ndns of, and for, the people
By asack
a few weeks ago, i logged on to facebook ready to catch up on indian country. personal drama, family pictures, prayer requests, and discourses were all to be expected. one specific conversation caught my eye: the lumbee tribal council recently voted to increase the payment of tribal council (meaning elected representatives on the lumbee tribal government) to $200 more dollars a month, per council member. people are upset, rightfully so, that as tribal council members get a budget increase, food insecurity, housing insecurity, and addiction run rampant in robeson county (robco). discussions around our tribal government structure and the purpose of council members quickly followed suit in the controversy around the specific legislation. one person commented that we are “in need of a revolution.” i started to feel validated in some thoughts i’d been considering for the past few weeks.
the lumbee tribe of north carolina is a nation in southeastern nc. robeson, hoke, scotland, and cumberland county are all parts of lumbee homelands, with robeson county serving as the primary area for organized political and cultural expression. today, the tribal government of the lumbee operates as a central governing authority. we are a state-recognized tribe meaning that the federal government does not recognize our government as that of a legitimate, sovereign nation. as a result, a significant portion of lumbee advocacy has focused on gaining the tribe federal recognition. this focus on recognition as a core part of lumbee activism has always made me feel off-put and recently i feel i’ve been better able to articulate why.
a centralized governing authority has not always been our primary method of political organization. before the current ideation of the lumbee constitution in 2001, there hadn’t been a recorded formalized, central body of government that our people lived under (although it is worth mentioning an attempt in 1994 to create the “the constitution of the ‘lumbee tribe of cheraw indians’” and the work of the lumbee regional development association, a lumbee non-profit with prominence in the community, est. in 1968). the concept of a constitution itself is not a form of traditional lumbee political expression. the reason for this change can be attributed to many things, but it’s important to note that without a constitution (proof of political organization) it becomes very hard for tribes in amerikkka to receive federal recognition. altering our traditional ways in the hopes of a chance of validation from the federal government is not uncommon for tribes.
our traditional systems are quite different from what we operate under today. rather than a centralized authority, members of the tribe operated under localized clan systems based on kinship. small, intimate communities made the calls for what was needed in their own spaces. since initial colonization, this has largely manifested in churches being the hotspot for addressing social ills. although there are obvious issues with indigenous communities primarily relying on christianity as a form of governance, there is no doubt that the format of churches throughout robco has allowed for a continuation of our clan systems.
another important aspect of our localized, clan system is it allowed for the swamps of robeson county to be known and understood only by those with a need to know. the complex twists and turns of the water and the thick pine woods surrounding the swamps have historically offered refuge for those at odds with the creation of a settler colony. indians of various tribes gathered in the swamps to form a new community, and with the creation of amerikkka bringing new people to the region, formerly enslaved people and poor whites started to join in as well. unless there was a commitment to living with the swamps and in community with others, outsiders faced difficulty entering the space.
settler-colonialism differs from colonialism in both its framework and therefore the response needed to make opposition successful. many native people and communities focus on the struggle for federal recognition as a core need for indigenous liberation. on a surface level, it makes sense that indigenous sovereignty needs to be recognized for us to move forward. in reality, if the root of our oppression as native people is white settlers coming onto our land, desecrating our culture, and raping and killing our people, then how can this be resolved by the same settlers “recognizing” us as a nation without any other action? furthermore, how can it be resolved if we’re recognized as a nation, not built on our traditional values, but based on a document built in the image of the amerikkkan constitution as a way to validate our indigeneity to outsiders? and if we can recognize that our power is inherent and comes from within, why would we waste time and money on trying to have our sovereignty recognized when there is more to be done?
federal recognition would allow for negotiations between the lumbee tribal government and the amerikkkan government, but, at the end of the day, the root cause of our struggles is untouched.
i don’t want to be in conversation with amerikkka, i want amerikkka dissolved.
as i write this i am unsure of how we can best agitate for a better future as a tribe, but it is unmistakable that the lumbee tribal government and the creation of the formal tribe is a newer concept, influenced by western standards of indigeneity. for a long time, our people were ok with no centralized name and no centralized authority. my parents and grandparents grew up with a tribe very different than the one that i now know. lumbees have previously been known as fighters, troublemakers, and resistors. we’re scuffletownians, yet our revolutionary spirit has started to dissipate — it falls further asleep the more we assimilate.
the one thing i know for certain is that we can look to indigenous revolutionaries of the past who have operated through themselves for guidance. the lowry gang, members of the american indian movement, water protectors, the indians of all tribes, and more have consistently advocated and acted as they saw fit in the interest of, and with, the people, regardless of what tribal governments have said in response.
