50 Years Ago: A tribal employee struggles to keep his job, housing

Can an employee of the Navajo Tribe stand up to the might of the tribal government? And as this employee stands up for his rights, can that struggle end up with massive changes within the tribal government?

If you asked that question 50 years ago, the answer to both questions would be an unqualified yes.

You could say it was a David vs. Goliath type situation and you would be right because no one ever thought that Frank Budai had a chance of winning his case.

Budai was a bookkeeper in the tribe’s heavy equipment pool but on September 29, 1965, Navajo police came to the door of his trailer at 3 p.m. and informed him he had been fired and since he was living in tribal housing, he had until 5 p.m. to move himself and his belongings from the trailer, which was located behind the motor pool.

Budai said at the time that he had no idea why he was fired but surmised that it had something to do with Herbert C. Longenbaugh, who was then head of the motor pool.

Budai immediately filed a complaint in the Window Rock District Court, arguing that he should not be forced to move without a chance at due process and the court agreed, ordering that the Navajo Tribe cease and desist for all attempts to force him to move from his home until he had due process.

This paved the way for him to file a complaint before the tribe’s grievance committee.

But there was a massive problem.

Budal believed that the chairman of the tribe, Raymond Nakai, supported efforts to remove him from his job. He still didn’t know why he had been fired but he had heard that Longenbaugh and Nakai were good friends.

He also realized that the grievance committee was made up of people who had been appointed by Nakai and therefore Nakai could and did reach out to committee members and tell them how they should vote. He also knew that the committee was very pro-tribe and almost never sided with someone who filed a grievance against the tribal government.

But Budai had a ray of hope – something that could possibly guarantee him the opportunity to get a fair shake.

Two weeks before Navajo police showed up on his doorstep, the tribe’s advisory committee held a meeting and heard testimony about how unfair the grievance committee was to tribal employees who had a grievance.

This committee was made up, for the most part, of members of the Old Guard who disliked Nakai so it was no surprise to anyone that they would pass a resolution trying to usurp Nakai’s authority.

So on Sept. 15, they passed a resolution taking away the power of the tribal chairman to appoint all of the members to the grievance committee. Instead, in the future, the grievance committee would consist of someone appointed by Nakai, three department heads, the chief tribal judge and one person to be chosen by the employees.

The resolution said the new membership would be put in place as soon as the resolution was signed by the chairman.

The only problem was that Nakai refused to sign it and under the tribal law at that time, it would not go into effect until the tribal chairman signed off on it.

But there was a loophole and members of the Old Guard knew about it.

At the time, the power of the chairman only existed when he was on reservation land. When he traveled, as he did often, his power would switch over to the tribe’s vice-chairman, Nelson Damon.

This didn’t help Budai any since Damon also refused to sign the resolution.

Budai was able, through various legal means, to keep the Nakai-appointed grievance committee from hearing his case and for two months, nothing happened.

And then, on Nov. 29, something finally did happen.

For the first time since Nakai took office almost three years before, both he and Damon were off the reservation at the same time. Nakai was on his way back from meetings in Washington, D.C. but for several hours a tribal chairman pro tempore had to be appointed and that person was Harold Drake.

Drake immediately signed the advisory committee resolution as the pro temp chairman and Sam Billison – who was a candidate for tribal chairman along with former chairman Paul Jones – was appointed by Drake to represent the chairman.

By then, the employees had chosen a representative to the grievance committee so Billison got hold of the tribe’s chief judge and the three department heads and called for a meeting to be held to hear Budai’s case.

The hearing began two hours later and Budai presented the committee with a copy of his contract which spelled out that he would be given tribal housing as long as he was employed by the tribe. He argued that he continued to be a tribal employee even though he was fired until such time as he could bring his case before the grievance committee, which he was now doing.

Then the committee asked a simple question – why were you fired? To which Budai replied, “I have no idea.”

Who fired you? To which Budai replied, “My supervisor, Herbert C. Longenbaugh.”

Which then brought up a strange situation.

Longenbaugh was no longer working for the tribe. Shortly after he fired Budai, Longenbaugh’s name had come up in a New Mexico highway scandal that was being probed by a Congressional committee and Longenbaugh was forced to resign his tribal position.

With Longenbaugh gone and no official record as to why Budai was fired, the newly formed grievance committee had no problem ruling in Budai’s favor.