hey just wanted to give everyone an update on the interior lights incase someone else has a similar problem. My jeep is a 98 cherokee sport and I removed all the switches including the tailgate and headlight switch. Even with everything removed the lights were still on...leading to a grounding issue somewhere. After much tinkering I removed the fuse panel located in the passenger side kick panel and when I did this the lights turned off. After some more investigating I found that the panel had wiggled loose and was not properly grounding itself. I re-attached the fuse panel and have had no problems since.
thanks for all the pointers!