Full Faith and Credit
By Jon Duckstad

"With all things and in all things, we are relatives."
- Sioux proverb

That winter, in response to the misbehavior of a few, the school principal had banned all fourth, fifth, and sixth graders from sliding on the hill near the school during recess. As the eighth child in a family of ten, then-grade school student Mary Al Balber was familiar with the concept of "unfairness"; and she protested the punishment of the many for the behavior of a few. The principal, she says, was not persuaded, but the seeds of Mary Al's subsequent career as a lawyer and judge were sown.

Now employed as solicitor general for the Mille Lacs Band of the Ojibwe on the southwest shore of Lake Mille Lacs, Mary Al also serves as an appellate judge at the Fond du Lac Band of the Ojibwe Tribal Court and as an associate judge of the Grand Portage Band of Ojibwe. Named a "rising star in the legal profession" by Minnesota Law & Politics magazine in 1999, Mary Al is a founding member and former president of the American Indian Bar Association, an active contributing member of the MSBA, and worked for six years with the Minnesota Attorney General's Office in the commercial litigation and environmental compliance division.

This combination of outlook and experience places Mary Al together with the tribal courts in Minnesota at the center of an issue now before the Minnesota Supreme Court: whether to adopt a procedural rule for granting full faith and credit to tribal court orders and judgments.
There are 295 tribal courts in the United States at this time, 12 of them in Minnesota. Wisconsin and Michigan currently provide full faith and credit to tribal court orders and judgments by court rule. Other states have varied in their response to the full faith and credit issue, alternately addressing it by legislation, court rule, caselaw, or some combination of these.

In Minnesota, a group of state court judges and tribal court judges Ñ the Minnesota Tribal Court State Court Forum Ñ filed a petition with the Court in April 2002 requesting adoption of a procedural rule for granting full faith and credit to tribal court judgments. The group, cochaired by Court of Appeals Judge Robert Schumacher and Tribal Judge Henry Buffalo, has been meeting since 1997 to discuss interjurisdictional enforcement issues and other matters of common concern.

The Court has scheduled a public hearing on the Petition for October 29, 2002, and the MSBA Board of Governors voted on September 13 to support the Petition.

It is encouraging to see the increasing measure of cooperation between tribal and state courts in Minnesota, and a pleasure to recognize the contributions of judges like Mary Al Balber, who work to build bridges between these court systems and among the diverse members of our legal community.

Mary Al Balber

• Title: Solicitor General for the Mille Lacs Band of the Ojibwe
• Location: Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, Minnesota
• Career: 1999-present, Solicitor General for the Mille Lacs Band of the Ojibwe; 2000-present, Appellate Judge, Fond du Lac Band of the Ojibwe Tribal Court; 1998-present, Associate Judge, Grand Portage Band of Ojibwe Tribal Court; 1993-99, Assistant Attorney, Minnesota Attorney General's Office; 1990-93, Staff Attorney, Southern Minnesota Legal Services, St. Paul.
• Education: J.D. Hamline University School of Law, 1990; B.S. Northern Michigan University, 1983.

JON DUCKSTAD is president of the Minnesota State Bar Association. This month he visits Judge Mary Al Balber with the Mille Lacs Band near Onamia, Minnesota.