Tribal Power
American Indians Find Seats at the Table
by Beth BrittonPhoto by Todd Goodrich
Representative Carol Juneau remembers well her first day on the job during the 1999 Montana Legislature. Representing a relatively small population on the Blackfeet Reservation in northern Montana, one of a few Indians in the 150-member body, Juneau says she felt like a fish out of water.
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 from left: Carol Juneau, Joey Jayne, and Margarett Campbell |
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What a change six years can bring.
Juneau has become a leader for Indians statewide and an educator for legislators not familiar with issues facing the state’s tribes. And two other UM grads have joined her in representing their reservations—Joey Jayne and Margarett Campbell.
The three representatives have different backgrounds, but they have found common ground in Montana state government—working to improve the lives of their constituents. And they have backup: five other Indian legislators are serving. American Indians now hold twice as many seats as the state’s tribes held just four years ago.
The Indian Caucus represents 5 percent of the 150-member assembly—close to the 6.2 percent of American Indians in Montana’s total population. The number is significant; it places Montana second only to Alaska in the percentage of Indian legislators. With seven Indians in its sixty-member legislature, Alaska has just under 12 percent representation.
TRIBAL LEADERS’ INSTITUTE
“I think many Montanans forget about Indians, but Montanans need to understand that these three women come to the Legislature with a wealth of understanding about issues relevant not only to their own tribes but to all Montanans,” says former U.S. Congressman Pat Williams, now senior fellow at UM’s O’Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West.
“What really strikes me is [that] people [are] finally recognizing their competence. Carol is one of the most competent of state legislators, a nonstop hard worker. Joey is a quite accomplished lawyer and whip smart, and Margarett is razor quick.”
Williams is leveraging his experience and the O’Connor Center’s resources to provide a quick anecdote to the American Indian legislators’ steep learning curve. The center received a one-year pilot grant of about $40,000 from The Sallie Mae Fund to finance the Tribal Leaders’ Institute.
The institute, designed for any and all elected or appointed American Indian officials, debuted last fall. “The purpose of it is simple: Indian leaders tell us what they want more information about and we attempt to provide it,” Williams says.
Issues of specific interest to the 2005 legislators are the principles of federal Indian law, the partnership between state government and tribal government, and how the state budget affects people on and off the state’s Indian reservations.
“The overall goal is to provide Native American leaders with an understanding of the issues they select as wanting to know more about,” Williams says. “This request for help is a sign of genuine maturity. Most elected officials don’t want to ask for help.”
CAROL JUNEAU
For Juneau and the seven other American Indians holding office in the 2005 legislature, the growth of Montana’s Indian Caucus is not just about numbers. It’s about time.
“Indian people have to be a part of the decision-making process,” Juneau says. “I’m hoping that as Indian legislators we’re able to make a much stronger connection between Indian people and the state of Montana. It’s wonderful to be a part of the decision-making process. We’re sitting at the table, which is only right.”
Juneau, the vice-chair of the Democratic Party in Montana, is optimistic about the future of tribal involvement in state government. She proudly states that residents of every reservation in Montana now have an Indian representing them in the Montana Legislature.
Juneau, a Mandan and Hidatsa in her fourth term, earned a master’s degree in education from UM in 1980. It was at the University that she learned the power of a strong education and what education allows people on or off reservations to accomplish. “It’s always good to be on a college campus and around people with different ideas,” she says. “I developed my skills there.”
She worked for Blackfeet Community College and retired recently from Browning Public Schools, where she was student affairs adviser and the director of the Stay-in-School program.
Now a leader in the Montana House, Juneau says she learned as much from her personal life as she did from any professional experience. She grew up on the Fort Berthold Reservation, sixty miles southwest of Minot, North Dakota, and moved to Montana in 1969. Having lived on reservations most of her life, Juneau says she is familiar with Indian issues and the challenges that Indians have faced for decades.
Her background serves her well today in her role as a member of the Joint Appropriations Subcommittee on Education. Juneau also serves on the Joint Appropriations Subcommittee on Long-Range Planning and the House Appropriations Committee, where she is vice-chair.
“It’s good to go into the hearing room showing a real strong, united front on issues of importance to us,” Juneau says. “Hopefully [the Indian Caucus] is sending a strong message. So often we come to Helena or the federal government and ask for support, and then we leave, go home, and hope it works. Now we can make those laws.”
The creation of the Indian Caucus, which meets weekly at the Capitol, has been a successful strategy in keeping the Indian legislators together on issues, Juneau says. A key issue for the 2005 caucus is “Indian Education for All,” a Supreme Court ruling requiring Montana schools to recognize and preserve American Indian culture and heritage in state classrooms, she says.
“Support for the concept is there, but the money isn’t,” Juneau says. “We want the public school system to provide instruction on contem-porary Indian issues.” Juneau is a realist, and she understands that this year, in her final session in the House, not all issues of importance to American Indians will make it to the floor.
“My sense of hope is dwindling. I had greater hope that we’d have additional resources, but already three of my bills have died in committee,” she says. “Even though we have a budget surplus, there are so many issues, so many cutbacks in the past. We’re trying to make some programs whole again”
MARGARETT CAMPBELL
The journey from UM classrooms to the floor of the Montana House of Representatives was a short one for freshman legislator Margarett Campbell. Just one year ago, she was finishing her class work in Missoula on her way to earning her doctorate in educational leadership and technology management.
Today the Poplar resident serves on the House taxation, legislative administration, local government, and education committees. “Each time I walk into the House of Representatives, there’s this incredible sense of responsibility. It’s almost breathtaking to think I will push a button to create a law or keep it from being created,” Campbell says.
The fifty-year-old Campbell, who served as president and academic dean of Fort Peck Community College for twenty-two years, today works as the vice president for the Department of Community Services on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation. She comes from a long line of American Indians who served their country. Before her father became a U.S. citizen and earned the right to vote, he fought in the Second World War and was a prisoner of war following the Bataan Death March. Both her father, now deceased, and her mother believe in giving back to one’s country and community.
Holding political office was not part of any childhood dream or goal for Campbell, however. After redistricting, Senator Frank Smith came to her and said he had approached every leader in the community. “He told me that if they didn’t come up with someone soon there would be a problem,” she says. Campbell laughs to think of what a spur-of-the-moment decision she made to run for the vacant seat. But she was not altogether unprepared. In 1992, Campbell worked as a program coordinator for the ‘Discover the Indian Vote’ campaign and she also had registered voters in the past.
Campbell, an Assiniboine, laughingly describes the learning curve for new legislators as “steep.” She says she had great teachers at UM, but even her doctorate level work didn’t prepare her for her new job.
“It’s complicated, but not impossible. I do spend all my time reading rules and doing lots of research,” she says. “The information from the Tribal Leaders’ Institute has helped me so much. That program gave me a running start, and the only complaint I have is it didn’t last long enough,” says Campbell, who admits to feeling some pressure to accomplish much for her district.
The chance for significant legislation aimed at helping the state’s tribes is greater this year than ever, she says. “Indian people have been absent on taxation issues, and that’s been a concern to me. It’s essential we understand the bigger picture of taxation, and I can provide a voice for Indians.” The growing number of Indian legislators has resulted in the need for more understanding of Indian issues on the part of non-Indian lawmakers, and there also is a disconnect between rural and urban Montanans, Campbell says. “What I find is an absence of thought from people in urban areas for those of us in eastern Montana,” she says. “Montana is like two states, and I feel a responsibility to educate other legislators. That is a humbling and incredible process.”
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AMERICAN INDIAN CAUCUS Montana Senate SD 16: Sen. Frank Smith, D-Poplar Montana House of Representatives |
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JOEY JAYNE
Joey Jayne of Arlee admits that her honesty can occasionally get her into hot water.
“I feel like I have good judgment, but I’m not afraid to stand up for what’s different,” she says. “Some people just sit around and don’t want to make waves; some people don’t even read the bills before they vote on them. I think a lot of legislators are narrow-minded and think it’s too much work.”
The 1993 graduate of UM School of Law, who owns a law firm on the Flathead Reservation, is no stranger to hard work or plain talk. She says she pursued a legislative seat because statutes are unclear and she “wanted to be the one that was making laws.” When she reads the bills under consideration at the 2005 legislature, Jayne says, “I feel a huge responsibility and weight on my shoulders.”
A forty-eight-year-old Navajo, she represents newly created HD15, a huge expanse of land stretching from Missoula and Lake County north to Heart Butte and East Glacier. In her first two terms, before redistricting, the New Mexico native represented HD73.
It was her education at UM’s School of Law and her experience as an attorney that she says prepared her for the legislative debates and a leadership role in state government. She is the sole female attorney currently serving in the Montana House.
A familiarity with federal Indian law and an understanding of how the law works—along with a high comfort level when debating bills before her peers—helped ease Jayne’s transition from private practice into the very open process of making law, she says. “My biggest concern is that bills are being passed that limit people’s rights and narrow their opportunities,” Jayne says. “What I feel deeply about is that we do not take liberties away from people.”
She spends time breaking down barriers between Indians and non-Indians. “We have to educate legislators who are naive or who don’t accept Native Americans,” she says. “They learn there’s unemployment of over
seventy percent [on some reservations], and it’s very powerful. I am reaching both Democrats and Republicans. I have felt the responsibility to educate others, and I work pretty well with both sides of the aisle.”
Although Jayne admits that the atmosphere for Democrats at the 2005 Legislature is “happier” than in the past—due to the 50/50 Montana House, and the Democrats’ majority in the Senate—if she had her druthers, the members would do their jobs with little consideration of party affiliation.
“There are people on both sides who will not budge on party lines,” she says. “When parties fight and when one party wants to be superior to the other, who’s going to win here? It’s challenging, but if I can make it easier for someone [in Montana] to go to bed at night, then it’s worth it to me.”
Beth Britton, M.A.’99, is a freelance writer and
journalism teacher at C.M. Russell High School in Great Falls.
She covered the 1999 Montana Legislature for the UM Community
News Service.
