Maine’s Native American tribes are treated differently from the vast majority of tribes in other parts of the country. The federal government recognizes the inherent sovereignty of those tribes, meaning they are treated as a separate nation rather than as a state or municipality. Sovereign tribes can establish their own form of government, determine membership requirements, and play a substantial role in law enforcement and court systems.
Maine’s Wabanaki tribes—the Penobscot Nation, Passamaquoddy Tribe, Houlton Band of Maliseet, and Aroostook Band of Micmacs—as well as the Abenaki and other tribal communities living in diaspora outside of Maine, do not have sovereignty. A law passed in 1980 created what is essentially a state/municipality relationship between Maine and the tribes, subjecting the tribes to Maine state laws. Maine’s tribes have sought sovereignty on par with most federal tribes for years, and now the effort is closer than ever to becoming a reality.
Maine Audubon supports tribal sovereignty in Maine. We stand with Wabanaki and other indigenous people in supporting their communities, their culture, and their right to self-determination. We stand with dozens of our peer conservation advocacy organizations in submitting testimony in support of this legislation, LD 585. And we stand with hundreds of other organizations and businesses striving to be more inclusive, equitable, and just in our work and our lives.
Sovereignty for the Wabanaki has direct implications for our relationships, work, and mission.
As a landowner, Maine Audubon must acknowledge that the land of this state was stolen from the tribes, and whole systems were created to perpetuate ongoing theft, persecution, and oppression throughout every generation and landscape here since. While white settlers worked to systematically eradicate Wabanaki people, communities, and culture, the land throughout what is now Maine has also been abused under white ownership and “stewardship.” Maine Audubon can claim positive land use practices that align with indigenous principles of reciprocity on our land and the land management that we influence, but the Wabanaki have been the best stewards that the lands have ever known. Maine Audubon supports Wabanaki sovereignty as a step toward acknowledgement and reparation of the occupation and seizure of Wabanaki ancestral homelands.
As a leader in conservation and environmental education, Maine Audubon points to Wabanaki culture as the ultimate example of natural resource stewardship, sustainability, and governance. Just as we rely on Western science, technology, and white education and leadership institutions to advance our mission, we also rely on Traditional Ecological Knowledge and ways of knowing. Concepts such as phenology, conserving resources for seven generations ahead, being water protectors, and silviculture that were central to indigenous culture are still the sources of most of today’s environmental restoration solutions. For decades, we have worked alongside Wabanaki leaders and communities restoring fish passage on the Penobscot River, observing signs of climate change, testifying on behalf of conservation values in the legislature, hosting Wabanaki experts for lectures, and developing new school curricula that blends STEM and traditional ecological knowledge. Maine Audubon supports Wabanaki sovereignty as a way of further enabling, empowering, and entrusting these traditions and values so ingrained in our mission and work.
Maine Audubon Testimony on LD 1626
Submitted May 4, 2021 (bill carried over into 2022)
Committee On Judiciary
℅ Legislative Information Office
100 State House Station
Augusta, ME 04333
May 4, 2021
RE: LD 1626, An Act Implementing the Recommendations of the Task Force on Changes
to the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act
Dear Senator Carney, Representative Harnett, and members of the Judiciary Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to present testimony in support of LD 1626, “An Act
Implementing the Recommendations of the Task Force on Changes to the Maine Indian Claims
Settlement Act”, on behalf of Maine Audubon and our 30,000 members and supporters.
Maine Audubon is a nonprofit conservation organization working to conserve Maine’s wildlife
and wildlife habitat by engaging people in education, conservation, and action. We have been
dedicated to the promotion of natural history for nearly as long as Maine has been a state,
founded as the Portland Society for Natural History in 1843.
But by the time of our founding, Wabanaki people had been living in what later became known
as the State of Maine for millennia, with an understanding of and connection to natural resources
far deeper than ours today. Their stewardship was interrupted by force, part of a shameful history
that has seen the Wabanaki Tribes lose 98% of their population and access to most of the lands
and waters they had lived on and managed for hundreds or thousands of years. Maine’s tribes
deserve the opportunity for meaningful participation in decisions that affect their lands, waters,
and economic future; rights that have been denied to them for centuries. Maine’s White and other
non-native residents deserve to see Wabanaki culture, in particular their reciprocal relationship
with nature, emulated rather than oppressed.
Maine Audubon is an organization that strives above all else to engage people in Maine wildlife
and wildlife habitat conservation. We feel that the ability to engage in that important work is
significantly weakened if Maine people are disempowered, marginalized, or disenfranchised.
Maine Audubon supports LD 1626 because it would recognize the inherent right of the people of
Maine’s Wabanaki tribes to govern themselves, just as more than 570 other tribes throughout the
nation are recognized. This fundamental change is overdue. Maine Audubon strongly supports
this bill to return the right of self-determination and sovereignty to the Wabanaki.
Thank you for your consideration of our testimony.
Sincerely,
Nick Lund
Outreach and Advocacy Manager
Maine Audubon
