only for a handful of lawyers.

Recognizing tribal sovereignty and encouraging independence and self-government have proven to be the formula for attracting investment in Indian economies and the success of tribal development projects. Maine Indian policy must change so that it encourages tribal self-government, builds mutual respect and cooperation and prepares Maine for the new economic realities of this century.

Douglas Luckerman of Lexington, Mass., is an attorney in private practice representing tribal governments in Maine and throughout New England.