THE SUPREME COURT OF THE LUMBEE TRIBE OF NORTH CAROLINA

THE SUPREME COURT OF THE LUMBEE TRIBE OF NORTH CAROLINA

Chief Justice Ronette Sutton

Justice Eric Freeman

Anita Hammonds Blanks,

Petitioner,

v.

Lumbee Tribal Council,

Respondent.

Justice Tona Jacobs

Justice Emily Deese

Justice Edward Brooks

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Case No.: 2025-002

OPINION AND ORDER

Chief Justice Ronette Sutton delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Petition of Anita Hammonds Blanks against the Lumbee Tribal Council is dismissed without a

hearing for lack of a justiciable case or controversy within this Court’s jurisdiction and for failure to state

a claim upon which relief can be granted under the Lumbee Constitution and governing tribal law.

I. Background and procedural posture

Petitioner, a Lumbee tribal member and former Speaker and Treasurer of the Lumbee Tribal Council, filed

a pro se Petition alleging that various practices of the Tribal Council, including use of closed sessions,

budget work sessions, interview procedures for certain positions, and publication and notice practices,

violate the Lumbee Constitution. Petitioner cites, among other provisions, the Preamble, Article III,

sections 2 and 5, and Article VII, sections 1(b), 5, and 6, and seeks broad prospective relief requiring

expanded public access to proceedings and advance public dissemination of Council documents and

supporting materials.

The Speaker of the Lumbee Tribal Council, the Honorable Albert Alexander Baker, moved to dismiss the

Petition pursuant to Article IX of the Lumbee Constitution and this Court’s Rules of Civil Procedure,

arguing that the Petition is overly broad and vague, untimely and moot, and that it seeks relief that would

usurp constitutionally vested legislative authority and presents a non‑justiciable political question. The

Court, after reviewing the Petition, the Motion to Dismiss, and the constitutional and ordinance materials

appended thereto, acts on the written submissions without hearing.

II. Jurisdiction and governing law

Article IX vests in this Court “original jurisdiction over all cases and controversies arising under the

Lumbee Constitution and all ordinances of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina.” The rule of law to be

applied “shall be the will of the Lumbee people as expressed in the Lumbee Constitution, duly adopted

tribal ordinances, and Lumbee custom,” and, in their absence, federal common law. The Judicial Codes

further require that a Petition state “a case or controversy arising out of an alleged violation pursuant to

the Lumbee Tribal Constitution or any duly adopted Tribal Ordinances,” identify the specific provision

allegedly violated, and clearly state “how or why” the provision has been violated and the grounds for

relief. This Court’s duty is to decide concrete cases and controversies; it does not issue advisory opinions

or supervise the political branches in the abstract.

The provisions at the core of the Petition include:

Article III, section 2, guarantees that “[t]he members of the Tribe shall be secure in their persons and

property,” with such security preserved by the constitutional government.

Article VII, section 1, delegating legislative power, including the adoption of rules and regulations

governing Council “procedure and decorum,” to the Tribal Council.

Article VII, section 5, requires that “[a]ll proceedings of the Tribal Council shall be conducted in public

session, except for proceedings certified in advance by the speaker as implicating privacy rights of a tribal

employee or member.”

Article VII, section 6, requires posting and periodic publication of ordinances and “a calendar of

proceedings showing all council actions taken and the address and phone number where copies of

ordinances are available.”

The record also includes the General Ordinance Governing the Duties of Committees, Appointments, and

Tribal Government Affiliated Positions (Ordinance No. 2005‑0007), and the Standing Rules of Order and

Regulations Governing the Duties of the Tribal Council Officers and Decorum of Council Meetings

(TCRR‑2011‑1215‑01, as amended through March 20, 2025), both adopted pursuant to Article VII,

section 1(b). These enactments authorize, among other things, committee meetings, limited closed

sessions for specified subject matters, and the internal distribution of supporting documents to Council

members.

III. Justiciability and the LaClaire precedent

This Court has already articulated a controlling standard for the sufficiency of petitions challenging

Council practices in Rebecca LaClaire v. Lumbee Tribal Council, Case No. 2020‑003. In LaClaire, the

petitioner alleged unconstitutional “work sessions” and exclusion of tribal members from judicial and

Elections Board interviews and requested that this Court prohibit such practices. The Court held that:

Its “duty is to only determine if an act, described with particularity, amounts to a case or controversy

inconsistent with the Constitution and/or Ordinances.”

A petition that merely alleges “suspect behavior, without citing enough facts to establish that such

behavior is both actual and identifiable, is not reviewable.”

To undertake a generalized inspection of “insufficiently identified constitutional violations” would be “the

constructive equivalent of offering an advisory opinion,” which this Court would not do.

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Applying those principles, the Court in LaClaire dismissed the petition for failure to state an act with

sufficient particularity to enable constitutional review.

Petitioner’s pleading here substantially parallels LaClaire. The Petition merges a wide range of alleged

practices—closed sessions, budget work sessions, notice and publication issues, and document

distribution—but generally does so without specifying the date, particular meeting, specific ordinance, or

concrete action being challenged, or the individual or body responsible for each alleged infraction. As in

LaClaire, this level of generality “deprives [Respondent] of fair notice and renders meaningful review

impossible,” and invites the Court to supervise a category of legislative behavior rather than adjudicate a

discrete controversy.

IV. Failure to state a claim and lack of a live controversy

A. Vagueness and overbreadth of the Petition

Although the Petition recites multiple constitutional provisions, it aggregates years of Council practice

into generalized claims about “Council goes into closed session” for budgets, interviews, amendments,

and other matters, without identifying concrete instances—dates, meetings, votes, certifications by the

Speaker, or specific ordinances—on which this Court could perform constitutional review. Even taking

the Petition’s allegations as true for purposes of review, the pleading is overly broad and vague. It does

not clearly identify:

A specific ordinance or formal action enacted or taken in violation of Article VII, sections 5 or 6;

A particular closed session, with date and subject matter, that was not certified in advance by the Speaker

as implicating privacy rights; or

A concrete instance in which Petitioner personally was denied access to a proceeding that the Constitution

clearly requires to be open, or denied access to an ordinance or calendar of proceedings that the

Constitution or an ordinance clearly requires to be publicly available.

Instead, the Petition asks this Court to declare broadly that multiple categories of Council activity are

unconstitutional, and to impose an advance‑distribution regime for Council documents extending to “all

documentation” supporting budgets, interviews, hearings, and other proceedings, to be provided to tribal

members five business days in advance. Such generalized complaints and structural remedies do not meet

the particularity standard required by LaClaire and this Court’s conception of its constitutional role.

Under the Judicial Codes, the Court must determine “if a hearing is warranted based on facts stated in the

Petition.” Where, as here, the Petition offers broad characterizations of practice rather than discrete, factspecific episodes, the Court cannot meaningfully assess whether any identified act is inconsistent with

Article VII, Section 5 or Section 6. To proceed on such a record would invite the Court to perform a

general audit of Council operations and issue abstract pronouncements untethered to a particular tribal

action, precisely the sort of advisory function this Court has already disclaimed.

B. Mootness and temporal disconnect

The Motion to Dismiss also notes that many of the practices Petitioner challenges occurred under prior

Councils, and that the current Council has not held budget work sessions or conducted the specific

proceedings described in the Petition during its present term. A petition that targets past practices of a

different body, with no allegation of ongoing or imminent conduct by the sitting Council, fails to present a

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live controversy suitable for judicial resolution and risks transforming this Court into a forum for

historical grievances rather than current constitutional disputes.

C. Political question and separation of powers

Even if the Petition were sufficiently specific, the principal relief sought would require this Court to

restructure the Constitution’s allocation of legislative authority. The Petition asks this Court, in effect, to:

Compel the Council to treat all supporting documents for legislative business— including contracts, draft

agreements, and other sensitive materials—as publicly available five days before any meeting at which

they might be discussed; and

Restructure the balance between representative and popular oversight by converting the Council’s

continuous review of budgets and other matters into an ongoing plebiscitary process driven by

pre‑meeting document releases.

Article III, section 1, however, reserves to the Tribal Council the legislative powers “expressed herein and

those powers necessary and proper to the exercise of those powers,” as delegated by the general

membership. Article VII, section 1(b), in turn, expressly grants the Council authority to adopt rules and

regulations governing its own procedure and decorum, subject to consistency with the Constitution. The

Standing Rules and Ordinances in the record, including the committee ordinance, rules for closed

sessions, and provisions on document distribution to Council members, are exercises of that delegated

legislative discretion.

Recasting that framework into a judicially enforced requirement that all supporting documents be publicly

disclosed in advance of deliberation would effectively amend the Constitution and Standing Rules, rather

than interpret or enforce them. Using a judicial decree to impose a particular model of continuous

document-level oversight by the entire membership would cross the line from interpreting the

Constitution to amending it. That is not a role Article IX assigns to this Court. This Court’s jurisdiction

extends to determining whether a specifically identified act or ordinance violates the Constitution. It does

not extend to permanently supervising the internal structuring of legislative calendars, work sessions, or

packet distribution except insofar as a particular practice, proven on specific facts, can be shown to

contravene a clear constitutional command.

The design of the Lumbee government, as reflected in recall, initiative, and referendum provisions and in

the Elections Board’s authorities, already provides political tools for the membership to hold the Council

accountable. Determining whether to expand those mechanisms or alter the structure of legislative

transparency in the manner Petitioner requests is a policy question reserved to the Lumbee people acting

through the amendment, initiative, or legislative processes - not a matter for judicial decree.

Accordingly, the core relief sought presents a non‑justiciable political question and falls outside this

Court’s proper role under Article IX.

V. Transparency, practice, and existing remedies

The record also reflects that the current Council has undertaken substantial steps to promote transparency

and public participation within the existing constitutional framework:

The Council has conducted open‑session interviews of Supreme Court Justices, an Administrative Judge,

and an Elections Board member.

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Tribal ordinances, including budget ordinances and the Standing Rules, are posted and published, and a

calendar of proceedings is made available through the Tribe’s website and public postings.

Council business meetings are conducted in chambers with live-stream access, and community comments

are permitted under defined rules, with time allotted at regular business meetings and committee sessions.

Additionally, the Constitution itself provides multiple political remedies, recall, initiative, referendum,

and elections, for tribal members dissatisfied with Council performance or transparency. The existence of

these mechanisms underscores why judicial displacement of the Council’s procedural judgments is neither

necessary nor appropriate as a constitutional matter.

Nothing in this opinion should be read to diminish the constitutional requirement that “all proceedings of

the Tribal Council” be conducted in public session except for those legitimately certified as implicating

privacy rights, nor to preclude future, properly pleaded challenges to specific actions alleged to violate

that standard. Those questions remain fully justiciable when presented in a concrete, fact‑specific context.

VI. Disposition and citation

For the foregoing reasons, the Court holds:

The Petition fails to state with sufficient particularity any discrete act or ordinance that can be adjudicated

under Article IX and thus fails to present a justiciable case or controversy.

To the extent the Petition seeks to require structural changes to the Council’s transparency and

document‑distribution practices that would reallocate legislative oversight authority from the Council to

the general membership, it raises a non‑justiciable political question and seeks relief beyond this Court’s

constitutional power.

The Petition is therefore DISMISSED without hearing, per the Court’s unanimous decisioni in

Conference.

SO ORDERED, this 5th day of March 2026, in Robeson County, North Carolina.

Chief Justice

Supreme Court of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina

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Justice Edward Brooks took no part in the consideration or decision of this case; he was not a member of the Court

at the time of deliberation.

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