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An editor reflects
by Stephanie Hemphill, Minnesota Public Radio
March 8, 2004

Joel Patenaude is leaving after covering the friction between Mille Lacs County and the Mille Lacs Ojibwe for 2-1/2 years. He says he found the experience "fascinating and frustrating." (MPR Photo/Stephanie Hemphill)

Joel Patenaude recently left his job as editor of the Mille Lacs Messenger. He's heading back home to Wisconsin after spending 2-1/2 years covering what may be the most complicated and contentious issue in rural Minnesota - the lawsuit over the existence of the Mille Lacs Ojibwe reservation.

Isle, Minn. — Not long after Patenaude arrived in Isle to take over the weekly newspaper, Mille Lacs County went to court to get the Mille Lacs Ojibwe reservation declared nonexistent. The suit came after more than a year of closed-door meetings between the county and the band.

"One of the first problems I had was not getting into the meetings," Patenaude says. "They were obviously talking about an issue that had profound public policy implications, and those meetings should have been public all along. Actually, one of the few things the county and the band agreed on was to keep me out."

The roots of the current case lie in an earlier court battle, which was decided just five years ago by the U.S. Supreme Court. It ruled that the Mille Lacs Band and other Ojibwe Indians had reserved hunting and fishing rights on land they ceded to the federal government in the 1800s. So each year the Minnesota DNR adjusts fishing regulations to make sure the Ojibwe can get their quota of fish. Patenaude says some people have never accepted that decision.

"There are people who feel that because the tribe won that round, revenge ought to be taken," he says. "If they can prove in court the reservation doesn't exist and all sovereign power the band believes they have can be stripped away, you couldn't beat the band better than that. But it's a long shot. There's just too much precendent, case law, and federal Indian policy, to say that's a possibility. For one little county of 20-some thousand residents to think they can afford to take this all the way is foolhardy. I think our representatives have failed us by not doing the hard work -- which is to not sue, but sit down and negotiate some agreements that would give us some security."

Patenaude says the people who are unhappy about the earlier treaty rights case should understand better than anyone else what a risk it is to go to court.

"I've struggled since I arrived to understand how anyone would want to go back to the federal courts and play another hand, because they're not going to be happy with the result. That is about the only thing I think is guaranteed."

"A growing number of Mille Lacs area residents are voicing objections to the current lawsuit, which so far has cost each side more than $1 million." - Joel Patenaude

There are other similarities between the two lawsuits, according to Patenaude. He says in the early stages of the treaty rights case, the Mille Lacs Band was only asking for the chance to take a small amount of fish for ceremonial purposes. But the Supreme Court ruled the band was entitled to far more than that.

The current case could go the same way, Patenaude says.

"A year ago, the Mille Lacs Band was saying, 'All we want is for the county to recognize that we have authority over our own membership, on property we own, primarily in the area of zoning.' The county said, 'We'll give you that, if you'll deny the reservation exists.' The band said, 'No.' So the zoning option, like the ceremonial amount of fish, will become much bigger. What's looming out there is much broader environmental regulation, including water and air quality. These are the things that are feared, but my contention is they weren't worth fearing until the county filed its lawsuit and decided to gamble everything, including an untold amount of tax revenue."

The legal tug-of-war between the Ojibwe and their non-Indian neighbors today is complicated. The Mille Lacs Band relies on wording in treaties that recognized the help their ancestors gave to the new settlers who were encroaching on their land.

"In 1862, when the Dakota Sioux had their uprising, the Mille Lacs Band sent warriors to Camp Ripley to defend the white settlers who ran there from wanton killing across the region," says Patenaude. "The provision you see in all the treaties since then recognizes that help. Treaties in 1863 and 1864 say, 'owing to the heretofore good conduct of the Mille Lac Indians, they shall not be compelled to remove so long as they shall not in any way interfere with the persons or property of the whites.' This was written in the same documents in which the Indians ceded their territory. That's very contradictory. It's thus that we have an almost impossible situation to settle. I think that's fascinating and ironic."

Patenaude says a growing number of Mille Lacs area residents are voicing objections to the current lawsuit, which so far has cost each side more than $1 million.

"If the letters to the editor of this newspaper are any indication, people are saying, 'We need to invest our tax money better than in a lawsuit.' We're talking about true day-to-day public safety that's being underfunded. But an amorphous reservation boundary dispute, that's hard to even get your head around to understand properly, that's our top priority. I think that's skewed and wrong."

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