Covenant Anniversary Op-Ed

Op-Ed by Edoardo Ortiz and Zeno Deleon Guerrero Jr.

The United States made it clear to the United Nations: the Commonwealth was a bilateral relationship, founded on principles of mutual consent, self-government, and democracy. Despite this, most people know the U.S. has not lived up to these statements.

But enough about Puerto Rico.

As we come upon the 50th anniversary of the Northern Mariana Islands Covenant, it is important to think both about how it is an agreement unique in U.S. history and also to consider what lessons might be drawn from the legal agreements and lived experiences of other Territories.

The NMI’s Covenant and Constitution were developed to explicitly address -as the Covenant says - the NMI’s "inalienable right of self-determination”. The broad nature of the Covenant was intended from its very preamble to “establish a self-governing commonwealth” in a relationship that is “mutually binding”, including sections of the Covenant stating certain provisions can only be modified with “joint consent”.

Yet, in time, the United States has walked back its promises of limited powers by agreement and mutual consent. Despite the negotiators’ efforts and the language of the Covenant, the U.S. Senate made clear before approving the Covenant that: “Although described as a commonwealth, the relationship is territorial in nature with final sovereignty invested in the United states and plenary legislative authority vested in the United States Congress”. Yet, “Territorial” and “plenary” authority are inconsistent with mutually binding agreements and self-government. Even before agreeing to the Covenant, Congress had already undermined this historic achievement.

More and more throughout the years, they have continued chipping away at it. When Guam tried to negotiate its own commonwealth status relationship with mutually binding elements - like those expressed in the NMI Covenant - the Federal government explicitly denied that this was possible. They claimed any mutual consent agreements between the United States and any Territory are “legally unenforceable”. The Federal government thus reduced what many understood as should be the binding power of the NMI covenant into merely a promise to “honor” past commitments.

We all remember the recent cockfighting ban and how the courts ruled that this applied to all five U.S. Territories, regardless of unique relationship. NMI legal experts explained how this imposition shows the Federal government treating the NMI in the same way as Puerto Rico and other Territories without any kind of Covenant or “Commonwealth” arrangement.

Just this past week, the US Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management (BOEM) has decided to nearly double the area (from 35 million acres to 69 million acres) under consideration for deep sea mining activities in the Marianas. The federal government made this decision and is moving the process forward despite the objections and concerns of numerous community members, elected leaders, and experts. Again, the promises of “self-government” and “mutual consent” erode.

A remarkably similar pattern of erosion has played out in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico’s Commonwealth began with assurances that the relationship was “in the nature of a compact” and included explicit statements before the United Nations that “there exists a bilateral compact of association between the people of Puerto Rico and the United States which has been accepted by both and which in accordance with judicial decisions may not be amended without common consent.”

Despite this, the following years brought with them actions and legal decisions that revealed this to be simply false. Slowly but surely, the United States chipped away at the autonomy and internal self-government Puerto Ricans had fought for and negotiated. This all culminated in “PROMESA”, a 2016 law that completely altered Puerto Rico’s local government by imposing a Congressionally-appointed “Fiscal Oversight Board" with broad powers to set the Territory’s budget and even annul local laws. What’s to stop this from happening in the NMI?

As the Federal government continues to undermine the power and agency of people in the NMI and other Territories, it only underscores the need for a reckoning with the fundamentally undemocratic structures that undergird the US-Territory relationship. As we have learned by participating in the Cross-Territorial Coalition, all Territories - in their own way - have attempted to put forth reforms that amount to true, binding self-government, yet have all come up short.

Whatever the future holds for each Territory, it should be the result of their own self-determination journey. However, that journey begins in the same place: recognition that the status quo is not protecting our rights or preventing us from being unilaterally imposed upon or having our constitutions violated.

In celebrating the hard fought and hard won reforms our ancestors made to ensure a relationship based on equality and dignity, we should not forget that our journey is not over. We stand on the shoulders of giants, and we need to keep working to ensure that work is completed.