Speaking for sovereignty

Jackson Flynn | Argonaut Karen Condon, Colville tribes program manager, talks about tribal research protocols Monday in the College of Law courtroom. She was one of the speakers in this year’s Native American Law Conference.

UI College of Law hosts annual Native  America Law Conference

Although the audience saw a dead, moldy fish on the screen in the College of Law courtroom Monday morning, Daniel Stone said the rotting fish actually served as the basis of an entire ecosystem. 

Jackson Flynn | Argonaut Karen Condon, Colville tribes program manager, talks about tribal research protocols Monday in the College of Law courtroom. She was one of the speakers in this year's Native American Law Conference.

Jackson Flynn | Argonaut
Karen Condon, Colville tribes program manager, talks about tribal research protocols Monday in the College of Law courtroom. She was one of the speakers in this year’s Native American Law Conference.

“My grandfather taught us to respect salmon,” Stone said. “They lay their eggs and die on the riverbank, and that’s why we have healthy streams … We see a dead fish, but it is really a provider of nutrients. “

Stone, a policy analyst for the Fort Hall Reservation’s Fish and Wildlife Department, was one of the many speakers who covered a variety of topics, from tribal stewardship to the legalization of marijuana, at the College of Law’s annual Native American Law Conference Monday.

Stone’s speech about the value of wildlife resources and management tied in to the greater theme of the conference, Tribal Stewardship of Plant and Food Sovereignty.

Angelique EagleWoman, a professor of law in the UI Native American Law Program and conference organizer, said this year’s theme encompasses many emerging environmental issues reservations face.

“The theme really touches on how we don’t view agriculture as a primary industry for most tribes,” she said. “We’re featuring speakers from the Coeur d’Alene Tribal Farm and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s tribal liaison will be speaking as well.”

EagleWoman said many of the emerging issues with agriculture among reservations began with the General Allotment Act of 1967.

“One of the issues for tribal communities is that the reservation home base was broken into small parcels because of this act,” she said. “The stated purpose of the United States government in doing that was to promote farming by households, but that didn’t necessarily happen.”

The theme of the conference explored the ways in which tribes are able to reconnect to agriculture while examining the plant and food sovereignty that is taking place across the country, EagleWoman said.

The conference, which began at 9 a.m. and ended at 4 p.m., featured speakers from a number of different tribes, including Nez Perce, Colville, Kootenai and Alaskan tribes.

Danielle Mayberry, a second-year UI law student, said she views the topics covered throughout the course of the conference to be of increasing importance and the conference itself as a significant annual event.

“I really like the conference every year, because it touches on topics important to tribal nations,” Mayberry said. “It also humanizes them to people who are not as familiar with the issues Native Americans face in the courtroom or with our culture.”

She said this year’s conference was unique because of the range of contemporary issues covered.

“Food sovereignty is a new topic with my tribe, and the conference was a way to inform tribal nations about issues they might not be familiar with,” Mayberry said. “For example, they touched on everything from resource preservation to the legalization of marijuana and how it effects the tribes.”

The conference, which UI has hosted for the past six years, is open to the public every year and is made possible thanks to the funds donated by the late James E. Rogers, EagleWoman said.

EagleWoman said she hopes the conference will continue to serve as a means of beginning a conversation among tribal communities about relevant issues, such as environmental and agricultural concerns.

“We hope to jumpstart a conversation and tribal stewardship,” she said. “It’s important to look at what is happening now so we can gauge what will happen in the future.”

Corrin Bond can be reached at [email protected]

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