Basketry as Economic Enterprise and Cultural Revitalization: The Case of the Wabanaki Tribes of Maine

There are many in Maine—in and out of government—who are best served if we stay quietly on our reservations, weaving baskets.

—Barry Dana, former chief of the Penobscot Nation, in 2003, after the tribe’s defeat in a state referendum on Indian gaming¹

In November 2003, Maine’s Penobscot Nation and Passamaquoddy Tribe were defeated in a statewide referendum that would have permitted the tribes to jointly build and operate a large casino and hotel complex near the town of Sanford, in southern Maine. Moreover, four years later, in November 2007, the Passamaquoddy Tribe suffered a separate defeat on a Maine ballot initiative that would have permitted the tribe to run a combined horse harness racing facility and Vegas-style casino (referred to as a “racino”) in Washington County, Maine. That the tribes needed the approval of the voters of Maine was unusual, the outcome of a series of legal struggles and limitations on the sovereignty of Maine’s tribes dating to the 1980 Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act (MICSA). An uncomfortable compromise between the state of Maine and the Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, and neighboring Maliseet tribe, MICSA had effectively recognized but relinquished the tribes’ claims to almost two-thirds of the land base of the state of Maine in return for monetary compensation.² However, two peculiar clauses in the Settlement Act—one likening the tribes to “municipalities”³ subject to the laws of the state of Maine and another stating that the tribes could not benefit from any federal legislation passed after 1980 designed for Indians (unless the Maine tribes were explicitly mentioned by name)—essentially have since prevented Maine’s Indian nations from taking advantage of forms of economic enterprise that are widely available to other federally recognized tribes. The ability to conduct Class III gaming operations (high-stakes, Vegas-style casino gambling) on tribal lands, which has been a federally protected right for other federally recognized tribes under the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act (IGRA) of 1988, has been denied to Maine’s Indian communities because of MICSA. As a result of this peculiar legal history, if MICSA is allowed to stand unaltered, then Maine’s Indian tribes will likely not be able to take advantage of casino gaming—a growing and profitable form of economic enterprise⁴ that has been adopted by federally recognized tribes in twenty-eight states—without the approval of voters in the state.⁵ Because of this unique history of tribal-state relations in Maine, discussions of viable economic alternatives to Indian gaming—and public and tribal perceptions of these options—are of fundamental importance today and are the keys to future tribal successes in pursuing economic enterprises and asserting tribal sovereignty.

My goal here is to contribute to this important discussion by providing an analysis of one form of tribal economic enterprise—basketmaking—that is often subsumed only under the conceptual categories of tribal art or traditional culture but that is, I argue, also a form of individual and tribal economic enterprise that has a long history in the region and that is generally accepted by non-Indians as non-threatening, benign, and positive.⁶ It is also viewed by many Wabanaki people (the collective term for Maine’s Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet, and Micmac tribes)⁷ as a form of cultural preservation, revitalization, and education (connected to language acquisition) that makes a powerful statement about sovereignty and that can be used as a tool for decolonization.⁸ The emergence in Maine of several large annual social gatherings designed specifically around the display and marketing of Wabanaki baskets to collectors, tourists, and non-Native consumers points to the economic importance of basketmaking in the local economy. Moreover, these gatherings have strong social importance as well: They connect Wabanaki producers to both Native and non-Native consumers, they provide a space for discussion of tribal politics in Maine, and they bring together relatives in fun and celebration of Wabanaki culture. In spite of these positive associations with Wabanaki basketmaking as a form of economic and cultural enterprise, there are...