Oglala Sioux Tribe

This Community Is Striving To Rebuild One Of The Poorest Places In America

Year

PINE RIDGE, South Dakota — Alan Jealous, a 27-year-old construction worker, dreamt of building and owning a home. Homeownership is the cornerstone of the American Dream. But for this citizen of the Oglala Lakota Nation living on the Pine Ridge reservation, a community that regularly tops the list of the poorest places in the country, having realized this dream is a monumental achievement. Pine Ridge, a 3,500-square-mile landmass home to nearly 20,000 people, mostly Oglala, has one of the worst economies and some of the weakest infrastructure in the developed world.

Native Nations
Resource Type
Citation

NoiseCat, J. B. (2019, June 10). 'We Gotta Carry On': The Struggle To Rebuild In One Of The Poorest Places In America. Retrieved June 13, 2019, from https://www.huffpost.com/entry/pine-ridge-thunder-valley-housing-community-development_n_5cd47574e4b0796a95d8824f

Healing Our Future: Indigenous Wealth Building for Seven Generations

Producer
Native Governance Center
Year

What does an Indigenous approach to wealth look like? How can Indigenous wealth concepts help us heal our future? What are examples of wealth building happening in Indigenous communities?

Native Governance Center's Indigenous Peoples' Day 2021 event, "Healing our future: Indigenous wealth building for seven generations," provides viewers with an overview of Indigenous wealth concepts and a deep dive into how Indigenous people are building wealth in their communities. It also explores how Indigenous ideas about wealth can help all of us heal for the next seven generations. The event features stories from three Indigenous wealth building leaders: Dallas Nelson, Tasha Peltier, and Dani Pieratos.

Citation

Native Governance Center. Healing Our Future: Indigenous Wealth Building for Seven Generations. Oct. 12, 2021. Youtube video. Accessed Apr. 28, 2023. Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMswM6rzo84

Transcripts for all videos are available by request. Please email us: nni@arizona.edu.

Indigenous Governance Speaker Series: A Message for Indigenous Women Leaders with Cecilia Fire Thunder (Oglala Sioux/Lakota)

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

The first woman to successfully run for president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, Cecilia Fire Thunder shares valuable insight on being an impactful leader.

Her wisdom includes stories about working with local and national governments and lobbying congressional leaders. She reflects on why and how she became president and the challenge of meeting the numerous and constant demands of leadership. She notes that successful leaders must constantly educate themselves, knowing not only yourself and your ancestry, but also tribal history and other basic facts about your tribe, including everything from basic demographic data to the cost of health care.

Native Nations
Resource Type
Topics
Citation

Native Nations Institute. "Indigenous Governance Speaker Series: A Message for Indigenous Women Leaders with Cecilia Fire Thunder (Oglala Sioux/Lakota)". Native Nations Instititue, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. March 24, 2022.

Sovereign Nations: Giving Visibility

Producer
Produced in partnership with TPT-Twin Cities PBS and producer/director Missy Whiteman
Year

Tribal nations have always had formal ways of self-governing. Take a closer look at local Tribes exercising their inherent rights to land, culture, and self-governance in a contemporary context. Produced in partnership with TPT-Twin Cities PBS and producer/director Missy Whiteman. Special thanks to Bradley Harrington, Byron Ninham, Levi Brown, and Peri Pourier.

Resource Type
Topics
Citation

Native Governance Center. 2018. "Sovereign Nations: Giving Visibility." Produced in partnership with TPT-Twin Cities PBS and producer/director Missy Whiteman. St. Paul, Minnesota. Video. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZG9AVnIA5O0, accessed November 30, 2023)

The Indian Reorganization Act at 80 years

Year

At Pine Ridge, daily controversy surrounds the Indian Reorganization Act (IRA) of 1934. Congress enacted the IRA on June 18, 1934. However, the voting requirement was drastically altered just three days prior. This amendment (H.R. 7781, 49 Stat., 378) dated June 15, 1934, lowered the overall voting bloc from "majority of all eligible voters" to "30 per centum of all eligible voters." Although similar voting laws have been voided by the Supreme Court (Baker v. Carr), this reduced voting requirement is legal, and Pine Ridge elections still adhere to this law. On Pine Ridge, the IRA was put to a public vote on October 27, 1934, with only 28.7 percent participating. The current Constitution and By-laws of the Oglala Sioux Tribe was accepted by the members of the new Oglala Sioux Tribe via referendum vote on January 15, 1936.

Native Nations
Resource Type
Citation

Star Comes Out, Ivan F. "The Indian Reorganization Act at 80 years." Native Sun News. Rapid City, SD. October 14, 2014. Opinion. (http://www.indianz.com/News/2014/015347.asp, accessed October 14, 2014)

Pine Ridge Renaissance: From the Ground Up, Sovereignty Can Be Real

Author
Year

This article chronicles the groundswell of small business development taking place on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota, home to the Oglala Sioux Tribe. It examines the critical importance that citizen entrepreneurs can and do play in developing sustainable economies in Indian Country.

Resource Type
Citation

Record, Ian. "Pine Ridge Renaissance: From the Ground Up, Sovereignty Can Be Real." Native Americas Journal. Spring 2003, 54-59. Article.

Permissions

This article, which appeared in the now-defunct Native Americas journal, is featured on the Indigenous Governance Database with the permission of author Ian Record.

Strengthening and Rebuilding Tribal Justice Systems

Year

Assesses the U.S Department of Justice's Comprehensive Indian Resources for Community and Law Enforcement (CIRCLE) Project, which aimed to help participating tribes implement strategies for making the individual components of their justice systems work better in addressing crime and related social problems.

Resource Type
Citation

Wakeling, Stewart, Miriam Jorgensen. "Strengthening and Rebuilding Tribal Justice Systems: A Participatory Outcomes Evaluation of the U.S. Department of Justice Comprehensive Indian Resources for Community and Law Enforcement (CIRCLE) Project." CIRCLE Project Outcome Evaluations. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy at the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, The University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. September 2007. Final Report.

Terry Janis: Citizen Engagement and Constitutional Change at the White Earth Nation (Q&A)

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

Terry Janis, former Project Manager for the White Earth Constitution Reform Project, fields questions from the audience about his specific role in White Earth's constitutional reform process. He stresses the need for those engaging in constitutional reform to be cognizant of the fact that a process involving foundational change will necessarily entail Native nations citizens to confront and deal with the enduring legacies of colonial federal policies.

People
Resource Type
Citation

Janis, Terry. "Citizen Engagement and Constitutional Change at the White Earth Nation (Q&A)." Tribal Constitutions seminar, Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. April 2, 2014. Q&A session.

Audience member:

"Okay, to develop this, I guess this governance model because we've been at this for awhile now and we got our... Let me take you back. It first started, we tried to go to self-government, that was shot down; people were scared of that. Our land code, people were scared of that; that went down. But we got our own election code and that's what the people passed and membership code. I guess how I see it is you gave us all this information how to govern ourselves, the whats and ifs, what if this happens, what if that or whatever, all the unknowns. Maybe it was too much for our people to give them all that at once. Now we have a problem of backlog of over 400 and some odd homes, some houses are boarded up and need renovation and so it boils up dollars.

So let's say if we develop a model and this is important what you're talking about on communication, that's important. With that same concept, if we've already got our election code and membership code, now let's develop the housing code because we have a problem, we pay rent. Nobody understands that money goes back into their homes and whatever to develop and all. Nobody likes paying rent. They think everything's free. So we have a problem of collecting rent. If we develop this model, let's say just for the housing area to start off, develop this kind of model, bring it out to the people, not evictions, whatever might work.

So is there processes like that that'll slowly sort of keep the whole picture into the... To me, the way I look at it is, there's too much, they can't digest all that. So bit-by-bit, I guess that's how I'm looking at it. Now what we're talking about here is just the housing part of it. We've got our own education, hopefully we develop that. At least in this term, at least we can push something, working with... It's a process to make it work, at least we're going someplace instead of taking a step back all the time. I'm trying to look for solutions I guess."

Terry Janis:

"I don't know if this is on, but can you hear me okay? In every situation you have to deal with the reality of two issues, one of which is our colonization. And we as Indian people have a colonized mentality, regardless of whether we realize it or not and when we're talking about change, we have to accept that. So we are a colonized people and change in that sense is going to be difficult to accomplish. And as people that are moving our communities towards change, whether it's a broad constitution or a specific code, that's got to be part of the educational process is accepting our people for who they are and where they're at. There's beauty in our people and because of the history of what we suffered there's also darkness. And when we're thinking about how we're informing and how we're educating our people, we have to keep in mind the colonized mindsets that our people have and are we going to engage that because we have to engage it, otherwise it'll kick us in the ass. It'll stop things from moving forward. And the reality is, it's only going to be able to move forward as far as it can. Sometimes you have to take a staged process. So that's one thing.

And the second thing I spent a lot of time with earlier is just the politics of our community. Anytime you're talking about change and you're talking about an informational, educational process the politics of the community are very real and you have to deal with that. I didn't mention earlier the kind of colonized reality or colonized mindsets because it's sometimes difficult to really accept about ourselves. But...and it's not always the best strategy to say it directly, but you see it over and over and it's a part of the reality of who we are as Indian people. It's how we grew up. We have certain ideas.

My dad growing up on Pine Ridge, the idea was that him as a landowner is he was completely free; he could never be regulated, he could never be taxed, he could do what he wanted with his land. That's what it meant to be Indian on a reservation. And the reality is that's just not true at all. We as Indian people are regulated and managed and controlled more than any other people on the country, my dad included. And if the tribe wants to move forward and start to assert its sovereign authority by zoning and regulating and taxing and doing other things with their property, they're going to do that at some point. But that's our reality and the colonized mindset comes from what happened to us as Indian people, but also the unique sort of situation that we live in, what we've gotten used to, the things that we think we can do and that are inherent, but oftentimes are just circumstantial. For my dad, it's just because the tribe hasn't chosen to regulate their tax yet and that's all that is.

But I agree with you completely. Thinking through, knowing your own people, how best to achieve change, how best to inform and educate your people about that process, maybe a staged sort of process is the best way, maybe a broad complete reform-like what White Earth did is the best way. You're in the best situation to make that decision but it's a decision you have to make. You have to make that decision. It's tactical, it's strategic and you're responsible for it. As leaders, you are responsible for making that decision, period. And you'll live or die on that. Sometimes it'll be the wrong decision and then it'll all fall apart, but that's your job and that's what you do."

Herminia Frias:

"Another question...do we have a question on this side? Okay, question over here. Oh, I'm sorry. Ms. Porter did you want to respond?"

Jennifer Porter:

"Oh, no."

Audience member:

"Okay, so I have a question for you, Terry. So you mentioned maintaining a firm principle of neutrality. That's really interesting and I suspect I'm probably not the only one thinking this, but as you noted, as a Lakota person working up with Ojibwe people, it's really difficult for me to imagine that, one being a Diné, I cannot imagine Navajo, in this case we have a constitution, but a Navajo government development person who is basically in charge of putting together a reform or a government that is one for either Comanche or worse case with the Ute, speaking from that role. So referring to that again what I'm saying is I commend you White Earth Nation and you for doing that. Getting to the question is the neutrality piece to it. We all come with our values, our perceptions, our thoughts. I can't help but think that at some point during this process that you sort of like wanted to nudge folks in one way or another on some of your own issues with respect to one being an attorney and having a good understanding of federal Indian law in relation to Indian Country. I just wanted to ask how do you handle something like that?"

Terry Janis:

"Yeah, yeah. There's two answers to that. The first is that in this particular issue, this idea of neutrality, it only focuses on the educational and informational process. The whole drafting of a constitution or an amendment to a constitution, you cannot be neutral on that. You're going to make decisions and you're going to compromise and it's going to be one way or another and that's the work that tribal members really need to be doing I think. So as far as your own governmental reform, actually drafting the reforms, actually thinking them through, I think the very nature of that is positional and political and about compromise. For me the neutrality thing was important from an educational perspective, strictly in getting information out there, educating, helping people to understand, answering their questions. When they're completely wrong about something, fighting with them about that. That's the only time I took a position. When they were wrong about what they were saying about what this proposed constitution said, then I fought about that because I just wanted them to get it right. I don't want...that didn't decide for them one way or the other, I just wanted their information to be accurate, that they learned the materials and I got into plenty of fights, I had plenty of fun on that. The reason why we go to law school is we kind of like fighting a little bit, right? And so you get into plenty of fights and you have plenty of fun with that, but that neutrality position is really directly tied to the educational and informational process as a community-based thing. This is community-based work. This is going into people's house, this is personal, this is physical, this is live; you've got to be comfortable with that. You've got to get educators and people that are a part of your community training and information thing that are comfortable with that kind of arrrgh. It's a beautiful thing and it's really fun if that's what you enjoy and that's what you love as an educator and that's... So no, I never really compromised in that sense. I didn't really have a struggle with that ever."

Herminia Frias:

"We have time for one more question and just to let you know, we're going to continue this conversation after lunch. Ian Record is going to be continuing this on citizen engagement. So Robert, you'll have the last question before lunch and if you have more questions, we'll open it up again after lunch."

Robert Hershey:

"Thank you and thank you very, very much for the presentations. In response to the gentleman from Canada, I was going to talk about this in my presentation later, but let me just say really the idea of big bites versus small bites. And there are a number of constitutions, like you talked about housing, well, the Tohono O'odham have a constitution that has a lot of power reserved to the districts. The districts are responsible for home site, land site assignments. The way the Navajos constructed land site assignments through matrilineal. The Hopi, the villages have independent authority in many regards and things are specifically reserved. So by working on these different codes, your election code, your education or whatever, it might be your housing, you are actually then having the discussions, which will then transform themselves when the time comes into writing themselves as constitutional amendments. So you are basically in the process of creating constitutions by virtue of your actual practices in these different areas."

Herminia Frias:

"Thank you, Robert. And I'd like to thank both of the panelists for sharing their stories. Thank you very much. Give them a round of applause." 

Terry Janis: The White Earth Nation Constitutional Reform Process

Producer
Native Nations Institute
Year

In this lively and far-reaching discussion with NNI's Ian Record, Terry Janis (Oglala Lakota), former project manager of the White Earth Nation Constitution Reform Project, provides an overview of the citizen education and engagement campaign that preceded White Earth's historic vote to ratify a new constitution in November 2013, and specifically the role he played in that process.  

This video resource is featured on the Indigenous Governance Database with the permission of the Bush Foundation.

People
Resource Type
Citation

Janis, Terry. "The White Earth Nation Constitutional Reform Process." Leading Native Nations interview series. Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, The University of Arizona. St. Paul, Minnesota, February 6, 2014. Interview.

Ian Record:

“Welcome to Leading Native Nations. I’m your host, Ian Record. On today’s program we are honored to have with us Terry Janis. Terry is a citizen of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota and for the past year he has served as project manager for the constitutional reform process of the White Earth Nation in Minnesota. Terry, welcome and good to have you with us today.”

Terry Janis:

“Thanks, man. It’s nice to be here.”

Ian Record:

“Yeah, it’s good to see you again.”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah, yeah.”

Ian Record:

“So I’ve shared a few highlights of your personal biography, but I’m sure I left some pertinent things out. So why don’t you just tell us a little bit more about yourself.”

Terry Janis:

“From Pine Ridge, came over here to Minnesota, went to McAllister. From there went to Harvard for a master’s in education, University of Arizona for my law degree and several jobs since then -- kind of a balance between international Indigenous rights, land rights issues and broader national policy issues as well. So that kind of education -- law, law reform, policy development -- was a good fit for this particular job.”

Ian Record:

“So we’re here today to discuss constitutional reform”

Terry Janis:

“Right.”

Ian Record:

“a big topic across Indian Country and specifically, the work you’ve done on behalf of the White Earth Nation over the past year or so. As the White Earth Nation has worked to develop and then ratify, recently ratified, a new constitution, but the process has been underway there at White Earth for quite awhile.”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah.”

Ian Record:

“And can you sort of talk aboutcan you begin by talking about where White Earth was in the process when you came on board because as I mentioned, this thing had been underway for quite awhile before you joined the nation and its effort.”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah, they really started this effort of drafting a constitution in 2007 and it took them a couple of years. By 2009, they had had four constitutional conventions and came up with this draft. The number of delegates that participated in that process, voted on itthe idea was to approve a draft of this constitution that would then be moved to a referendum. That drafting process was completed in 2009 and it kind of sat there for a bit; I think part of the dynamics are complex. It’s difficult to move a constitutional reform process forward. The drafting process is critical and very difficult, but every stage subsequent to that is equally difficult and part of the issue was funding. And so a grant from the Bush Foundation helped them to move it to the next phase of really engaging in active community education process, move it then to a referendum, and then start to think, after that referendum depending upon the outcome -- and this one was positive -- to then look at the implementation process.”

Ian Record:

“Based on your understanding, of someone who is charged with helping to lead and implement that community education effort, what prompted the nation to go down the reform road to begin with?”

Terry Janis:

“I’m not from there, and because of that I don’t have the kind of personal insights or the personal biases that a person that’s from there would have. What I observed and the stories that I’ve been told is, like a lot of tribes, they went through a governmental crisis, a profound foundational crisis in the ‘90s with the 'Chip' Wadena administration; his conviction of embezzlement and how broad that was throughout their whole governance system. In reacting to that, not only did the people stand up in order to reassert an effective governance, but they really looked at the genesis of that: how did it get to that stage? And they immediately turned to the constitution.

And the conversations that you heard from that period of time, that were told to me when I got there, was how the constitution is so centralized in its power structure -- that the people, in power, can be dominated by a single person. And that kind of absolute power, in their experience, did corrupt absolutely. And so without any kind of way of balancing that they, as a reaction to that, they immediately moved to this kind of conversation of, ‘What can the constitution do to create checks and balances, to really have an independent judiciary and do those kinds of things?’ But I think that was the genesis of it.

So they actually started a constitutional reform process in ‘94, ‘95, ‘96. They drafted a constitution at that time as well and attempted to take that out into the communities. The stories that I’ve heard, both from the people that were doing it and the community members themselves, is there was just way too much tension still. They had gone through this amazing crisis. The communities were divided -- not just in two factions, but multiple factions -- so every time they brought this idea of a new constitution out into the communities, those factions and emotions really dominated the story line and it was just too premature. So they waited the 10 years. In 2007, brought it again and that’s where we stand.”

Ian Record:

“So you mentioned there was this profound governance crisis, if you will, that culminated in this high profile scandal. So they go down this reform road and in developing and ratifying, now ratifying, this new constitution system of government. What are some of the main things the nation is hoping to address? You’ve made quick allusions to them but”

Terry Janis:

“And I think that comes out of those crisis points. And what you see in this new constitution is a very clear separation of powers: a legislative body, an executive body and a judiciary. They clearly put a lot of time into that. Also the value of me not being in that drafting process, I wasn’t there, but you can see from the text itself that those parts of the constitution are clear, clean, deliberate and well drafted; that’s what they put their heart and mind and time and energy into. So there’s a very clear separation of powers, there’s clear establishment of an independent judiciary, they also put a lot of time into thinking about what it means to have a traditional government, something that’sin looking at separation of powers, you really harken back to the U.S. Constitution, which hearkens back to the Haudenosaunee constitutional form of government, but what you really get caught up in is it’s an American style of constitutional government -- the separation of powers, how they frame it, how they reference it -- but the way they do it is quite unique in the way of establishing mechanisms with language that tie it back to Anishinaabe traditions -- using Ojibwe language as a part of the constitution preamble and frame of governance, making sure that their judicial system isn’t just about punishment, but really emphasizes restorative justice -- engages the kind of most foundational aspect of the constitution in a way that depends on the people themselves to organize governance. So a range of different things that are quite unique that is really, I think, less controversial and more easily understood.

They also took on this huge issue of defining membership, citizenship. We all know or we should know about the way the federal government used blood quantum as a part of a military and colonial strategy to subjugate us. The ultimate result of that was our disappearance and that’s still on the books. And so they tackled that though with a very broad and dynamic rejection of blood quantum and move to lineal descendency. And that was a thing that came out of those conversations in 2007, 2008 and 2009. It’s part and parcel, very simple, very straightforward in the way the constitution defines it and it ended up being one of the most controversial aspects of their conversation.”

Ian Record:

“I think you’ve touched on some of these already, but from your vantage point, what do you see as some of the fundamental differences between the old constitution system of government, basically an IRA [Indian Reorganization Act] model, and this new creation?”

Terry Janis:

“I’ve talked about this new one. You got -- in order to make a comparison -- you’ve got to read their oldall of the IRA constitutions, but the MCT [Minnesota Chippewa Tribe] Constitution is even worse. And I’m not knocking MCT; they’re some good people, they’re trying to do good work with a bad system. But you’ve got to understand the history of the Indian Reorganization Act, its shift away from allotment; it ended the allotment process, which on its face is a very positive thing, but what this country was at that period of time, after the Great Depression, just before World War II, was all about assimilation. It wasn’t about recognizing the strength and sovereignty of Indian nations, it was about making Indian people white.

And the constitutions that came out of the Indian Reorganization Act, this model constitution that they had, the primary purpose of that was to make things easier for the Bureau of Indian Affairs -- their colonial objectives, their oversight, their kind of attitudes of superiority in having a trust responsibility towards Indian people actually owning Indian land, and Indian people having to ask for permission for using everything. These constitutions have at least a dozen, the MCT constitution has almost 30 specific places where before the tribe can do anything, they have to ask for permission from the Bureau of Indian Affairs and it’s in their constitution. And so that’s their starting point.

And it establishes a mechanism where, for example, even though White Earth has the majority of the population, they’ve set up a governance structure in the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe where each of the separate bands is represented by two individuals on their governance structure. And so White Earth has over 50 percent of the population almost; they only have two votes out of 12. It is completely unrepresentative. There is no government in the world that would allow that kind of unrepresentative form of government and they accept it. It’s what they were forced to take up. The Bureau of Indian Affairs wrote their constitution for them. There’s no story or history or genesis of the language of this constitution coming out of Indian minds. It was the Bureau of Indian Affairs that wrote it, put all of these tribes together under one body so they didn’t have to build relationships with six separate tribes. They only had to deal with one entity.

So this is as colonial a system as you can imagine and me coming from the outside, I’m shocked honestly that they find a way to make it work, every day. But that’s where it’s coming from and having that conversation, and engaging that conversation as a part of this conversation, was a part of everything that we put together as well.”

Ian Record:

“Let me follow up on that. This is not part of our original questions, but this is something that I see come up in so many tribes I work with on the issue of constitutions and constitutional reform is...you’ve just shared with us a pretty deep knowledge of the genesis of, until recently, what was the law of the land for the White Earth people. And so often when these tribes struggle with this issue of, ‘Our constitution is inadequate. We pretty much understand we need to change it.’ It’s a whole other question of, ‘How do we do it?’ But a lot of folks contemplate reform without a full working knowledge of, ‘Where did our specific constitution come from? Did our own people have any meaningful say in its creation? Did they have any meaningful sense of ownership in this apparatus that they now use to make decisions and try to live as a nation?’ And how important is it for other tribes -- if people are going to look at White Earth as an example -- how important is it for other tribes to understand that historical context when they tackle the question of, ‘Do we need to change our current constitution and how?’”

Terry Janis:

“Honestly, I don’t think it’s all that important. At the end of the day, it’s relatively irrelevant because when you get to this scale of change, what you really have to have a deep understanding of is politics, power and change.

Politics is important. Who has what political source, where does it come from, how did they engage and develop it? In order to engage at this scale, you have to have a deep respect for politics, you have to understand the politics that’s happening in that community at the local level and a broader level that affects it. When you look at process of change, you’re going to recognize that some people are gaining, are benefiting from the current system and other people will gain or benefit from the change. And so you have to recognize where those tensions are going to come from, where’s the push-back going to come from, and you have to respect that and honor that and deal with it in a very real and dynamic sort of way.

And then that’s the process of change, the engagement of it. Whenever there is a compelling reason for change, like in White Earth -- the constitutional crisis in the ‘90s, history of where the constitution that they’re working under comes from, and how it contributed to the disaster that they just went through -- is an important part of what pushes and sustains. And that’s important, that has to be there, but in order to actually for change to actually occur, you’ve got to deal with the reality of politics and power and that is all a part of the conversation. Some of it is one-to-one information sharing education process, others are very practical sitting down and trading realities. ‘You’re going to lose this. Your people are going to gain that. How important is it that your people gain even though you may personally lose in certain ways?’ And you just deal with that in a very real sort of way.

The leadership at White Earth, at Bois Forte, at all of the MCT bands, are the same as the leadership in any other Indian nations; they’re practical, they’re very realistic and they’re in it as a life issue. And I didn’t say life and death. They’re in it as a life issue. Our leaders are politicians from that life perspective, but whenever you start to challenge them to give up, or this is going to be taken away -- this thing that has benefited you and your family -- that has to be an open conversation. It has to be a real conversation and you have to honor their integrity, their respect, and their ability to come to a decision that not only helps them to deal with the practical realities, but also fits with their integrity.”

Ian Record:

“In the point you just made, doesn’t that argue for tribes ensuring that they develop a reform process that is distinctly theirs and that distinctly attends to their own local dynamics, as you laid out?”

Terry Janis:

“Absolutely. You cannot do it any other way. And there’sin this situation -- having me as an outsider come in -- there’s value in me being able to say, ‘I don’t care what you do. I didn’t draft this thing. I have noof my own self into it at all. What matters to me is you, as the people, make your own choice. Do you realize the power that you have? That’s what matters to me.’ So me coming in with that kind of outsider perspective, and also coming in with the history of really fighting for and having some losses and successes in supporting tribal sovereignty, that was the base. And we can have those conversations, and they could insult Erma Vizenor or the elected leadership and everybody else, and I’ll sit there and I’ll nod my head and I’ll let them give voice to that, and then we’ll try to turn to a deeper understanding of what this constitution says and the changes that it incurs. And without that conversation, without having the ability to sit through the emotions, and the local history that’s there, and understand it and take it in, and then incorporate that into a conversation about, ‘Look at the text of this language.’ And so all of those things are local, they’re about that local community, they’re about the people that are there and their personal histories and stories.”

Ian Record:

“I want to follow up a bit on this issue of power and politics that you mentioned. My sense in working with a number of tribes on reform is that yes, that is a huge dynamic that you have to wrestle with and that the approach that you develop in response to that has to be local, it has to be unique to that tribe, and it has to attend to those unique circumstances, but isn’t part of it also dealing with the reality and developing a process that deals with the reality? That, in many times when you’re dealing with fundamental sort of foundational change like constitutional reform, often entailsif you’re going beyond pro forma type amendments and really dealing with substantive constitutional change, you’re often asking the people of the nation to put up a mirror in front, and [to] look in the mirror not just as an individual citizen, but as a collective group and say, ‘Who are we, how do we want to govern, and what do we want our future to look like?’ And often that involves confronting a lot of colonial trauma, a lot of historical trauma, and that tends to contribute to a very organic and sort of messy process that you have to be ready for, does it not?”

Terry Janis:

“Right, absolutely, absolutely. And the fact that I can tell you with some of the folks that I’ve had conversations, how far spittle travels between you and that other person because that’s how pissed off they are and emotional, and that kind of anger and anguish and frustration and fear is very real. Me coming into this as an outsider with absolute respect for the sovereignty of an Indian nation -- and when you’re dealing with the fact that this constitution is going to move to a referendum vote -- that sovereignty lies within each individual. And so my job is to absolutely respect where that person is and where that person can move to. I can have a conversation with somebody about the colonial dynamics of the MCT constitution. If they say, ‘I cannot accept the idea of defining me as a 'citizen' or defining the White Earth Tribe as a 'nation,' we are a 'band,' I am a 'member,'‘ they insist on that over and over and over, my job is not, as an academic, to know better than them and say, ‘You’re wrong.’ My job is to say, ‘Okay. This is your choice. You are the sovereign here. Your vote is all that matters. Your decision and your opinion is all that matters. I respect that a hundred percent.’”

Ian Record:

“So then didn’t your challenge then become, in respecting their ability to choose, and that’s ultimately what self determination’s all about, that your job then became, ‘how do I make sure that they, when they do choose, that they’re making as an informed choice as possible in that they understand fully what this constitution says and more importantly what this constitution will do in terms of structuring how the government actually works and how it makes decisions, how it carries out decisions, etc.’?”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah, yeah. If you think about how Indian people come together and we talk, we learn things as much from laughter as from serious conversation. We learn things as much from getting into a fight and getting a bloody nose as we do by reading a text together side by side. And so that is a multi-faceted dynamic of the process, Indian people coming together and learning this kind of document, this kind of resource materials, this kind of system, systemic construct, it’s really complex.

The White Earth constitution is amazingly complex, how they all fit together and flow together; you are not going to achieve full understanding, period. What I realized is that each person is going to need a certain level of understanding in order to come to their own decision point and that’s my job, is they know how much they need to understand and I’m going to keep pushing everything at them with every vehicle and mechanism that I can. Whenever we came in and designed the educational strategy, there wasn’t going to be just one event in every community and the national symposium. We were going to have dozens. We ended up having over 50 across every single community, a national symposium, multi-media resources, videos, radio turned out to be incredibly important with Niijii Radio and other radio interviews and individual conversations, follow up with thousands of individuals, taking the time to have all of those conversations in as many ways as possible, talking with folks over dinner, over breakfast, in their houses, on the street, wherever. And so that’s just how we are. We as Indian people, we learn in a certain way and if you’re comfortable with that, if you can engage that, if you can get with that, then there’s the potential that you’re going to make the offerings and people are going to come at them in the way that they can come at them.

I never expected to find perfect understanding. The more I got into it, the more I realized I don’t have perfect understanding. There are so many nuances to this stuff that a relationship between this person and that person as a drafter, as an editor, as a voter was a much more complex and real sort of dynamic as well, but having respect for the sovereignty of the individual to make this decision because that’s where it really lies in a referendum, as well as the learning process of us as Indian people. It’s personal and being able to do that and willing to do that and enjoying doing that.”

Ian Record:

“Was part of your challenge trying to sit down in a community session or via multi-media and the many different tools and strategies and approaches you took, but was part of the challenge getting people to care about the role of the constitution in their lives? To say, ‘Okay, basically this current constitution we have, this is how it impacts you as a citizen. This new constitution we’ve drafted, this is how it will change the nation, this is how it will change the, potentially change the community, this is how it will change the role that you can play in the governance of the nation.’ And you talked about making it personal -- is that not part of the challenge?”

Terry Janis:

It’s definitely part of it. It’s not so much how do you get them to care. Again, it’swe’re Indian people, and in my experience, we care deeply; we just do. The question is, ‘What do we care about?’ And so that was the issue, trying to figure out what this person cares about or if it’s a group of five or 20 or 100 or 200, what is the sense of what they care about and then how do you take that and share the information about the text of this constitution, how it changes things and what it will mean? How do you then tie that into what they care about because it is tribal politics, and so much of that is personal? It’s going to be, ‘This person is an elected leader and I hate him or her. She did this or he did that,’ and that is a very real sense of care and is very personal and it’s got nothing to do with me, but it has everything to do with this educational process on this constitution. And so people that are working within their own tribal communities and try to engage an educational process about constitutional reform, you have to respect that, that somebody cares about this thing and that does tie into their ability to learn about the constitution. And as an educator, that’s what makes a quality teacher is finding a way to tie that in so that you’re using that person’s energy, what they care about, to help learn about this thing. Every teacher, every quality teacher that is perceived of as being a good teacher, that’s what makes them good. It’s just normal education. This is not new stuff. This is not unique stuff. In order to do this well, you need good educators and you need people that are grounded in tribal sovereignty.”

Ian Record:

“And ideally grounded or at least understanding of the community, right? As you mentioned and sort of the dynamics and the”

Terry Janis:

“Absolutely, absolutely.”

Ian Record:

“So you made reference to this a little bit earlier in discussing the new constitution and how different it is from its predecessor and how different it is from anything that the United States government would ever conceive of. From your perspective as an outsider, can you share with us some of the things that are contained in this new constitution that are distinctly Anishinaabe, that advance Anishinaabe values, that reflect Anishinaabe culture, governance principles? For instance, you made reference to restorative justice and the use of language and things like that.”

Terry Janis:

“I’m not Anishinaabe and I can’tI cannot communicate that from that perspective. What I can do is say that the preamble uses Anishinaabe language and that is referenced throughout the constitution. The judicial system places a very real emphasis on restorative justice rather than the punishment model of a judiciary. That language ‘restorative justice’ is not in Indian language, but the heart of it, the substance of it, that is all Indian, whether it’s Anishinaabe or Lakota or whatever, that is about that community and the way they’re going to implement it is going to be all Anishinaabe, it’s going to be all Ojibwe.

Whenever you look at...the constitution allows or provides for, requires, three advisory bodies, formal advisory bodies that have direct advisory responsibility to the legislative council and the office of the president, an elder’s council, a youth council and a community council. The constitution establishes them specifically and it states specifically certain aspects of Anishinaabe culture and tradition that that elder council is responsible to give advice to the legislative body and the president on. You don’t see that in other constitutions, period. So it structurally establishes a mechanism for that to be in there, but it also, at the same time, is an advisory body. So it’s not a full shift over to a traditional model of governance where the chiefs are making decisions in that process. It’s a unique sort of mechanism in that regard.

The last one that I think is most unique is if you think about a governance, you’re really talking about the ability of a representative to truly represent their community. That’s where so much of the gap is. In this country, what is the percentage of American population, voting age population that actually votes? It’s a huge gap because the representatives that we can vote on to represent us don’t represent us. Here, in this constitution, the people themselves organize their own voting districts. They are responsible for organizing those voting districts and if they’re the ones that have to carry that burden, there’s a greater potential that they’re going to organize the voting districts that actually mean something to them and if it does, then they’re going to select a person to represent them and then there’s that connect. That is f*cking awesome. It really is. And it is so problematic. How do you actually implement that? Nobody’s ever done that before.”

Ian Record:

“But I would argue that that is righting one of the greatest wrongs of, in particular, the IRA system, which”

Terry Janis:

“Absolutely, absolutely.”

Ian Record:

“It either corrupted, or displaced entirely, these traditional governance systems that, as you mentioned earlier, centralized power. And really what are you talking about when you talk about power? You’re talking about decision-making responsibility and basically where in most, if not all, traditional Indigenous societies everyone had a valued role to play, everyone was expected to contribute to the governance of the nation in some respect, and it wasn’t called the governance of the nation back then, it was called something else, but basically that’s what it was: young people, old people, elders, everyone had a role. And now from what you’re saying is that White Earth has made a conscious decision to return some of that decision-making authority directly to the people so that they can once again have a valued role.”

Terry Janis:

“I think that if you really apply this accurately, this is the whole ball of wax. If this constitution is going to be effectively implemented, the people themselves are going to organize their own voting districts. That’s the only way it’s going to move forward. And in order for that to succeed, they have to be engaged much more broadly, much more actively, much more dynamically than they have now. The strategy for full ground up, bottom up community development to implement this, requires that kind of engagement for them to really understand that and to organize their own voting districts so that it means something to them. And the constitution provides that they can organize it based upon population centers, historic associations, clan systems and their understanding of that, ‘What does that mean?’ is what defines it. The constitution uses these broad, open words. They have to be defined and the only one that can define them under this constitutional form of government is the people of White Earth and that’s just exciting.”

Ian Record:

“That’s cool. So I want to turn now to the process and that’syou were involved with the process because, as you mentioned, you came on board after the constitution had been drafted, and your job in part was to work with citizens that had been designated by the tribe, employees, etc. to figure out what’s the best approach to actually teaching the people about what this constitution says, what it does. Can you give us a brief overview of the campaign, the comprehensive citizen engagement, citizen education campaign that you guys launched and continue to implement?”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah. We went over it just in the fundamental way. On a most basic level it has to be personal. In order for it to be personal, you have to engage in multiple venues, multiple formats, multiple times. And so small gatherings, unique gatherings, having as active and dynamic a calendar that if they miss this one, there’s going to be another opportunity and another and another. And so really playing that out so that it’s personal in that regard.

Secondly, if you’re going to do this, it really has to engage multiple medias. The majority of the population does not live on the reservation and so we had events not only on reservation, but in the Twin Cities, in Cass Lakes, on the Iron Range and other places where major populations are, but we didn’t go outside of the State of Minnesota, and there’s a huge White Earth population outside of Minnesota as well. And so having the website, having different resources and materials on the website, videos. We did the whole training, a whole two-hour session over each article of the constitution and posted that on the website as well, and then having a symposium that was live streamed on the website; accepting the offer of another entity, Truth to Tell, to host an event on the reservation. The chairperson, the primary drafters of the constitution, all came together and participated on that and had a raucuous good time. It was like really intense.”

Ian Record:

“I watched it -- very intense. I’ll ask you a follow-up question about that.”

Terry Janis:

“And it was real. And so just multiple mechanisms for doing that and making sure that number one, it was personal. Number two, that there were multiple mechanisms for doing that. And then number three, there was absolute certainty that we were neutral, that we presented the materials with, as best as I could, with no offer of an opinion one way or another, good or bad, up or down, a complete respect for the sovereignty of that nation, which in this process meant the sovereignty of the individual to come to their own decision, to make up their own mind with their own process. And my job was to provide as much resources for them to do that as possible.”

Ian Record:

“That Truth to Tell forum, which was live streamed, that was quite athat was on our ‘Must See TV’ list for quite a while. I remember watching it and then saying, ‘You guys got to watch this, you got to watch this.’ And they hadI know they posted the first part first and then there was a little lag and then the second part and we were all waiting with baited breath. And it was interesting the conversation that we had internally because some folks among us said, ‘Oh, man, look how crazy this was. Look howlook how ugly it got at times with people beingraising their voice and calling people out.’ And I made the point, I said, ‘Having watched enough tribes struggle through constitutional reform, seeing some succeed and some fail, that this to methe beauty of this forum that you guys had and the way you did it and the fact that it was so open and it was so transparent,’ I said, ‘to me, that is the most important thing is because --aside from what’s being shared in that forum -- the nation and the project in particular are sending a message to the White Earth people that ‘we want to be transparent in this process, we are doing our part to make sure that everyone’s voice is heard.’' And isn’t that the most important thing, is that you’re giving everyone in the community every possible opportunity to make sure that their voices are heard so at the end of the day nobody can say, ‘I didn’t have a chance.’”

Terry Janis:

“And the reality is, whenever you get to learn of a community, after you’re there for a while, you realize people gather at this one place on a regular basis. If I had known that, I would have incorporated it into our strategy and done that. So being very open to the possibility that somebody else is going to come. This was not organized by me, or the tribe, or anybody else. This was organized by Niijii Radio with Truth to Tell and TPT; they did all the structuring of it, they paid for it, they put it all together, they decided on the format. I contributed a lot in conversations with them about the participants and everything else, but to accomplish their goal, having a balance between people that were supportive of it and people that were opposed with strong voices on both sides, even though we didn’t necessarily have strong voices in every situation. Some people didn’t feel comfortable in that environment, but it was their agenda and their show and their program and that kind of transparency is what the tribal council and Chairperson [Erma] Vizenor and Secretary Treasurer Robert Durant committed themselves to. They never interfered with our process at all and were very supportive of that.”

Ian Record:

“I’m glad you bring that up because with another nation we worked with over the past decade or so, they went through constitutional reform about seven or eight years ago now, and they attribute the success of their reform effort to, first and foremost, the fact that they went to great lengths to ensure that the process maintained what was termed an ‘aura of independence.’ Meaning that yes, the politicians, the elected leadership have a role to play and whether it’s funding the process, setting up the body that will lead the process to see it through, but once that’s done, it’s imperative that the politicians take a back seat, that they don’t come to dominate the process, or at least appear to be dominating the process, because it’s imperative that the process itself espouses the kind of principles that you’ve been talking about, which is, ‘It’s not my job to take sides, it’s not my job to champion this, it’s my job to make sure you understand what’s in it.’”

Terry Janis:

“There were people thinking about that in the hiring process. And as many times as I was attacked for not being Ojibwe, this outside guy -- especially a Lakota guy, we’re enemies -- coming in and taking one of their jobs, as many times as I was attacked there was somebody in the audience always who said, ‘This is the best way to do this. There’s no other way we’re going to have an objective look at this and give at least that a chance.’ And so even for the people in the hiring process and the selection committee -- you have to ask them what they were thinking exactly -- but I heard it over and over and over in the community as well.”

Ian Record:

“You talked about some of the strategies that you guys implemented in making sure that you were generating broad community awareness of not just what was in the constitution, but the choice that was before the people about this process, you talked about some of the strategies that you guys implemented in making sure that you were generating broad community awareness of not just what was in the constitution, but the choice that was before the people, individually and collectively. I’m sure not everything went according to plan. You’ve talked about some of the things that you didn’t anticipate when you first set out. Can you share what, from your view, were and are some of the biggest challenges to both, I guess, the process leading up to the vote and then now? And then, what did you do or what are you doing to overcome those?”

Terry Janis:

“On the one hand, you deal with the situation that you have and you create the best strategy you can realizing that you’re going to change it as you get into it. So all that being said, they finished the drafting in 2009 and had quite a few years of not a lot happening. If they could have done a level of this kind of process starting in 2009 leading to a referendum vote on November 19, 2013, that would have been awesome, but they didn’t. And so havingnot having that gap in time -- because you have to make up a lot -- the kind of impetus of coming together and drafting a constitution and then nothing happens and people forget, you lose momentum, you lose context, you lose memory, you lose priority. And so that had to be dealt with and energy created and generated in order to get interest and get everybody back on the same page as far as, ‘This is a priority,’ and ideas and tactics for doing that. That’s what we had to deal with. If something could have been done differently, it would have been changed in the past and have some process engaging from 2009 to the referendum vote.

It also is a really complex document and we put a lot of energy into reading it, working with educators, curriculum developers, the education department at White Earth, Joan Timeche who is the director [of the Native Nations Institute] -- she was really helpful in all of this -- my experience with curriculum development, etc. and thinking through, as adults, what sort of resources and tools can we bring to the table to help somebody work through a hugely complex document. And so reorganizing it, simplifying the language, creating summaries, creating a workbook, getting the text out, really emphasizing the text itself that even though this summary is a summary it’s in a useful way of introducing yourself to it, really being willing to sit down there and go through it word by word as well.

If there was something that we could have taken from that and learned from that, I think it might have been a broader range of stuff. Where if there was more time, really do a pre-K through full adult, develop an educational resource mechanism and tools and strategies to cover that whole broad range because developing a coloring book for a pre-K kid is going to help an adult with that education process as well. And because you’re doing it for a pre-K kid, it’s not insulting to that adult that is actually going to benefit from that. You see what I’m saying? But because we didn’t have that much time, we didn’t develop that full scope and full range of educational resources and tools and have the time to implement it at that scale.

But dealing with a very complex document that is the genesis or basis of a very complex system really would have benefited from more time, a broader-scale approach that engaged non-voting age members and voting age members in an equal sort of basis because everybody votes frombenefits from all of those resources being available to them. That’s just the reality of it. We didn’t have that time. We didn’t scoperamp it up to that scale and that scope of it right away just because of the timing issues. But if we were going to do it over again with more time, especially not losing momentum from the initial 2009 completion of the draft drafting process, I think that’s how it would have gone.”

Ian Record:

“Isn’t that couldn’t you argue that that’s the challenge now before the White Earth Nation is, ‘How do we now actually live this new constitution?’ And isn’t part of that challenge, of figuring how to live it, is this tribal civics challenge?”

Terry Janis:

“Oh, absolutely.”

Ian Record:

“of engraining in our people young, old”

Terry Janis:

“Absolutely.”

Ian Record:

“of all ages not only what the constitution says, but this is who we are, this is how we govern, this is how we make decisions, this is the future we seek for ourselves?”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah, and whenever people think about this kind of constitutional change, one of the easiest things to think about is, if you understand what an IRA council is, an IRA constitution and the tribal council and business committee that comes out of it, their kind of authority to make decisions into the most minute things. ‘Oh, you can’t fire that secretary’ or ‘cut their pay,’ or whatever. The council is integrating themselves in every single decision because that is the scope of power that they have; there is no limits on authority or separation of powers. And so for the new legislative council, once it gets organized, to really learn what it means to legislate, to legislate; for the office of the president to really know what an executive authority and role is, the limits and scope of that; for the judiciary to really believe that they’re fully independent. In order for that to happen, the training and education process have to happen from today. As we get resources and tools out there or White Earth gets resources and tools out there to help the people organize their communities, their voting districts, that education process has to happen at that scale.”

Ian Record:

“And doesn’t it also have to be. you mentioned. White Earth has to be sure that the chief executive, whoever that may be, whether Erma or someone else, that they fully understand”

Terry Janis:

“Exactly.”

Ian Record:

“what their role is under this new constitution. The constitution and the limits of that role, where it begins to get into thatoverlaps into someone else’s role and where they need to think twice and vice versa the legislative side.”

Terry Janis:

“And whenever the kids in the community and the people that aren’t going to run for those elected offices, if they understand it.”

Ian Record:

“Well, I was just going to say, that’s critical because they’re the ones that apply pressure, healthy or unhealthy, on those people”

Terry Janis:

“And who are organizing those voting districts and the representative that comes out of those voting districts is going to be one of them. And so they’re going to be selecting somebody based upon an understanding that they have. It’s a true ground-up, building-a-nation process that depends upon education at that broad scale.”

Ian Record:

“I want to switch to one of the strategies that you guys employed and, I think, were more aggressive, I would say, than we’ve seen with other nations that have gone down the reform road and that’s the use of multimedia. And you mentioned that you guys -- and I’ve seen the videos you’ve done. The website is very robust. It has a series of videos featuring you and some other folks talking, sort of, as you mentioned, breaking down the constitution, making it accessible, talking about constitutional, often very legalese-style language and breaking it down and talking about it in very accessible, laymen’s terms for somebody with a 10th-grade education, for instance, trying to make it make sense to them. How did the community respond to that, to that particular strategy of, ‘Here, we’re going to tell you a story about this particular aspect of the constitution and we’re going to use this visual media to do it’?”

Terry Janis:

“The only way that I can really respond to that is the few positive responses that we got. ‘I watched it. It was great.’ All of that was good. I think more importantly though is we put a lot of energy and thought into not just having a strategy and design for doing it, but doing it, constantly, persistently and not only in creating these multimedia things and getting them out there, but doing the community events, but also being absolutely responsive to everybody that called, everybody that walked up, everybody that wanted to talk, that responsiveness -- so returning 20 phone calls a day and having 40 -- and so that kind of response. I think it was the whole thing. And so from day one, building that on an increasing basis, feeling the tension ramp up because there was a growing interest and a growing desire for more information, a growing process of people actually making up their mind and caring about it and getting aggressive about it, and trying to convince their friends and their relatives and other people about their position, that’s all we wanted, that’s all we pushed for. And the only way that I definitively noticed success is when I felt people get more impassioned, more opinionated, and more aggressive about it. The more fights we had, the more I was excited.”

Ian Record:

It’s interesting you bring that up because on one hand you would think, ‘Oh, going into this, I want to avoid anxiety, I want to avoid tension,’ but”

Terry Janis:

It’s just the opposite actually.”

Ian Record:

“You want the opposite.”

Terry Janis:

“It has to build.”

Ian Record:

“Because you want passion and interest and you don’t want apathy.”

Terry Janis:

“Exactly. Exactly. And that’s how we knew we were being successful is because it did grow. And by the time it came to the referendum vote itself, it was a crescendo. It was so intense. It was like, ‘Ah!’”

Ian Record:

“So where does constitutional reform at White Earth stand today, if you can just give a quick snapshot?”

Terry Janis:

“A quick snapshot is passed in the referendum vote; the current process of deciding what the relationship is between White Earth and the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe. So what the elected leadership at White Earth decided from day one of my participation there, my contract there, was that they want to remain a part of MCT, if at all possible, to organize under this new constitution, if it gets approved, and negotiate with MCT to remain part of MCT. So that’s what they’re doing right now, a good-faith effort on their part to have conversations with MCT. And because the changes in this new constitution compared to the MCT constitution are quite profound, and how that’s really going to happen, one of the initial thoughts is to request from MCT to sponsor a secretarial election that would change the MCT constitution that would allow each Band to establish their own constitutional form of government, and there’s other options for negotiating that as well. So those things are happening right now. They’re pretty tough; MCT doesn’t want to change. I described to you a completely unrepresentative form of government. The smaller bands that are benefiting from that, why would they want to change? They’ve got their own issues internally within their own governance. The system that they have benefits their current leadership. There’s going to be changes, etc. So it’s a broad dynamic. Whether that succeeds or not and how long White Earth commits to those negotiations is a decision of the elected leadership at White Earth right now, and they haven’t given up yet.

If it moves away from that, then you’re really talking about withdrawing from MCT and issues of secession. One of the issue points with the Bureau of Indian Affairs is this is their baby –- MCT -- and they set up this broad infrastructure to maintain and sustain this thing that they created. BIA initially doesn’t want to see this thing changed as well. They can see the arguments for it and against it, etc. There’s a very clear sort of distinction. One of the concerns that the Bureau of Indian Affairs is naturally going to have, as a broad bureaucracy, federal bureaucracy is, what is the ripple effect? So if White Earth withdraws from MCT, the federal government is supportive and recognizes their right to do so and establish their own form of government. Does that open the door for another entity to do the same thing?

San Xavier as a district on the Tohono O’odham Nation, Sandy Lake at Mille Lacs, situations where there isn’t the history of treaty recognition and treaty establishment, for example, White Earth and the federal government. San Xavier necessarily doesn’t have that kind of relationship, or maybe they do, I don’t know their story that well, but there are some things about this that distinguish it in a very real sort of way, not only the treaty relationship between White Earth and the federal government, but at every level, legislative, judicial, executive that recognizes White Earth as a distinct, federally recognized tribe independent of MCT and treats them that way and operates that way. So that kind of historical and practical federal recognition that exists in MCT and doesn’t exist in other places can argue or should argue that there’s not going to be the slippery slope sort of situation that is going to cause a problem to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, but the reality is, it will and those are very practical realities for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. So that’s the other thing.

A bottom line for the elected leadership at White Earth right now is they are not going to do anything that jeopardizes the relationship, the federal recognition relationship between White Earth and the federal government. They are not going to do anything that would jeopardize their funding, their relationship, or their status. So that’s got to be resolved before they actually withdraw from MCT. That’s a pretty sticky situation.”

Ian Record:

“Yeah, it’s uncharted waters. It’s hard to find another parallel in the United States.”

Terry Janis:

“There’s none. MCT has no parallel in the country, period. And you can make an argument for that and I can call youI can describe 10 times as many reasons why it’s distinct because it is.”

Ian Record:

“So let’s turn to your own tribe for a second. As I mentioned at the outset, you’re a citizen of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, often cited as one of the poster children, if you will, of IRA, the Indian Reorganization Act in that”

Terry Janis:

“I thought you were going to say something else, but I actually”

Ian Record:

“Well, no, in that there’s been a lot ofthere’s been books written about IRA formation at Pine Ridge and the process and you’re quite passionate about IRA, a lot of people are, and I’m wondering, you’ve beenyou’re working with a nation that just basically jettisoned -- or you could argue based on what you just said is still in the process of trying to jettison -- their IRA system, and your own nation still operates with one.”

Terry Janis:

“Yeah.”

Ian Record:

“And being that you’re sort of in this unique position, in that you’re sort of a student of your own nation and its governance system and then you’ve come to learn so much about another nation and their governance system and how they’ve changed it, I guess, if you can sort of try to meld those together and, I guess, what does the White Earth experience say to you about Oglala Sioux and its own governance system and potentially what the future of that could hold?”

Terry Janis:

“The political history of Pine Ridge has had a fairly consistent policy of holding the Bureau of Indian Affairs accountable for its trust obligations. That’s a stronger way of framing this idea and that has been the position of Pine Ridge virtually my whole life. I have argued with them about this a lot, that Pine Ridge should be contracting every function that we can...taking over all obligations, responsibilities, and if it costs us more money, we’re going to do it 10 times better than the federal government will. But the policy position of Pine Ridge is to not let them get away with doing a bad job, to hold them responsible to their trust obligation. That’s how their positioning it. I’m hoping that if they continue with that position that will actually change the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the federal government because that’s what it’s going to require. In order for Pine Ridge to succeed with that, they’re going to have to change the Bureau of Indian Affairs and move it away from a colonial, paternalistic structure to a service entity. That change is not coming any time soon that I’m aware of.”

Ian Record:

“I would agree and looking more internally though, because basically what you’re getting at is that they’ve taken a very staunch position, and I agree with you based on my work with them that that’s my impression as well, but looking internally, this sort of deep self examination that White Earth has gone through in terms of looking at their own governance system, do you feel inspired or encouraged by the White Earth experience to think that Oglala Sioux will engage in that full examination of their own governance system and perhaps identify a better way?”

Terry Janis:

“No, only because Pine Ridge is Pine Ridge and White Earth is White Earth. We as Oglalas are going to chart our own course. For me it goes back to, ‘Do I respect tribal sovereignty or not?’ And I do. And Pine Ridge, Standing Rock, any other reservation has an obligation to assert their sovereignty and make that decision for themselves. I think that Pine Ridge is wrong in that position in regards to the trust obligation and their ability to really change the federal government. I think it’s a lack of recognition of what the federal government is vis-á-vis Indian nations and that relationship, but given that that has been their position and the strength of it -- that’s why I don’t speak in weak terms in that regard and I speak in strong terms -- that it is the policy of the Oglala Sioux Tribe to require the federal government to live up to its trust obligations, period. That is a strong statement, an assertion of tribal sovereignty and it puts the obligation for improvement and reform on the federal government and the Bureau of Indian Affairs in particular. And that’s the best I can do with that.”

Ian Record:

“Final question. You’ve been immersed in the White Earth constitutional reform process for about a year. What, and I understand your point that every tribe is distinct in the way it chooses to express its sovereignty is unique, but aren’t there lessons from the path that White Earth has traveled and is traveling right now that other nations who are feeling like their constitutions and their system of government aren’t up to par, that aren’t reflective of who they are, aren’t there lessons that they can learn from the White Earth experience?”

Terry Janis:

“Absolutely. The bottom line is, White Earth is doing it. You saw the Truth to Tell; you saw the level of opposition to this thing. White Earth is doing it and the vote that the referendumI was sitting there when the count came in. I was completely shocked. We had a registration process that had a larger percentage of registering voters than has ever turned up to an election before, over double the normal turnout and of that, 80 percent of them voted for it. I was stunned. I didn’t expect it to be that large. Given thatand one of the things that you, if you have a conversation with the folks at Osage, for example, the kind of opposition that you saw in Truth to Tell that I saw every day out there, that they saw at Osage as well, whenever you’re thinking of a fundamental and profound change like this, there is going to be opposition. There has to be. You have to accept the reality of this colonial history and that people actually benefited from it and they’re not going to give that up without a fight, period. And that fight is going to be intense and you’ve got to stick with it and you’ve got to make it happen and see it through and let the people decide in as full and honest as a vote as you can get. And if they reject it, that’s great because that then leads you to another conversation and to draft a constitution that they really do want. That’s all that means.”

Ian Record:

“I’m glad you brought that up because I’ve heard a number of folks who’ve been directly engaged in constitutional reform say, ‘There’s no such thing,’ or something along these lines, ‘there’s no such thing as a failed reform effort.’”

Terry Janis:

“Exactly.”

Ian Record:

“For instance, Lac du Flambeau just went through a referendum vote on some pretty important amendments and they were voted down. And I think that if you talk to the people that led that effort, they might be discouraged a little bit, but they’re not giving up and I bet you they would say that, ‘We came out of this process with a greater understanding of what’s at stake and what the role of the constitution is in the life of the nation than we did before and that’s a good thing.’”

Terry Janis:

“And that’s the bottom line that I take from this experience. White Earth is doing it, an Indian nation, a tribe that wants to define their own governmental system. You don’t accomplish that without doing it. Whether it succeeds the first time or the 20th time, it doesn’t matter because each time you do it, you’re informing your population, you’re engaging the conversation and you’re building that base and that is nation building.”

Ian Record:

“Great way to end. Well, Terry, we really appreciate you taking some time to share your thoughts, experience and wisdom with us.”

Terry Janis:

“It was a pleasure. It was good seeing you again, too.”

Ian Record:

“Yeah, good seeing you. That’s all the time we have today for Leading Native Nations, a program of the Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management and Policy at the University of Arizona. To learn more about Leading Native Nations, please visit the Native Nations Institute’s website at nni.arizona.edu. Thank you for joining us."

 

Terry Janis: Citizen Engagement and Constitutional Change at the White Earth Nation

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Native Nations Institute
Year

Terry Janis (Oglala Lakota), former Project Manager of the White Earth Nation Constitution Reform Project, provides participants with a detailed overview of the multi-faceted approach to citizen engagement that the White Earth Nation followed as it worked to educate the White Earth people about the nation's proposed constitution in advance of their November 2013 referendum vote on the new document. He also shares some lessons learned from his experience at White Earth, and stresses that those engaged in constitutional reform efforts always respect the opinions of all of those people who have a direct stake in the outcome of those efforts. 

People
Resource Type
Citation

Janis, Terry. "Citizen Engagement and Constitutional Change at the White Earth Nation." Tribal Constitutions Seminar, Native Nations Institute for Leadership, Management, and Policy, University of Arizona. Tucson, Arizona. April 2, 2014. Presentation.

"So my name is Terry Janis. I'm Oglala Lakota from the Pine Ridge Reservation and I worked for the last year at White Earth Nation, which is in northern Minnesota, which is an interesting thing because historically Sioux people, Lakotas, are enemies with Anishinaabe people, Ojibwe people. But they hired me, so what can you say? And it was a fun year. I'm a lawyer; I came to the University of Arizona for law school. I've known Rob Hershey forever and the other people that are here. And this kind of presentation for me here today is not so much going to focus on the White Earth Nation constitution per se, but on our educational process.

By the time I got on the scene, in the 1990s like a lot of places there was a huge governmental crisis, indictments, convictions, etc. In '97, very soon after that was resolved, they realized that it was the IRA [Indian Reorganization Act] constitution that was really at the core of those issues. Whenever you engage and bring together all the power and decision-making authority in one small body, the likelihood of abuse and corruption is fairly high and they very quickly turned to this idea of reforming their constitution. They tried it in '97, but because of that recent history there was still too much division like in a lot of situations. I'm from Pine Ridge, we have plenty of examples of this where you get into a fight like this and you get factions and you have a hard time letting it go. So they waited for 10 years and then in 2007 did a process for drafting a proposed constitution.

There's important issues -- and we can engage in a long conversation about their drafting process because there's a lot to learn from it -- but the idea of an open and free opportunity for input, transparent drafting and revision process, opportunity for compromising consensus, the question of whether all of that is there in your drafting process is critical and there's going to be plenty of chance...Red Lake is doing an amazing job of really trying to engage that in a very real sort of way and a number of tribes are as well that are right in the drafting process.

But when I came on the scene, they had already completed that process and they had a proposed constitution. It was completed in 2009 and when I came on, my job was to start a dialogue, start a conversation amongst the community about this proposed constitution and then move it to a referendum vote so that the people themselves would decide whether they wanted to accept or reject this proposed constitution. And the other caveat that I had is that they were not going to allow any more changes, that the document that they created from 2007 to 2009 is the document that they voted on in November of 2013.

And I was brought on about a year ago, so in April of 2013. We had from 2009 to April of 2013 not really much going on, not a lot of conversation about it, some publications in the newspaper, but that was the challenge that we had ahead of us of how to pick this thing up, communicate to folks about what the delegates at the convention as well as the current council decided to do in moving this proposed constitution to a vote. And so I came in, we pulled together a team and started thinking about how do you engage an educational process with the community, how do you do that so that the people themselves are informing themselves and have opportunity to inform themselves as much as possible.

And so we looked at these three kind of ideas as a starting point and we realized that you really have to have multiple venues in multiple formats. You can't just hold one big seminar and expect that to meet everybody's needs. You can't just hold community meetings and expect that to meet everybody's needs. You have to have a range of different things: going door to door, talking to people in their kitchen, organizing community meetings that are part of the infrastructure that's already there with whatever that is, community councils, church groups, elder groups, whatever that is, utilizing all of the infrastructure that's already there and holding meetings and informational sessions with them, working with that infrastructure to bring people together, utilizing their networks, utilizing their relationships, utilizing their own feelings about this.

Formats as well. You know how the educational process is. Some of us learn best by looking and by hearing and by talking. Some of us learn best by reading, others have to write things out. Oftentimes for me, it's a combination of things. When I'm talking to somebody, when I'm listening to somebody, when I'm writing notes, when I'm reading it, it's that combination of stuff that does it for me. And so we try to engage all of those different formats and try to create situations where whenever we brought people together, we had all those formats there as well, recognizing everybody learns in their own way, especially as adults. Most of you are adults. We learn in different ways and hopefully we know how we learn best so we can bring those resources to ourselves.

So we tried to do that, a lot of meetings and types of meeting, utilizing the infrastructure that was already there, having a lot of printed materials, having a lot of visuals, having a lot of opportunity for conversation and debate, putting together a workbook where they could draw out and write notes and make it their own. And so we tried to create all of that functionality, all of that process.

The other thing that we really tried to do...and actually was the good thing about me being a Lakota coming into Ojibwe country is I wasn't involved in the drafting process; historically, I'm their enemy. I could be neutral. I didn't have anything invested in this document that they created. I didn't really have a strong feeling one way or another and I could maintain that idea that I was coming in to help people get the information that they need in order to make up their own mind -- that idea of neutrality. It was also strengthened by the kind of career that I pursued as well, that I could say in a very clear and honest sort of way that my interest in this is that the people make up their own mind, that the people have the authority and the information and the tools that they need to come to their own decision. Because as a Lakota man from our traditions, the sovereignty of our nation resides with each individual man and woman and then it moves from there to the family and to the tiospayes and then to the nation. And in our tradition, our sovereignty rests with each individual. And so that was my focus, that was the base of my assertion of neutrality, and I told them that story over and over and over and over. And so there's value in that -- of having an educational and informational process that's not tied to one family or one political party or pro or con. It's a group of people that you bring together to provide the resources for information and education that emphasizes the fact that sovereignty in this decision lies with each individual person. That's what was important to us, not what they decided or which way they went. So that idea of neutrality.

And then we went into it just thinking like Indian people. How are Indian people, how do they decide stuff, the use of humor, the use of respect and integrity, respecting everybody's position, everybody's history, everybody's ideas, connecting the materials to their interests. For me as an Indian person, if I have a conflict with my tribal government or some other thing, I may oftentimes -- or any of us might oftentimes -- put off this idea that we don't really care, but just the opposite is true. We as Indian people care deeply, almost always. And so the trick in an educational process is how do you connect these resources to the things that we as Indian people care about and thinking about who the people are, what their history is, what they really care about, and how do you present the material and information to them in the way that lines up with the things that they care about. That is what any good teacher will do -- whether you're teaching math or science or history -- is how do you line up the information that you're teaching with what the students care about and then how do you engage it with them from that perspective? So that's basically all we were trying to do.

The final thing that we came in this with...with this idea of respecting the politics of the community. Any time you're dealing with a constitutional reform process, regardless of how narrow or broad, it's a political issue, it just is. And if you're going to engage your community to help that community, to learn about it, come to their own decision and respect their decision, and you're going to do it in a way that really has good educational pedagogy and groundwork, that's not going to be enough.

In any reservation community, you're going to have to deal with the politics of the situation. You just have to. You cannot avoid it. You cannot wish it away. If somebody's mad, one family is mad at another, you've got to deal with that. You've got to find a way of dealing with it. If one group hates the elected leader -- which in White Earth they really, really do -- you've got to deal with that. You've got to go into communities maintaining your neutrality, maintaining your emphasis on this idea that the people are the source of sovereignty and it's important that they make a decision and that's why I'm here and that their hatred of the chairperson, their hatred of the secretary-general...or secretary-treasurer or anybody else is important, it's valid. Not that I'll agree with them, yes or no, but that their feelings, their political base is valid, it has value.

It's not my place as an educator on these issues, on these highly political issues, to argue with them about the rightness or wrongness of their politically held positions. My job is to see them, to understand them and to respect them and to make room for them. In an educational process, if you're going to have a conversation about the content of a constitutional reform and help people to understand what that reform is, you're going to have to make space for those political issues.

So that was our starting point and we went through six months of almost 60 different community education sessions, hundreds of small-room conversations, thousands of phone conversations, an all-day seminar, eight radio interviews...there's a community radio station that we used a lot...internet and web-based streaming formats of all of the training sessions, all of the seminar materials and other stuff, everything available online. Even the ugly conversations, we put it up on the web. The whole world was able to see if they wanted to how intense and vibrant this thing was. And that was our goal. We put all of this stuff up and there's a few things that we learned. [I've got a few more minutes.] These are the things that we learned.

Politics and power in the community must be respected. I ended that previous slide with it and I began this final slide with that. This cannot be overstated. You have got to make room for the politics of that community. You've got to. A constitution is inherently a political document and people have got to see it and engage it. If they're not engaging it, if they don't have...and remember what I said earlier, we as Indian people, we care. There is not one of us that lacks for caring. Even if it's the only thing we care about is drugs or something, we as Indian people care deeply about a lot of different things. And whenever you combine that with a political issue, especially if you're dealing with membership and citizenship, which the White Earth constitution did and moved from a quarter-degree blood criteria to lineal descendancy; a hugely, hugely volatile issue for the entire community. And we realized that coming off the history of that community, coming off what this proposed constitution was proposing that politics and power in the community must be respected. And that process is not easy; it requires you to deal with sometimes very extreme emotions.

I can tell you, when somebody's really angry and you know how spit'll comes out of their mouth sometimes, I can tell you exactly how far it goes so I put myself right at this space so it doesn't hit me. That was the nature of it. You just...you've got to be okay with it and it may not come to that, you can do a number of things that try to engage it in a way that defuses it, but sometimes you're not going to be able to.

The truth for me, I found, that what I wanted was an escalating interest and that is going to show itself in a variety of ways. Sometimes people are going to get more excited and more positive about it. Other times people are going to get more excited and more negative about it. We want an escalating amount of interest in this thing because we had a timeframe moving to November 19th to a vote. We wanted an escalating amount of energy, an escalating amount of dialogue, people taking positions and arguing for their decisions. I said this over and over and over, "˜Don't be quiet. Talk to every family member, go to the tribal council meetings, talk about these things as much as you can.' I wasn't at the council meetings so I didn't care, but that was my job.

The second thing is the importance of emotion and passion, which we basically just talked about, but it really does work, this idea. And in some ways it was just happenstance, something that you stumble across, but it was something that my elders told me. Once I was deciding to go to law school and stuff like that, we started having these conversations about sovereignty and where it comes from and what's the traditional base of it amongst Oglala Lakota people, and those are the things that they taught me. And I used what they taught me from that traditional base to have these conversations in the White Earth community, that there's value and reality in the individual holding the base of that sovereignty and making those sovereign decisions for themselves, taking that responsibility, carrying that burden and making that decision. So that results in emotion and passion, that results in interest and care, that results in decision-making and advocacy, and I think that's what you want. You want your people to be interested and from that perspective, there's no win or lose. Whether the constitution passed or not, we created interest and care and passion about it.

Timing and place for building momentum. Do not put yourself in a situation where you complete a drafting process and then wait three or four years before you do anything with it. It's a tough deal, if you're going to actually go through the process of drafting it, and what I'm learning about Red Lake and other places that are engaging the drafting process, do that in a deliberate way where you have plenty of opportunity for feedback and compromise and engagement. Engage an educational process without a bunch of delay. I think it's fine to make a decision -- once you have to draft -- to move it to a vote without further change, I think there's value in that, but if you have a huge delay like this, like we had, it's kind of fishy, it's kind of weird. How important is this thing really if you're going to do that? So keep that in mind.

You really do want to build momentum. You want to build this process where there's participation and engagement in the drafting process, that there's time and debate on people...allowing people to come to a decision. This is a pretty important decision, whether it's a small constitutional amendment or a complete reform of their constitution. Each one of those is critical and if the people are going to vote, then it's important that they be a part of that or at least have an opportunity to participate in that drafting and then give them time to really come to a decision, fight with each other, engage with each other, debate. And then a process for a vote.

Maintaining a firm principle in neutrality -- and again, some of this is just fortuitous -- but not only was I given the opportunity to do this as a Lakota in Ojibwe country, but the elected leadership, the tribal council, the chairperson, the secretary-treasurer were consistently supportive of that idea as well. Not because of me -- and I'm sure they had their own political reasons as well -- but when the council also supported our educational efforts and our education team, gave us the space and the resources to engage, didn't interfere. They still had their own opinions, they were divided just like everybody else was, but they emphasized the desire that the people themselves would decide and that the educational process would engage in a neutral fashion, that we would not promote one direction or another. There is real value in that. If you engage in an educational process and you're pushing it one way constantly, it's just going to fail. I think it's going to push against you and I think you're going to end up with a bad result. And so there was real value in that.

The final thing that we really learned as much as anything else -- especially when you're engaging a very broad reform like we did and on very highly controversial issues like from blood quantum to lineal descendancy -- you're going to get some pretty intense opposition and some of you have experienced that. Almost every other tribe that I've talked with that have engaged this, they come up with words like "˜the local Taliban' or the kind of intense kind of argument and debate and opposition. It's really important to just do it, to maintain your focus, to stay your course, and that attitude of doing it has to be a commitment from your educational team that does it with respect, respecting all of those people that would give voice to the strength of their opinions regardless of what that opinion is. But also the elected leadership, the elected leadership cannot back away. They have to maintain a principled approach to this and that was the value of White Earth's elected leadership as well. Their position -- whether they supported it or opposed it -- consistently, "˜We want it to go to a vote, we want the people to decide and we'll respect the decision of the people.' So those kind of principles and those kind of ideas help you as a team to stick with it, to stay with it and bring it to a referendum vote or whatever the eventual process is.

So those are the key principles that we engaged in our educational process. They're very simple. There's a lot of other details. Whenever you start into it, you want to think about the educational process, what is a learning process for adults on your reservation? They're going to be fairly consistent. We learn through different formats. We have to learn by seeing it, by coloring it, by writing it, by hearing it, by arguing it, by watching a movie, by going to your grandma's house or whatever it is. That's how we learn. You're going to have passion with it. So the general educational process in the pedagogy of your people, adult education; this is not new stuff, none of this is new stuff. This is understood.

As Indian people, how do we learn? Humor, everything else, food, it's got to be there. And the passion. The passion is there. We as Indian people, we are passionate people. We just are. We care deeply. How are you going to connect these sometimes very technical things, constitutional reform? We're going to go over some of those technical stuff, the legal side of this this afternoon as well. How do you connect that to what people really care about and have those conversations and take the time. It takes time, evening, morning, whatever that timeframe is that people think the best. I've set up sessions at 5:00 in the morning because that's when that guy thought the best and we did it. This is what it takes and it's doable and it's fun in a lot of ways. If you care about education, this combination of education, grounded in tribal sovereignty. That's what we learned as the keys to having a successful education and information process."