Wanted: An advocate for Article 12 and 18

I am in total disagreement with the governor’s legal counsel’s personal opinion on Article XII as expressed recently in our media. I wish to respectfully offer clarification to enlighten Howard P. Willens and the people of the Commonwealth about counsel’s solemn responsibility and obligation as a freelance and paid lawyer for the governor to faithfully and not be wish-washy in upholding the sanctity of the Covenant and the application provisions of the Northern Mariana Islands Constitution.

As a government legal adviser for the Commonwealth, you are ethically duty bound to protect and defend vigorously the Covenant and the Constitution of the Commonwealth, like you used to do, and not to be guided by your lofty wisdom of reversed liberalism against your own client. You need not be reminded that you were once the legal adviser for the United States Government during the Covenant negotiation and an architect and chief proponent of the resulting provisions incorporated in the Covenant and the subsequent inclusion of the same in the NMI Constitution. This is not the same Howard P. Willens I used to know when we were drafting my proposal on Article 12 during the 1st Constitutional Convention. You courageously defended Article 12, with no expression of what you now singing with a new melody and new title “to be unconstitutional.”

As an adviser in similar capacity for the Commonwealth government and specifically the governor, we expect nothing less than for you, Mr. Willens, to be an advocate of and for our Covenant and the NMI Constitution-persons of Northern Mariana Islands descent, and not to be now beholden to the very conundrum which led to be inclusion of this provision then in protecting against the alienation of real property, in order that the acquision of such interests in real property is restricted to persons of Northern Marianas Islands decent.

Section 805 of the Covenant clearly states that “notwithstanding (underscored) the other provisions of this Covenant, or those provisions of the (U.S.) Constitution, treatises or laws of the United States applicable to the Northern Mariana Islands, the Government of the Northern Mariana Islands, in view of the ownership of land for the culture and tradition of the people (underscored) of the Northern Islands, and in order to protect them against exploitation and to promote their economic advancement and self-sufficiency: (a) will (underscored) until twenty-five years after the termination of the Trusteeship Agreement, and may (underscored) thereafter, regulate (underscored) the alienation of permanent and long-term interests in real property so as to restrict (underscored) the acquisition of such interests to persons of Northern Mariana Islands descent (underscored); and (b) may (underscored) regulate the extent to which a person may own or hold land which is now public land.

The intent of this specific provision of the Covenant was naturally embraced and manifestly incorporated in the NMI Constitution in 1978, of which I was instrumental and privileged to have been blessed with the duty and honor to faithfully uphold my solemn oath in the first Constitutional Convention when I introduced Article XII on land alienation which unambiguously comports with Section 805 of the Covenant.

Article XVIII Section 5 (c), a new subsection added by Senate Legislative Initiative 11-1 in 1999, provides: “In the case of a proposed amendment to Article XII of this Constitution, the word ‘voters’ as used in subsection 5(a) above shall be limited to eligible voters under Article VII who are also (underscored) persons of Northern Marianas descent as described in Article XII, Section 4, and the term ‘votes cast’ as used in subsection 5(b) shall mean the votes cast by such voters.”

I like to call upon the Legislature, the Municipal Council and in particular the Board of Election, not to take the personal opinion of Mr. Howard P. Willens, on Article XII as final. I like to suggest to continue the registration on NMD and any disagreement, let them challenge through “Article IV, Section 11 of our Constitution on “Certified Legal Question”.

I also like to remind you that Article VIII, Section 805(a) of the Covenant is a facet of a United States Public Law 94-241, which was also adopted by Joint Resolution by the 94th United States Congress and the product of a Presidential Proclamation No. 4534.

On behalf of the people of Saipan, I thank you for your personal attention to and interest in this issue of great importance to the people for whom the Covenant was dedicated to when it was signed by the Covenant negotiators and acceded to by the United States government as a United States Public Law 94-24, having been adopted by Joint Resolution by the 94th United States Congress; and elevated to a Presidential Proclamation No.4534 by United States President Jimmy Crater.