Maine’s tribes have been excluded from provisions of the 2013 Violence Against Women Act that allow tribal courts to try non-Indians accused of domestic violence on reservations, but that may be changing.
The Penobscot Nation court was blocked from participation when the state of Maine — and then-attorney general Janet Mills — argued VAWA did not apply to Maine tribes under its interpretation of the 1980 laws that settled the tribes’ claim to more than half of Maine’s territory. As I report in today’s Portland Press Herald, the US House has just passed a revised version of the act with language introduced by Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME01) that would explicitly include the Maine tribes.
For background and the bill’s prospects in the Senate, please read the story.
For deeper background, settled into the 29-part series “Unsettled” on the land claims, the Passamaquoddy, and the fraught state-tribal relationship.
COLIN WOODARD is a New York Times bestselling author, historian and award-winning journalist. He is the author of seven books that have been translated into a dozen foreign languages and inspired an NBC television drama. He is currently Director of Nationhood Lab at the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Affairs at Salve Regina University. As State and National Affairs Writer at Maine's Portland Press Herald, he won a 2012 George Polk Award and was a finalist for a 2016 Pulitzer Prize. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Politico, The Economist, Smithsonian and dozens of other major publications.