American Indian Constitutional Reform and the Rebuilding of Native Nations

Five. MY GRANDMA, HER PEOPLE, OUR CONSTITUTION

Five MY GRANDMA, HER PEOPLE, OUR CONSTITUTION I see a lot of creative people on the reservation. They’re caught in a paradoxical situation. They adhere to the values of what the grandmothers and grandfathers talked about, to be in tune with themselves, to be in tune with their environment . . . This value system that I’m telling you about goes this way, and the other value system comes back the opposite way. I’m telling young Indian people that there is a place there, right down the middle. Not too far to this side, not too far to that side but down the middle between pairs of opposites.” APACHE M AN, OUR VOICES, OUR L AND “Midt Midt Miya:m.” (“Go straight, right down the middle.”) HUALAPAI ELDERS AND GR ANDM AS ELNOR A M APATIS, LOIS IRWIN, AND ANNABELLE JONES INTRODUCTION My grandma, Lois Marie Wildavs1 Irwin,2 was a “fullblooded ” Hualapai.3 She was an enrolled member4 of the Hualapai Tribe, although—other than attending the Valentine Indian School—she never resided on what is now the Hualapai Indian Reservation.5 Her people, her father’s and mother’s relatives, lived near what is now the Town of Kingman and the Walapai Mountain area of Arizona. Her people, the Hualapai, descend from the thirteen Pai Bands who once occupied what is now northwest Arizona, the ancestral homeland of the Hualapai. Today, almost Joseph Thomas Flies-Away My Grandma, Her People, Our Constitution 145 everyone of Hualapai blood is “related” somehow, and every tribal member can link himself with at least one of the band affiliations and families. The constitution of the Hualapai Indian Tribe—the writing—was born in 1934. It was revised first in 1955 and most recently in 1991. The writing attempts to define who we are as Hualapai and to describe our methods of governance, leadership, and organization. Our constitution—the content and character of our people—our culture(s), customs, and common practices , are what make the writing stay alive and be. My grandma, her people, and our constitution share a personal commonality . They are related to each other in that they contribute to and affect my identity, who I am, where I belong, even who I am born for. Or, in the plural, who are we? Why are we here? Where do we come from? Where are we going? This identity curiosity becomes even more engaging when thought about in terms of tribal membership and tribal citizenship. But, before discussing issues of membership, citizenship, and tribal constitutions , we should ask, are these concepts even connected to an indigenous worldview or capable of expression in the Hualapai language? How can, or does, a writing allow tribes to more clearly define who they are? How can these writings—these constitutions—artfully demonstrate tribally specific expressions of public power, personal representation, and political will? And what development strategies or approaches are available to tribes as they, or we, build and rebuild government? Similar reformative thought and thinking is occurring in places throughout the world. In some countries colonial governments are attempting to find contemporary ways to address indigenous issues constitutionally, or through legislation. In other places, such as the United States, indigenous people are empowered to create and construct their own constitutions and currently are engaged in complex processes of constitutional and governmental reform. Sometimes reform is subtle and occurs with little notice, methodical and dispassionate. Other times reform simmers and heats, until it explodes into a full-blown controversy or crisis. In 1991, members of the Hualapai Tribe voted to revise our constitution for a second time. This new governing document afforded institutional change to the Hualapai government. The new constitution is periodically tested and challenged in various ways,6 though the process is quite restrained. Tribal members often do not know when the constitution is being tested until it reaches a level of conflict that calls for the intervention of the Tribe’s judicial branch. Even then it can be uneventful or uninteresting to all but a handful of tribal members. Tests of the Tribe’s governmental and corporate sovereign immunity, election challenges, and leasing questions in 146 Joseph Thomas Flies-Away regard to economic development have also been brought before the Hualapai Judicial Branch in recent years, and more are expected as the Tribe continues to develop its government and economy. As more and more members...