Opinion: Alaska tribal court doesn't protect due process right

The Simmonds v. Parks petition before the Alaska Supreme Court is also a due process case. Although people may agree with the Minto court’s result—termination of Mr. Parks’s parental rights to his child—they should not disregard the constitutional violations that occurred along the way.

The Simmonds v. Parks petition is not about whether Parks is a bad parent, or even whether he should have custody of the child. (The child’s placement is a separate issue in a lower court case the State is not involved in). The Alaska Supreme Court petition is about whether a citizen of Alaska had a right to have his case considered by a state court. Even though Mr. Parks is not a member of the Minto tribe and has never lived in Minto, the Minto tribe claimed jurisdiction over Mr. Parks and permanently ended his parental connection to his child. The tribal court applied unwritten law and would not let Mr. Parks have an attorney speak for him in the tribal termination hearing.

The State intervened at the Alaska Supreme Court level because in our view, citizens should not forfeit their basic constitutional rights when they have a child with a tribal member. It is unfair to end a parent’s connection to his child if that parent has no ability to vote for the governing tribal council, to have a say in the laws being applied against him, or to have a lawyer speak on his behalf.