constitutional reform process
Presenters from the second day of NNI's "Tribal Constitutions" seminar gather to field questions from seminar participants on a variety of topics ranging from citizen education and engagement to the role off-reservation citizens can and should play in a Native nation's present and future.
Angela Wesley, Chair of Huu-ay-aht Constitution Committee, discusses the painstaking effort the Huu-ay-aht First Nations undertook to develop a new constitution and system of governance, and how they continue to work to turn the promise of self-governance embodied in their new constitution into...
Presenters and moderators from the first day of NNI's "Tribal Constitutions" seminar gather to field questions from seminar participants on a variety of topics ranging from dual citizenship to the relationship between a nation's constitution and its economic development environment.
Anishinaabe scholar Jill Doerfler discusses the process that the White Earth Nation followed to arrive at their new constitution, and details the evolving debate at White Earth about which citizenship criteria it would incorporate into this new governing document.
Jim Gray, former Principal Chief of the Osage Nation, provides an overview of how the Osage Nation completely overhauled its constitution and system of governance, sharing the strategies that Osage used to educate and engage its citizens in order to ensure that their new government reflected the...
The Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe is hosting the three-day “Build our Nation” convention which kicked off at noon Tuesday, Sept. 17 with a powwow and informational fair, followed by a “Nation-Building 101” educational session on Wednesday, Sept. 18, and wraps up on Thursday with a gathering of...
Days after certification of the Secretarial Election, positive comments were coming into the office of the Constitutional Revision committee. Donna Morgan and Ramona Two Shields began receiving flowers and calls from tribal members happy with the results. Both Two Shields and Morgan say it was the...
On Tuesday, tribal members of the White Earth Nation voted resoundingly to adopt their own constitution and eventually split from the 80-year-old Minnesota Chippewa Tribe constitution that dictates the laws of many Ojibwe tribes in the state. Neighboring Ojibwe bands at Leech Lake and Red Lake may...
In a historic vote, on November 19, 2013, the White Earth Nation in northwestern Minnesota became the first member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe (MCT) to adopt a new constitution. Of the 3,492 ballots counted, the vote was 2,780 in favor and 712 opposed, a 79 percent approval. Since the ballots...
In collaboration with production partner KKWE/Niijii Radio, TruthToTell and CivicMedia/Minnesota traveled west on August 14, 2013, to the White Earth Reservation to air/televise the seventh in our series of LIVE Community Connections forums on critical Minnesota issues. Convened at White Earth's...
