By ROBERT JUMPER
Tutiyi (Snowbird) and Clyde, N.C.
For decades, the tribe has given lip service to the idea of a constitution for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI). Members of the community have advocated. They have assembled. They have planned. They have devoted their time, their resources, and their insights to meetings. There has been enough support for the idea that Dinilawigi (Tribal Council) representatives have openly endorsed it and, at one point, unanimously voted to present referendum questions to the tribal community to decide the fate of a tribal constitution proposal.
For a roughly three-year stretch, I was a frequent member and attendee of the constitution committee meetings. Back then, you didn’t have to be chosen by designation through resolution. You just had to be a community member. The most recent of a decades-long quest for a constitution was a roughly six-year process. In fact, I participated in drafting sessions with EBCI Beloved Woman Carmaleta Monteith and Lloyd Arneach from the committee, who proposed the draft that was eventually submitted to Dinilawigi with a resolution to hold a referendum.
While there were differing levels of agreement with the proposed constitution in its entirety, the Dinilawigi agreed unanimously (at the time) that the decision on the constitution should be the people’s, not the Council’s.
The draft constitution, crafted over six years, had input from many members of the tribal community. It had been shared, presented, and tweaked repeatedly during that time. It was featured in the One Feather article by article alongside committee rationales for the language of each section or article. In the end, special sessions of the Community Club Council were held publicly about the proposed draft. In those sessions, which were comprised of officers from each community club, the draft constitution was examined line by line, taking a full Community Club Council vote for each individual article of the proposed constitution. In my opinion, the draft was thoroughly vetted by the Community Club Council, and it was so sure of its content that they were the official submitters of the document and resolution to the Dinilawigi.
By contrast, how much biographical information do you see about candidates for elected seats before a tribal election? In my opinion, there was more information available to the community about the proposed constitution for a longer period than is available for most candidates for the most important seats in tribal government.
Mailings were sent out by the EBCI Election Board outlining both the questions that I submitted for consideration concerning Dinilawigi terms, those unanimously approved by Dinilawigi and ratified by the Ugvwiyuhi (Principal Chief) in late 2021 and again in early 2022, and the proposed constitution question, voted for by Dinilawigi and ratified by the Ugvwiyuhi in April 2023. It was considered, at the time, a landmark event in the history of the EBCI, since the decision would be placed in the hands of the community for a tribe-wide referendum vote. There were celebratory tears from members of the community and at least one member of the Dinilawigi. Six-plus years of diligence had seemingly come to a head at that April meeting to allow the community-crafted constitution’s fate to be decided by the community.
But in May 2023, after years of silence on the drafting of the constitution, the Attorney General and his staff sought a meeting with the Constitution Committee to ask that group to join him in asking that the questions be nullified and removed from the ballot, in favor of his resolution to ask new referendum questions to consider modifying the existing Charter “in small increments” to achieve some level of controlled adjustment to the law to settle larger issues like civil rights and adding a judicial branch. He stressed that having multiple outstanding resolutions addressing the same issue could be “potential” for “causing significant difficulties at the ballot box” and “conflict”. He said he was concerned that language in the proposed constitution might be “an abrupt and dramatic change” in the way the government operates. He also stated he disagreed with the Constitution Committee and the Community Club Council on the proposed constitution and the attempt to have a referendum vote on it, and added, “It is not just me but the AG’s Office.”
In his explanation, the Attorney General said that his resolution had been submitted per tribal code, as had the one from the CCC, and the Dinilawigi would make the decision.
Shannon Swimmer of the Aniwodihi (Painttown) Community (now Aniwodihi Dinilawigi Representative) said in the May 2023 Dinilawigi session, “I have been attending the (Constitution) Committee meetings for a while. Our original intentions were that we would work alongside the Attorney General to make any possible changes. But then he brought to our attention that if we made any changes to any word whatsoever to the current document that was approved by the Tribal Council, we would have to rescind and go through this process again. The Constitution Committee’s concern was that it would not be passed by the Council. We would be taking several steps back. Right now, we have a constitution that is ready to be voted on. The Tribal Council has already authorized the referendum so that people can either vote for it or against it. We plan on having more informational sessions to educate people, answer any questions, and hopefully alleviate any of their concerns. You are not going to lose your per capita. You are going to have rights that are protected by this constitution. That was the whole point of working on this. It was to guarantee people’s rights. The AG’s office is doing a great job of representing its client. Their client is the tribal government, not the members of the Eastern Band. We are representing the Eastern Band people, not the government. That is why we are here today: to ask that the resolution (to nullify the referendum questions and replace them with a question to allow modification of the Charter to limit the scope of change) be killed and people are allowed to vote on the constitution as it was approved by Tribal Council, and that the people get to have their voice, in September, heard.”
Rep. Swimmer is now on the “Constitutional Convention,” which was created by Dinilawigi to “organize” the constitution creation effort. The Attorney General, at the behest of the legislative branch, crafted yet another resolution, submitted and passed in the June 2023 session, that eliminated the term and constitutional questions from the September ballot and killed the proposal submitted by the Attorney General. It also dissolved the constitution committee that had worked for six years on the 2023 draft and created a committee with the title Constitutional Convention. It laid out the makeup of the committee to include government elected officials.
At the most recent committee meeting, April 23, 2026 the Constitutional Convention was unable to conduct business because it did not have a quorum. Out of 15 designated members, including alternates who are supposed to attend in case of absence, four members attended. For those of you who like math, that’s a 26 percent attendance rate. Some had “excused absences”, but most of the committee was simply absent with no explanation provided. In the April 9 session of this committee, it reached quorum roughly twenty minutes into an approximately 90-minute session.
The Constitutional Convention was established on July 13, 2023, with the ratification of Res. No. 627. Since that time, the committee has been engrossed in policymaking and leadership adjustments. When they finally got around to addressing the constitution, there was a question as to whether they would start afresh, use the Attorney General’s red line version, or use the 2023 draft submitted to Dinilawigi and approved for referendum vote as a foundation for a new constitution draft. The Constitutional Convention decided to use the 2023 draft. In April 2026, nearly three years after its establishment, the committee started addressing the first article of the constitution. They selected Article 4. The committee’s stated goal is to have a draft ready for consideration by Dinilawigi for a referendum vote during the 2027 election.
In 2019, $75,000 was allocated to the constitution committee. In Res. No. 627 (2023), that money was carried over for the use of the Constitutional Convention. No expenditure has been publicly reported.
The bottom line is that if the enrolled members of our tribe are not interested and are content with having privileges instead of rights, if we stand silent when the opportunity to establish a judicial branch of government is made available to us, then why do we continue to take up people’s valuable time and tie up financial resources? If we are satisfied and willing to live with the system as is or are possibly so afraid of the “unintended consequences” that may come with taking control of our own destiny that we refuse to engage, then there is indeed no passion for a governing document “for the people, by the people.”
I hope this commentary makes you mad. I don’t care if you get mad at me for my words, mad at the government, mad at the system, or mad at yourself. One group you should not be mad at is the Constitutional Convention. This group of volunteers has been given a mountainous task and has had the cards stacked against them from the beginning. What about that low attendance in the April sessions? To me, that is just an indication of the frustration that these volunteers are feeling. At least they volunteered for the good of the community. Rep. Swimmer’s premonition in 2023 proved true. The effort for a constitution for our people has taken several steps backward. Only the Principal People can turn it back around. But will we?
