Rahnà·wakę·w Donnie McDowell pens “According to NC Tuscarora tradition, longhouses are governments, not churches”

The Haudenosaunee, the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, and Tuscarora, call themselves the People of the Longhouse. That is not a religious slogan. It is a declaration of political identity. The longhouse is where chiefs are raised by clan mothers, where consensus is built, and where the Great Law of Peace is carried forward. As the Oneida Nation’s Trust and Enrollment Committee explains, “Spiritual, social, and political elements were all tied together. It is more accurate to refer to the traditional teachings as a way of life, the Longhouse way of life.” For the Haudenosaunee, government and ceremony have never existed as separate institutions. The longhouse is both.

This confederate system allows distinct nations to retain their own governments while uniting under shared laws of peace. In 1987, the U.S. Senate formally acknowledged that the union of the original Thirteen Colonies was modeled on the Iroquois Confederacy. The longhouse was never simply a building. It remains the seat of Tuscarora government — a government whose presence in this region predates European settlement. As historian Douglas Rights documented in The State, “It is quite probable that the Tuscarora Indians of the Sandy Coastal Plain visited the area and possibly had hunting grounds or temporary dwellings there,” noting that “an old trail of the Tuscarora comes in this way up to Moore County and on to Randolph.”

The pattern of outside interference into Tuscarora governance is at least three centuries old. The Tuscarora Wars of 1711 to 1715 resulted in the destruction of Tuscarora towns, the enslavement of over a thousand people, and forced migration northward. Those who remained were placed on a reserved tract in Bertie County under colonial supervision. From that moment forward, external authorities have sought to define, divide, and diminish Tuscarora self-determination.

The Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 replaced traditional structures with elected councils. Harvard’s Pluralism Project confirms these governments “served to displace traditional structures.” The Lumbee Act of 1956 granted recognition under a geographical name while denying federal services. Each policy served the same purpose: replacing Indigenous governance with structures convenient to the state.

The Lumbee designation itself is a product of this interference. Reverend D. F. Lowry, the principal architect of the Lumbee name, admitted he descended from Tuscarora people. Yet rather than strengthening Tuscarora recognition, Lowry led a campaign to replace the identity with what he called “a legal and geographic name” with no tribal meaning. The 1952 referendum created the first official splinter group of the Tuscarora Nation, one that abandoned its original identity for a designation acceptable to state lawmakers.

House Bill 600 follows this pattern. Representative Ed Goodwin told the Tuscarora that “confederations never work” and that longhouses should be “caretakers of the language, heritage and culture, not the people’s voice in government.” Like Lowry before him, a figure outside traditional Tuscarora authority is prescribing what form our governance should take and elevating a group that conforms to state expectations over one rooted in centuries of tradition.

The Tuscarora Indians of the Kahtenuaka Territories have embraced this separation. Their Articles of Incorporation, filed March 12, 2025, identify their sole purpose as “Religious.” By their own filing, they are a church, not a government. Their dissolution clause directs assets to state or federal entities rather than back to the Tuscarora people. Both examples — the Lumbee and the TIOKT — demonstrate how lawmakers intervene to disrupt traditional governing institutions and elevate organizations conforming to political convenience.

The consequences are already tangible. On March 11, 2026, The Robesonian — Robeson County’s newspaper of record since 1870, which has documented the Tuscarora for more than 150 years — endorsed the Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina’s application for a state historical roadside marker. Editor Chris Stiles called it an “appropriate commemoration” of our “continuous, centuries-long presence” in this homeland. On May 19, the Highway Historical Marker Committee denied that application, stating it would be “inappropriate to move forward with wording for a marker while that bill is under consideration.” A bill that has not passed into law is already being wielded to erase documented Tuscarora history from the public landscape.

Article 5 of the 1712 Treaty between the Tuscarora Nation and North Carolina states: “If any injury to either party occurs, upon complaints made by such persons as shall be appointed for that purpose, full satisfaction shall be made.” The longhouse governing bodies are those appointed persons. Their complaints regarding House Bill 600 have been made. North Carolina’s obligation under its own treaty is not to legislate around those grievances. It is to provide full satisfaction. We call upon the General Assembly to honor that obligation, reject House Bill 600, and reaffirm the Tuscarora Nation of North Carolina.

Rahnà·wakę·w Donnie McDowell

Skarù·ręʔ Urihwaká·yę̀·ʔ Nyakwarihwatù·ręh

Co-Chair, Tuscarora Historical & Preservation Society

Drowning Creek Longhouse, Beaver Clan

E: Tuscarora.Preservation@gmail.com

Readers may continue the investigation into North Carolina’s Tuscarora in emeritus Duke University History Professor Dr. Peter Woods’ report Tuscarora Roots. It contains genealogy reports.

Aug. 1, 2026

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