4 ms·

> Part of the redacted material pertained to Maine’s treaty obligations to Wabanaki people. The motivation is very obvious - they wanted to conveniently forget

> Part of the redacted material pertained to Maine’s treaty obligations to Wabanaki people. The motivation is very obvious - they wanted to conveniently forget their treaty obligations.

boomboomsubban 3y ago
If they wanted to renege on their treaties with Native tribes, they likely would have openly done so. That's what was happening in most of the US around 1870.
- throwaway167 3y ago
  Perhaps they sought to hide it so those that sought to renege couldn't, making it a forever obligation.
  - eigenket 3y ago
    Given that about a month or so after the redaction they renaged on their obligations over Grass Island that seems unlikely https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/...
- ethbr1 3y ago
  It was nice to see the Supreme Court reverse the quiet abrogation trend 3 years ago: https://www.npr.org/2020/07/09/889562040/supreme-court-rules-that-about-half-of-oklahoma-is-indian-land https://www.npr.org/2020/07/09/889562040/supreme-court-rules... The 5-4 ruling, Gorsuch writing for majority, is a really interesting read: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/18-9526_9okb.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/18-9526_9okb.pdf Essentially, both liberals and conservatives can agree that... if the United States entered into a treaty... and the United States government never explicitly overrode that treaty... then it still stands. Which, fair, but still nice to see recognition even when the question has repercussions for the eastern half of Oklahoma, the state is opposed, and the facts are inconvenient.
  - enragedcacti 3y ago
    > Essentially, both liberals and conservatives can agree that... if the United States entered into a treaty... I think it would be more accurate to say that liberals and Gorsuch, who is uncharacteristically liberal on native american issues, can agree. Gorsuch's footnotes do a good job imo of making clear that the four conservative dissenting votes have very little respect for the treaties and promises made.
    - rsynnott 3y ago
      I mean, I get why, but it's very odd that people think of this as a liberal vs conservative issue; it is a rule of law issue.
      - adgjlsfhk1 3y ago
        well as Trump's repeated attempts to overturn the election show, preserving democracy and the rule of law are somewhat divided along party lines
      - enragedcacti 3y ago
        I agree that I'm playing kind of fast and loose with the terms. I think you could definitely make an argument that Gorsuch argues the position from a small-c conservative "rule of law" perspective. In my view the dissent is operating on a very different rule-of-law, one that Gorsuch is happy to dabble in with most other issues: > Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect. It's satisfying to raise issues above the partisan or ideological divide, but if the people that call themselves conservative consistently find ways make the law protect their own while restraining others, as four of them try to do here, then its naive to assume that the issues are really transcendent of that.
        rayiner 3y ago
        [flagged]
- enragedcacti 3y ago
  This is the relevant piece I believe: > The Articles also required that its terms and conditions “be incorporated into, and become and be a part of any Constitution, provisional or other, under which the Government of the said proposed State, shall, at any time hereafter, be administered; subject however, to be modified, or annulled by the agreement of the Legislature of both the said States; but by no other power or body whatsoever." They couldn't remove the sections because the terms of their statehood had them inherit obligations from Massachusetts that supersede their state constitution.
  - boomboomsubban 3y ago
    I don't think needing Massachusetts to sign off on your reneging would be a meaningful barrier.
    - enragedcacti 3y ago
      As far as I can tell the historical context around the decision is lost, but I wouldn't be surprised if Massachusetts could have been a legitimate barrier to actually eliminating the sections. One piece of historical context we do have is this: > In 1967, Maine’s first Indian affairs commissioner, anthropologist Edward Hinckley, discovered Maine had received $30,000 from Massachusetts in compensation, but the state never actually set aside new land for the tribes. If you're Mass. and you created those articles for a reason then I wouldn't find it surprising if you didn't want to help Maine throw them out after they've already violated your will at least once. All of that is secondary to the fact that they did renege on their promises repeatedly and unabashedly for the next century. Hiding the sections from print could have been an attempt to stop legal challenges before they started, it could have just been out of spite. Who knows, maybe they were very eco-friendly and were worried about all that wasted paper! I find it quite silly to extend such extreme benefit of the doubt to the state government that we already know wanted to escape those treaties and successfully did so before, during, and after passing this amendment.
      - boomboomsubban 3y ago
        >If you're Mass. and you created those articles for a reason then I wouldn't find it surprising if you didn't want to help Maine throw them out after they've already violated your will at least once. If you created those articles, you were probably dead by 1870, and definitely dead by 1967. Any generation of lawmakers would have been willing to renegotiate the terms if it benefited them. >find it quite silly to extend such extreme benefit of the doubt to the state government that we already know wanted to escape those treaties and successfully did so before, during, and after passing this amendment. I said that the US at that point cared so little about honoring treaties with Native tribes that I doubted they'd bother formally amending a constitution to do so. That's not giving them the benefit of the doubt.
eesmith 3y ago
Looks like you are right: https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/... There was a 1874 court case where Granger claimed he owned the land by a deed granted the same year Massachusetts signed a treaty with the Passamaquoddy Tribe. The court decided for Granger. Under the treaty obligation, "it was Maine’s duty to compensate the Passamaquoddy for the value of the lost land, and to pay the Tribe's court costs and damages—neither of which happened." Maine couldn't simply change its constitution as the Articles of Separation requires "bars Maine from altering the Articles of Separation without the consent of Massachusetts and requires their inclusion in the Maine Constitution." To be clear, it appears there is no smoking gun which explicitly says this is the reason, but the people involve knew, or likely knew, about the case when developing the 1876 change. There is a 2022 paper on the topic titled “‘It May Be Questionable’: Granger v. Avery and the Redaction of Article X, Section 5 from the Maine Constitution“ at https://www.academia.edu/60751074/_It_May_Be_Questionable_Granger_v_Avery_and_the_Redaction_of_Article_X_Section_5_from_the_Maine_Constitution_ https://www.academia.edu/60751074/_It_May_Be_Questionable_Gr... which may have more.
s1artibartfast 3y ago
This is a cynical take that I don't think can be made honestly by anyone who has read the sections
- enragedcacti 3y ago
  It's just a coincidence that Maine has repeatedly reneged on its responsibilities stemming from those sections: > If the constitutional commissioners who proposed the 1875 suppression of Section 5 intended to ensure the state’s obligations were forgotten, they were successful. Rather than protecting the Indians’ trust lands, Maine authorized some tracts to be flooded by dams, others to be annexed for the laying out of highways, and thousands more acres transferred to white owners. In no case was compensation given to the Indians, in violation of treaty obligations. In 1893, Maine courts even ruled that the Passamaquoddy tribe didn’t exist because it lacked sovereign powers. https://www.pressherald.com/2015/06/01/legislation-would-put-hidden-sections-of-maines-constitution-back-into-print/ https://www.pressherald.com/2015/06/01/legislation-would-put...
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    Yes, it is just a coincidence, in that Maine, as every other State (AFAIK) have reneged on their responsibilities. "The forgetting" has nothing to do with the constitutional change. Most people don't know or care about the contents of their state constitutions. Redaction wasnt useful legally or generally in the violation of indian treaties.
- eigenket 3y ago
  It is interesting that the redaction happened one month before the final judgement in the Granger v. Avery court case. https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/...
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    The redaction had and has no bearing on the law, because the redacted portion is still fully binding. What exactly is the meat of this conspiracy theory. That The judges were duped with misleading constitutions? That it was some sort of government psyop to influence public sentiment in the long run by distributing misleading documents?

> Part of the redacted material pertained to Maine’s treaty obligations to Wabanaki people. The motivation is very obvious - they wanted to conveniently forget their treaty obligations.

boomboomsubban 3y ago

If they wanted to renege on their treaties with Native tribes, they likely would have openly done so. That's what was happening in most of the US around 1870.

throwaway167 3y ago
Perhaps they sought to hide it so those that sought to renege couldn't, making it a forever obligation.
- eigenket 3y ago
  Given that about a month or so after the redaction they renaged on their obligations over Grass Island that seems unlikely https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/...
ethbr1 3y ago
It was nice to see the Supreme Court reverse the quiet abrogation trend 3 years ago: https://www.npr.org/2020/07/09/889562040/supreme-court-rules-that-about-half-of-oklahoma-is-indian-land https://www.npr.org/2020/07/09/889562040/supreme-court-rules... The 5-4 ruling, Gorsuch writing for majority, is a really interesting read: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/18-9526_9okb.pdf https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/19pdf/18-9526_9okb.pdf Essentially, both liberals and conservatives can agree that... if the United States entered into a treaty... and the United States government never explicitly overrode that treaty... then it still stands. Which, fair, but still nice to see recognition even when the question has repercussions for the eastern half of Oklahoma, the state is opposed, and the facts are inconvenient.
- enragedcacti 3y ago
  > Essentially, both liberals and conservatives can agree that... if the United States entered into a treaty... I think it would be more accurate to say that liberals and Gorsuch, who is uncharacteristically liberal on native american issues, can agree. Gorsuch's footnotes do a good job imo of making clear that the four conservative dissenting votes have very little respect for the treaties and promises made.
  - rsynnott 3y ago
    I mean, I get why, but it's very odd that people think of this as a liberal vs conservative issue; it is a rule of law issue.
    - adgjlsfhk1 3y ago
      well as Trump's repeated attempts to overturn the election show, preserving democracy and the rule of law are somewhat divided along party lines
    - enragedcacti 3y ago
      I agree that I'm playing kind of fast and loose with the terms. I think you could definitely make an argument that Gorsuch argues the position from a small-c conservative "rule of law" perspective. In my view the dissent is operating on a very different rule-of-law, one that Gorsuch is happy to dabble in with most other issues: > Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect. It's satisfying to raise issues above the partisan or ideological divide, but if the people that call themselves conservative consistently find ways make the law protect their own while restraining others, as four of them try to do here, then its naive to assume that the issues are really transcendent of that.
      - rayiner 3y ago
        [flagged]
enragedcacti 3y ago
This is the relevant piece I believe: > The Articles also required that its terms and conditions “be incorporated into, and become and be a part of any Constitution, provisional or other, under which the Government of the said proposed State, shall, at any time hereafter, be administered; subject however, to be modified, or annulled by the agreement of the Legislature of both the said States; but by no other power or body whatsoever." They couldn't remove the sections because the terms of their statehood had them inherit obligations from Massachusetts that supersede their state constitution.
- boomboomsubban 3y ago
  I don't think needing Massachusetts to sign off on your reneging would be a meaningful barrier.
  - enragedcacti 3y ago
    As far as I can tell the historical context around the decision is lost, but I wouldn't be surprised if Massachusetts could have been a legitimate barrier to actually eliminating the sections. One piece of historical context we do have is this: > In 1967, Maine’s first Indian affairs commissioner, anthropologist Edward Hinckley, discovered Maine had received $30,000 from Massachusetts in compensation, but the state never actually set aside new land for the tribes. If you're Mass. and you created those articles for a reason then I wouldn't find it surprising if you didn't want to help Maine throw them out after they've already violated your will at least once. All of that is secondary to the fact that they did renege on their promises repeatedly and unabashedly for the next century. Hiding the sections from print could have been an attempt to stop legal challenges before they started, it could have just been out of spite. Who knows, maybe they were very eco-friendly and were worried about all that wasted paper! I find it quite silly to extend such extreme benefit of the doubt to the state government that we already know wanted to escape those treaties and successfully did so before, during, and after passing this amendment.
    - boomboomsubban 3y ago
      >If you're Mass. and you created those articles for a reason then I wouldn't find it surprising if you didn't want to help Maine throw them out after they've already violated your will at least once. If you created those articles, you were probably dead by 1870, and definitely dead by 1967. Any generation of lawmakers would have been willing to renegotiate the terms if it benefited them. >find it quite silly to extend such extreme benefit of the doubt to the state government that we already know wanted to escape those treaties and successfully did so before, during, and after passing this amendment. I said that the US at that point cared so little about honoring treaties with Native tribes that I doubted they'd bother formally amending a constitution to do so. That's not giving them the benefit of the doubt.

eesmith 3y ago

Looks like you are right: https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/... There was a 1874 court case where Granger claimed he owned the land by a deed granted the same year Massachusetts signed a treaty with the Passamaquoddy Tribe. The court decided for Granger. Under the treaty obligation, "it was Maine’s duty to compensate the Passamaquoddy for the value of the lost land, and to pay the Tribe's court costs and damages—neither of which happened." Maine couldn't simply change its constitution as the Articles of Separation requires "bars Maine from altering the Articles of Separation without the consent of Massachusetts and requires their inclusion in the Maine Constitution." To be clear, it appears there is no smoking gun which explicitly says this is the reason, but the people involve knew, or likely knew, about the case when developing the 1876 change. There is a 2022 paper on the topic titled “‘It May Be Questionable’: Granger v. Avery and the Redaction of Article X, Section 5 from the Maine Constitution“ at https://www.academia.edu/60751074/_It_May_Be_Questionable_Granger_v_Avery_and_the_Redaction_of_Article_X_Section_5_from_the_Maine_Constitution_ https://www.academia.edu/60751074/_It_May_Be_Questionable_Gr... which may have more.

s1artibartfast 3y ago

This is a cynical take that I don't think can be made honestly by anyone who has read the sections

enragedcacti 3y ago
It's just a coincidence that Maine has repeatedly reneged on its responsibilities stemming from those sections: > If the constitutional commissioners who proposed the 1875 suppression of Section 5 intended to ensure the state’s obligations were forgotten, they were successful. Rather than protecting the Indians’ trust lands, Maine authorized some tracts to be flooded by dams, others to be annexed for the laying out of highways, and thousands more acres transferred to white owners. In no case was compensation given to the Indians, in violation of treaty obligations. In 1893, Maine courts even ruled that the Passamaquoddy tribe didn’t exist because it lacked sovereign powers. https://www.pressherald.com/2015/06/01/legislation-would-put-hidden-sections-of-maines-constitution-back-into-print/ https://www.pressherald.com/2015/06/01/legislation-would-put...
- s1artibartfast 3y ago
  Yes, it is just a coincidence, in that Maine, as every other State (AFAIK) have reneged on their responsibilities. "The forgetting" has nothing to do with the constitutional change. Most people don't know or care about the contents of their state constitutions. Redaction wasnt useful legally or generally in the violation of indian treaties.
eigenket 3y ago
It is interesting that the redaction happened one month before the final judgement in the Granger v. Avery court case. https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/display?use_mmn=1 https://www.mainememory.net/sitebuilder/site/3283/page/5208/...
- s1artibartfast 3y ago
  The redaction had and has no bearing on the law, because the redacted portion is still fully binding. What exactly is the meat of this conspiracy theory. That The judges were duped with misleading constitutions? That it was some sort of government psyop to influence public sentiment in the long run by distributing misleading documents?