The reauthorized Violence Against Women Act includes an additional provision that allows Native American tribes to prosecute non-Native offenders. The Dartmouth sat down with Native American studies professor Bruce Duthu to discuss what the legislation means for tribes across the country.
What is significant about the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act, or to be more specific, the new policy allowing Native American tribes to prosecute non-Natives for domestic violence crimes that occur on Native land?
BD: This is the first time that Congress is acknowledging that tribes, in the exercise of their sovereign powers, can prosecute individuals who are not members of the tribe or other Natives. You have U.S. citizens who could be facing criminal trials before tribunals, which are not subject to the full constraints of the U.S. Constitution. That is the principle reason why there was such vigorous opposition to this reauthorization.
For this pilot program, three tribes were selected. The Pascua Yaqui in Arizona, the Tulalip in Washington and the Umatilla in Oregon. Why do you think these three tribes were specifically chosen out of the 566 federally recognized tribes to participate in this program?
BD: Under the terms of the act, tribes had the leeway to submit to the Department of Justice a fairly detailed plan showing they have the infrastructure ready to go to provide comparable, or better, protections to what the Constitution requires, and have those protections already in place for any defendant who’s going to be prosecuted under this newly authorized power.
What will be the next step?
BD: It could very well be that this is Congress’s way of prepping the citizenry for an exercise of power that right now people don’t see coming. This could be a manifestation of this reversal, beginning with some low-level crimes, seeing how this experiment in tribal self-governance in the criminal setting operates in practice with either the possibility of enhancing sentencing authorities so that it could easily subsume felony crimes, or removing the cap altogether and saying this authority now extends to all crimes regardless of category, restoring full Indian territorial sovereignty. That principle says that when an offender enters the lands of a sovereign nation, he or she is subject to the law if a law is broken.
Why do you think Congress had this mentality shift?
BD: I think it reflects some of what we’re seeing on campus: a wellspring of frustration from the ground up that says the problem of sexual violence against women, and in this case the problem of sexual violence against Native women, is epidemic. The rate of sexual violence against Native women outpaces any other group in the U.S. Congress heard the data loudly and clearly.
