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Seven:
Civilizations Collide
Native
Peoples
A
major theme of Western history
is local subordination by
outsiders. Indians and later
the Métis provide especially
good case studies in alienation
because no other groups
of Westerners were treated
worse, or subjugated for
longer, by successive governments
in Ottawa. Oddly, native
concerns have only rarely
been included as part of
the western alienation issue,
but there is clearly a common
cause. This linkage continues
despite less-than-warm attitudes
demonstrated by western
provincial governments of
different political colours
over the decades.
Until
the mid-seventeenth century,
prairie, British Columbia
and northern aboriginal
peoples lived well as hunters
and gatherers, some probably
as comfortably as Europeans
did before the Industrial
Revolution. Gerald Friesen,
the prairies historian,
concludes that between 1640
and 1840 relations between
Indians and European fur
traders on our plains were
notable for" adaptation,
peace and cooperation."
Cultural autonomy and a
real sense of social equality
with Europeans prevailed
among Indians with only
minor setbacks until well
after the merger of the
Hudson’s Bay Company and
Montreal’s North West Company
in 1821. Admittedly, a Métis
party led by Cuthbert Grant
had killed 21 supporters
of the Governor of the Red
River Settlement in 1816
("The Seven Oaks Massacre"),
uniting the Métis people
in the process, but Lord
Selkirk himself re-established
the settlement and peace
the following year. Selkirk
with his strict Scottish
sense of propriety also
signed a treaty with local Crees, Ojibwas and
Assiniboines.
The
Métis
The
emergence of Western Canada
is closely linked with the
history of the Métis people.
They did not come centuries
ago from a distant part
of the world: Prairie Canada
alone witnessed their birth
as a new people.
The
Métis nation began in the
late eighteenth century
as the result of unions
between French and English
fur traders and Indian women.
Indian women were essential
for European survival in
the West because they made
pemmican, moccasins and
snow shoes and could act
as both guides and interpreters.
Their offspring, the Métis,
both bilingual and bicultural,
became the archetypal voyageurs
and were active as interpreters,
traders, canoeists and fur
packers at numerous western
trading posts. During a
century and a half, their
pivotal role in the fur
trade enabled them to become
a self-confident community
within Western Canada. This
was most noticeable at Red
River, where in the mid-1820s
many Métis began to take
up subsistence agriculture
as a supplement to the buffalo
hunt.
The
next two decades in the
western interior were prosperous
and peaceful. The harmony
began to unravel only in
the 1840s when corrosive
notions of race and class
from Victorian England and
elsewhere began to seep
into the Red River community.
Contrary to its earlier
practice, the Hudson’s Bay
Company, restored as a monopoly
in the fur trade, stopped
permitting ambitious Métis
to enter its officer ranks.
The Company governor, George
Simpson, stood adamantly
against the promotion of
Métis even though there
were virtually no "European"
children in the overwhelmingly
native region and most officers
therefore had to be brought
in from outside. Numerous
Métis who would earlier
have enjoyed good careers
with the company were driven
to trade outside the company.
Ultimately, when one Métis
trader was convicted of
illegal trading in 1849
but not fined, the monopoly
collapsed because the law
enshrining it had become
toothless. Approximately
6,000 Métis, divided about
equally between French and
English-speaking groups,
had regained a viable --
if short-lived -- niche
in the fur trade and buffalo
hunt. A new period of prosperity
began as Métis operated
a freight service by ox
cart between Red River and
St. Paul, Minnesota. Their
final golden age ended with
the decline of the fur trade
and the coming of the steamboat.
Disaster
for prairie Indians and
Métis alike began during
the 1850’s, when their region
came to be seen in what
is now Ontario as a place
for the land-hungry to establish
a new civilization. George
Brown, leader of the Reform
party, boomed from his Toronto
newspaper, The Globe,
in 1856: "Let the merchants
of Toronto consider that
if their city is ever to
be made really great if
it is ever to rise above
the rank of a fifth rate
American town -- it must
be by the development of
the great British territory
lying to the north and west."
Was the prairie West with
all its inhabitants to become
an economic colony to the
central provinces in general,
and Toronto in particular?
When
prairie Canada was sold
by the Hudson’s Bay Company
to the newly-formed Dominion
of Canada in 1869, it was
done without even minimal
consideration of existing
Indian and Métis land claims
in the region. Friction
quickly followed.
Louis
Riel’s first Red River rebellion
of 1869-70 led to the reluctant
creation of the province
of Manitoba by the Macdonald
government in 1870. Control
of public lands and natural
resources within its approximately
one hundred square mile
area was reserved for Ottawa
-- which was not the case
for any other existing province
-- because the Macdonald
government wanted to determine
itself precisely how the
West would be developed.
Although arguments still
exist that federal control
of prairie homesteading
was necessary for a number
of years if life was to
be breathed successfully
into national settlement
and railway policies, the
future was thus determined
for both English- and French-speaking
Métis. Central Canadians
had essentially ignored
their aspirations and needs
by making a farce of their provincehood.
Social
humiliation for the Métis,
who in fact constituted
about three quarters of
Red River’s 12,000 residents,
followed the birth of Manitoba.
Degradation came primarily
at the hands of those of
Colonel Wolseley’s disbanded
soldiers who remained in
Manitoba and who were openly
contemptuous of anyone who
was "French," "papist" or
a "breed." The new province
quickly became a boiling
cauldron of animosity. A
minority of Métis left for
the more hospitable social
climate of the western United
States. Some left Manitoba
to attempt to recreate their
former lifestyle along the
North Saskatchewan River
near Prince Albert; most
chose to remain on their
farms in Manitoba or to
establish new ones on land
promised to the Métis.
Following
the crushing of the North-West
Rebellion in 1885, the Métis
were completely routed as
a people. Their homes were
looted and burned, their
cattle were stolen, and
the people themselves were
dispersed. Many sought entry
into Indian bands on the
basis of their Indian blood.
Some migrated to northern
Alberta. Their independent
spirit was severely dampened.
The
census records tell the
story. In 1881, of the 56,500
people in the North-West
Territories the overwhelming
majority, 49,500, were either
Indian or Métis. By 1901,
of a total population in
the region of 159,000 only
26,304 were listed as Indian
or Métis. Many of the missing
23,000 Métis and Indians,
concludes the Métis historian
Don McLean, had simply "moved
on, beyond the reach of
the census takers, to the
marginal bushlands at the
fringe of the Arctic. Others
fled to the U.S.A., while
many who remained were reluctant
to identify themselves as
Métis, fearing reprisal
and persecution."
In
1901, the highly-respected
Father Lacombe and others
developed a plan with the
Laurier government to establish
a Métis reserve in central
Alberta. For various reasons,
including Métis distrust
of both Ottawa and the western
branch of the Roman Catholic
Church (many felt their
church had sided with Macdonald
against Riel in 1885), only
eighty families were persuaded
to move on to the reserve
near St. Paul des Métis
(later shortened to St.
Paul) in northeastern Alberta.
Against the wishes of a
frail and aging Lacombe,
the reserve was later disbanded
and settlers from Quebec
first arrived to settle
on it in 1908.
By
the Depression year of 1930,
the demoralization of a
proud people was complete
and their leadership was
virtually dormant. Those
who had succeeded in the
transformed prairie order
as farmers and entrepreneurs,
concludes McLean, "were
coming to be seen in the
community as ‘white men’,
not Métis."
Since
1945, the progress of the
Métis people has been more
positive. According to the
1986 census, there are today
approximately 150,000 Canadians
of Métis origin, about two
thirds of whom live in Western
Canada. Educational opportunities
have improved, and Métis
people have entered trades
and professions in the West
and some have found recognition
outside their own region.
Douglas Cardinal, for example,
is the architect of the
new Museum of Civilization
in Ottawa. Blatantly racist
interpretations of Canadian
history are being revised.
Métis community pride has
revived to a considerable
degree, and Métis associations
have been rejuvenated in
both Alberta and Saskatchewan.
Métis
rights were entrenched at
least in theory in the Canadian
constitution, and leaders
like Louis "Smokey" Bruyère,
president of the Native
Council of Canada, are being
heard. Bruyère himself notes:
"Just before his death,
in 1885, Louis Riel predicted
it would be three hundred
years before the Métis took
their rightful place in
Canada. We’ve just passed
year 100, and Métis are
entrenched as an aboriginal
people in the Canadian Constitution,
the highest law of the land
-- not bad for starters."
Much remains to be done,
but a brighter Métis future
is clearly indicated.
While
the Métis children of Manitoba
won a land grant of sorts
from Macdonald, prairie
Indians from the 1870’s
on were treated as wards
of the federal government.
Alexander Morris, who arranged
the initial prairie treaties
for the Macdonald government,
revealed much when he said:
"Let us have Christianity
and civilization to leaven
the masses of heathenism
and paganism among the Indian
tribes; let us have a wise
and paternal government
faithfully carrying out
the provisions of our treaties.
[Native people] are wards
of Canada, let us do our
duty by them." This policy
would result in a considerable
number of cultural, mental,
and physical deaths for
Western Indians over the
decades.
The
changing world of Indians
on the Canadian prairies
in the second half of the
19th century is caught well
in the following description:
"A typical Cree youth might
have been hunting buffalo
and raiding for horses in
the 1860’s just as his grandfather
had done sixty years before;
in the 1870’s, he might
have succumbed to the whiskey
trade or been struck by
an epidemic; almost certainly
he would have been removed
to a reserve and perhaps
even taught the rudiments
of agriculture. In the 1880’s,
some of his children might
have been attending school,
and he, having faced starvation
for three or four years
in succession, might have
participated in the violence
associated with the 1885
uprising. But nothing within
his power could alter the
circumstances of his life:
the buffalo had disappeared,
trains and fences and towns
now dominated the plains,
and the old ways had disappeared
beyond recovery."
The
white Canadian invasion
of the western plains hit
full stride after 1870.
Just before that date there
were 25-35,000 Indians,
another 10,000 Métis and
fewer than 2,000 whites
on the Canadian prairies.
A concerned Macdonald government,
which held the constitutional
responsibility for Indians
and their lands, signed
a number of treaties by
the end of the 1870’s with
as much pomp and ceremony
as individual circumstances
permitted.
There
were probably three major
misrepresentations by the
officials "negotiating"
the treaties. First, they
knew the value of the land
to be ceded to the Crown
whereas the Indians clearly
did not. Second, the chiefs
and bands had no legal or
other knowledgeable advisors.
Third, most of the Indians
who signed could not really
have understood the meaning
of many treaty terms or
their binding effect on
future generations. They
were simply swindled.
Prairie
Reality
In
the 1870s, prairie Indian
bands had no choice but
to sign treaties because
the huge buffalo population,
which at its peak had numbered
50-60 million throughout
the North American plains,
was annihilated between
1874 and 1879. Some token
conservation measures were
considered in Ottawa and
by some of the territorial
governments, but nothing
worthwhile was done in time
to regulate the massacre
by the white and native
hunters supplying the American
hide trade. Indians, who
for a century had relied
on the buffalo for food,
faced starvation in the
1880’s. The Macdonald government
did move more quickly to
provide emergency rations
to Indians, as Friesen points
out, than it had to preserve
the buffalo. "But," he goes
on, "what is striking, in
retrospect, is the government’s
apparent use of food rations
as a means of coercing reluctant
Indians into the treaties
and, later, as a tool for
controlling Indian diplomatic
activity."
For
example, three major Cree
leaders, Big Bear, Piapot
and Little Pine, sought
to create adjoining reserves
for their bands in which
they might jointly maintain
considerable autonomy. Ottawa’s
Indian Affairs Commissioner,
Edgar Dewdney, first used
food rations as a means
of sending each of their
bands to different locations
on the prairies which were
300 miles apart. When a
Cree revolt over the issues
of local autonomy and larger
reserves seemed imminent
in 1883, Dewdney threatened
ration cuts: ‘submit or
starve’. He abandoned this
option only when Prime Minister
Macdonald agreed to enlarge
the Mounted Police and to
amend the Indian Act to
permit the arrest of any
Indian present on another
reserve without the permission
of Indian Affairs officials.
When
some young Crees and Assiniboines
killed nine white men at
Frog Lake in Central Saskatchewan
during Riel’s NorthWest
Rebellion in 1885, Dewdney
and Macdonald had the perfect
opportunity to crush Cree
efforts to win treaty revisions
and a single large reserve.
Chief Poundmaker of the Crees, who had not approved
of the uprising and in fact
had ordered his followers
not to slaughter a contingent
of Canadian soldiers who
had attacked them at Cutknife
Hill, soon found himself
on trial for treason with
eighty other Indians. His
trial was a caricature of
justice. George Denison,
a police magistrate and
observer of the proceedings,
said that the chief was
"convicted on evidence that,
in any ordinary trial would
have ensured his acquittal
without the jury leaving
the box...." Poundmaker
died, broken in spirit,
within four months of his
release from Stoney Mountain
penitentiary near Winnipeg.
Centuries of Indian hegemony
on the prairies died with
him.
The
loss of land, hunting and
fishing rights, dignity,
self-sufficiency and nationhood
by Western Indians was both
a regional and a national
tragedy. In 1895, the Cree
Chief Piapot, known for
both his humour and his
eloquence, put a common
Indian view this way: "In
order to become sole masters
of our land they relegated
us to small reservations
as big as my hand and made
us promises as long as my
arm; but the next year the
promises were shorter and
got shorter every year until
now they are the length
of my finger, and they keep
only half of that."
West
of the Rockies, the pattern
was similar although both
coastal and interior Indians
were largely undisturbed
by outsiders until the late
eighteenth century. British,
Spanish and Russian explorers
thereafter arrived by sea;
fur traders came from the
East to establish posts
in the early nineteenth
century. By the 1860s, British
Columbia Indians had been
severely weakened by European
diseases, and those remaining
were terrified of ending
upon reserves. The British
Columbia government nonetheless
set aside reserves for them,
although the issue of title
would remain unresolved
to the present day. Probably
again because there was
no need for settlement lands,
no treaties were obtained
by Ottawa from Indians anywhere
in the province except in
an extreme northern corner.
Chief William of the William’s
Lake Indian band wrote to
The Victoria Daily Colonist
in 1880: "I am an Indian
Chief and a Christian. ‘Do
unto others as you wish
others should do unto you’
is Christian doctrine. Is
the white man a Christian?
This is part of his creed
-- ‘take all you want if
it belongs to an Indian.’
He has taken all our land
and all the salmon and we
have -- nothing. He believes
an Indian has a right to
live if he can live on nothing
at all...."
Indian
Act
Few
prairie Indians realized
early on that the aboriginal
rights recognized in the
solemn treaties signed with
Her Majesty the Queen were
subject to the Indian Act
of the Canadian Parliament,
passed in 1876 and still
in full force today. As
Harold Cardinal, the former
President of the Indian
Association of Alberta,
puts it, "They never understood
that the agents who came
among them came, not because
of the treaties they had
signed, but because there
had been a piece of legislation
called the Indian Act… legislation
totally separate, totally
remote from the whole treaty-making
process."
The
Indian Act mandated the
federal Indian Affairs Department
to control virtually every
aspect of Indian life, including
economic development, municipal
and provincial government
matters, politics, land
use and education. Cardinal
notes that the only power
chiefs and councils possess
under the Act which does
not first require them to
seek permission from the
Indian agent is controlling
weeds on reserves. The legislation
purports to protect and
encourage Indians, but in
fact affords no respect
whatsoever for their culture,
religion or traditional
way of life.
The
policy behind the Indian
Act was based on two misconceptions:
first, Indians were regarded
as incapable of managing
their own affairs, a view
which led to a perceived
need for paternalism; second,
the values, culture and
lifestyles of native peoples
were looked upon as inferior
to those of the white society.
Such views, notes law professor
Peter Cumming, "resulted
in the virtual destruction
of the Indian people. They
have been deprived, unlike
any other group of Canadians,
of the opportunity of learning
by self-experience and initiative.
They have been placed in
the proverbial 1984 welfare
state with consequential
destruction of pride and
ultimately self-identity."
The
manner of federal government
control and administration
of reserve lands is virtually
unchanged from that adopted
in 1876 when the Indian
Act became law. The provisions
of the legislation do not
allow for aboriginal self-government
and self-management. "Today
Indian legislation generally
rests on the principle that
the aborigines are to be
kept in a condition of tutelage
and treated as wards or
children of the state,"
said the 1876 document of
the Department of the Interior.
Georges Erasmus, President
of the Assembly of First
Nations, believes such attitudes
towards the native peoples
still prevail in the 1980s
and views his people as
"wards of the government
with no real ability to
influence their communities."
Native
War Records
The
contribution of Indians
and Natives in both World
Wars is of considerable
interest. Between 3,500
and 4,000 Indians from a
total of 11,500 eligible
for service across the country
enlisted voluntarily in
the Canadian Expeditionary
Force during World War I.
This constituted a 35% enlistment
rate and was at least equal
to the ratio of the non-Indian
population. Native people
also raised approximately
$44,000 by the end of the
first World War to donate
to various war relief funds.
The
Indians who volunteered
paid a significant price
in terms of the killed,
wounded and sick. Many of
them were decorated for
conspicuous bravery. Alberta
historian James Dempsey
writes: "In summary, the
contributions of Indians
in the military aspect of
the war effort were comparable
to that of other Canadians.
The major difference was
that Indians were not required
or expected to serve, but
they did so with gallantry
and valor."
Returning
Treaty Indian veterans did
not receive the same assistance
as other soldiers. Their
lot had not improved and
their contribution was soon
forgotten. Fred Gaffen in
his work on the native peoples’
role in both World Wars,
Forgotten Soldiers, describes
the problems many Indians
faced in obtaining land
grants under the Soldier
Settlement Act of 1919.
He concluded: "only half
a dozen grants of free land
under the Soldier Settlement
Act were given to Indian
veterans of the Great War
on the Prairies off the
reserves." Out of 25,000
soldier settlers to whom
land loans were granted,
only 224 were Indian soldiers,
most of them from Ontario,
with their locations on
the reserves. Indian veterans
on reserves in need of help
were to be treated like
other Indians on reserves
rather than as veterans
and were not eligible for
War Veterans Allowance.
It was not until 1936 that
this policy was modified
and the Indian veterans
on reserves received the
same benefits as others.
After 1918, the hope of
the better future for which
they had fought faded away
for many Native veterans.
Dempsey puts it, "The hopes
of the Indians not only
did not materialize, but
in fact their economic status
decreased from what it had
been before the war. As
a result, the era of the
1920’s has been noted as
a time of marked decline
for the Indians, economically,
numerically and politically."
When
World War II began, Canadians
of aboriginal origin again
responded well. Approximately
3,000 treaty Indians enlisted
along with many Métis and
non-status Indians. Those
who survived and returned
were again treated with
contempt. Louis Bruyère
writes: "One of Canada’s
greatest shames has to be
how aboriginal veterans
were presented medals and
decorations via the back
doors of legions by the
same comrades they fought
with. The laws and cultural
ignorance of the day made
it impossible for aboriginal
veterans to sit in taverns
and bars with their non-aboriginal
buddies and reminisce about
the war."
The
living conditions of Indian
veterans and their families
again deteriorated from
what they had been before
the war. Bruyère: "The families
of those Indian men who
had to give up their Indian
status in order to join
the Canadian armed forces
and were killed in battle
faced new odds because they
lost the support systems
of the reserves. Wives and
children with little or
no marketable skills were
forced to turn to the welfare
system for survival and
today you can witness the
results. Many of the grandchildren
of these people are also
on welfare because they
had no other role model
to imitate or follow." In
such circumstances, the
demonstrated patriotism
among natives from Western
Canada and elsewhere borders
on the astonishing.
A
report prepared by Indian
Affairs officials and published
in 1980 documented the story
of Indian conditions during
the previous ten to twenty
years. Life expectancy was
on average 10 years less
than that of the national
population. Indian death
rates were 2 to 4 times
the national average. The
number of deaths due to
suicide was almost 3 times
the national rate. The report
concluded that the major
causes of Indian deaths
were illnesses associated
with poor housing and living
conditions. In the 19 80’s
the native unemployment
rate in some regions reaches
90%. Many of Canada’s 700,000
aboriginal people live amid
alcoholism, unemployment,
despair and suicide.
Recent
Trends
The
1960s and 1970s witnessed
a reawakening Indian consciousness,
a rebirth of native pride,
a rediscovery of Indian
culture and traditions,
and a growing desire of
native peoples to redefine
their place in Confederation.
Indians who astonishingly
until 1960 were not even
allowed to vote in federal
elections (unless they relinquished
their legal Indian status)
sought to reaffirm their
right to self-determination.
Indian leaders emerged who
forcefully expressed their
desire to gain equality
with other Canadians and
at the same time to maintain
their heritage.
Since
1977, aboriginal groups
have actively sought recognition
of their "inherent right
to self-government," a right
they exercised before Europeans
arrived in North America
and which many believe has
never been extinguished.
Claims that political structures
were unknown to native people
prior to contact with Europeans
ignore the fact that most
First Nations have complex
forms of government that
go back centuries.
As
religion was an integral
part of the aboriginal life,
their governments were operated
according to spiritual values.
Government was often conducted
on the basis of traditions
modified with pragmatic
innovations. The Potlatch,
for example, was a West
Coast system for calling
assemblies. Through ceremonies,
songs, dances and speeches,
new leaders were installed
in office. Ottawa chose
to outlaw the Potlatch,
and attendance at Potlatch
functions was prohibited
by law as late as 1951.
People who lived according
to Potlatch had to practise
their religious beliefs
clandestinely and were forced
to live under a system of
government imposed on them.
The
House of Commons Special
Committee on Indian Self-Government
in its 1983 report emphasized
the value of the understanding
it had gained during the
hearings. "All Canadians,"
it said, "would benefit
from similar information
so that their understanding
of their relationship to
the Indian First Nations
could be extended. In this
way, the popular view of
Indians could be corrected.
They would learn that Indians
were not pagan and uncultured,
but peoples who moved from
free, self-sustaining First
Nations to a state of dependency
and social disorganization
as the result of a hundred
years of nearly total government
control." The special committees
made 58 recommendations.
The first was that the federal
government should establish
a new relationship with
the Indian First Nations,
and that an essential element
of this relationship must
be Indian self-government.
Meech
Lake
A
fourth and final First Ministers’
Constitutional Conference
held in March 1987 in Ottawa
focussed on the self-government
issue, but failed to produce
an amendment to the Canadian
constitution. No further
meetings are planned, and
the prospects of amending
the constitution to accommodate
aboriginal self-government
in the near future are poor.
The
1987 Meech Lake Constitutional
Accord is seen by native
leaders as having a negative
impact on aboriginal peoples.
"Aboriginal peoples are
left out of any realistic
chance of being included
in the future constitutional
order.... It ransoms our
long term future for the
short run gains of eleven
First Ministers," says Louis
Bruyère. Aboriginal leaders
have put forward several
proposals addressing their
concerns which might be
accommodated within the
framework of the Meech Lake
Accord. Hope persists among
the native leaders that
public pressure on the federal
and provincial governments
will eventually bring about
native self-government.
Northerners,
native and white, generally
share with natives the sense
of being left out by the
Meech Lake Accord because
they see opportunities for
provincehood in the two
Territories virtually eliminated.
The creation of new provinces
in the future requires the
unanimous consent of all
provinces. "This requirement
effectively denies the Yukon’s
hope of future provincehood
and is unacceptable to Northerners,"
says the Yukon government
leader Tony Penikett.
The
fallback position for the
Dene, asserts Erasmus, is
provincial status for the
North because only above
the 60th parallel are aboriginal
peoples sufficiently numerous
to be able to influence
their own governments. Otherwise
the vast North will remain
a storehouse for the future
resource needs of Southern
Canadians. But how will
all ten provincial governments
agree to provide status
as required by the Meech
Lake Accord? The accord,
Erasmus goes on, "has made
it impossible for us to
become provinces." The only
other option for Northerners,
an attempt to renew the
constitutional negotiations,
seems equally unlikely to
be productive.
In
Fort Simpson N.W.T. late
in 1987, Pope John Paul
II called for more self-government
for natives and for a new
round of talks so that aboriginal
rights may finally be entrenched
in the Canadian constitution.
He reaffirmed for native
peoples the need for a "just
and equitable degree of
self-governing with a land
base and adequate resources
necessary for the development
of a viable economy for
present and future generations."
In reply to a question,
he said that Canadian natives
"don’t have it good," adding
that the opportunity to
call for the re-opening
of the constitutional talks
and a just and equitable
land-claims agreement were
important reasons for his
trip.
Northern
Blues
An
estimated 10,000 Indians
and Métis and 17,000 Inuit
share 1.2 million square
miles with 20,000 whites
in the Northwest Territories.
In the much smaller Yukon
territory, there are currently
about 3,000 Indians and
Métis and 19,000 whites.
Both territories are essentially
still colonies of Ottawa,
and many of the same practices
which troubled Western Canadians
earlier are still carried
out as a matter of habit
north of the sixtieth parallel.
One
major native grievance is
the continuing attack on
hunting and trapping, the
traditional way of life
and source of livelihood,
by animal rights groups
in metropolitan Canada.
Trapping in fact remains
one of the major economic
activities over approximately
two-thirds of the land area
of Canada.
There
are many other grievances,
one being the relocation
during World War II of many
Yukon natives from their
hunting camps into towns
-- some forcibly -- by our
federal government. The
same thing happened in the
Northwest Territories during
the 1950s. Effective control
of native lives by whites
is especially frustrating
because there are not enough
town jobs in the North and
many do not wish to move
out of the North.
An
important mix of language
and aboriginal title issues
recently arose east of Yellowknife
where the Inuit, representing
more than 95 percent of
the permanent residents
of the vast Eastern Arctic,
contend their traditional
language of Inuktitut must
be entrenched in any land-claim
settlement under the Canadian
Constitution. The Inuit
negotiators are determined
that their language, which
holds, for example, twenty
words for the different
types of snow, does not
disappear like so many other
aboriginal languages because
of anglicization. Ottawa’s
negotiators have until now
refused to consider this,
contending in effect that
to concede a constitutional
language right here would
somehow require Ottawa to
concede the same to languages
spoken by new Canadians
in Southern Canada. The
Inuit’s persuasive counter
is that without constitutional
protection the same pressures
could result in the same
consequences as have appeared
over the decades for minority
official languages in various
provinces. If Ottawa recognizes
Inuktitut as an official
language in work places,
schools and courts only
within the land claims area
along with English and French,
it would also assist more
Inuit to find jobs locally.
An important language ball
is clearly in Ottawa’s court
following its recent success
in signing a historic agreement
with the Dene and Métis
of Northern Canada.
Native
land claims have emerged
in recent years as the focus
of the North-South dispute
partly because many northern
natives see land, in the
language of Northerner René
Lamothe, as "Mother because
she gives life, because
she is the provider, the
protector, the comforter....
We cannot stand on her with
integrity and respect and
claim to love the life she
gives and allow her to be
ravaged." The Edmonton academic
Gurston Dacks judges that
most northern natives believe
a favourable settlement
of their land claims would
give them within Canada
"a meaningful control over
the many features of their
lives that influence their
self-definitions and their
collective life as a people."
In
the western half of the
present Northwest Territories,
the Dene and Inuit co-existed
with Europeans for many
years. No treaties were
entered for a long period,
most likely because no one
in Ottawa thought there
was any land in the region
worth controlling. Indeed,
as Georges Erasmus points
out, Treaty No. 8 was made
applicable to part of northern
British Columbia and part
of the territory north of
60 degrees only after the
Klondike Gold discovery
in 1896, so that Ottawa
could open a right of way
for thousands of panhandlers
streaming north to Dawson
City. Only in 1921-22 after
oil was discovered at Norman
Wells, he adds, was Treaty
11 negotiated with the Dene,
presumably so that southern
access for oil exploration
could be enhanced.
Erasmus,
a Dene himself, stresses
that aboriginal peoples
across the North as well
as in Southern Canada had
considerable experience
with treaties long before
the European version arrived.
Peace and friendship treaties
were common, as were others
providing for an exchange
of hunting privileges. What
was different about the
Canadian treaties for aboriginals,
says Erasmus, was that the
Canadian treaty negotiators,
unlike native ones, "could
look you in the eye and
lie. What made it even worse
was that they could do so
in front of their own holy
men who often observed the
discussions." The Northerners
thought Treaty 8 and Treaty
11 were peace and friendship
treaties of the earlier
type.
Only
in the late 1960s, when
roads within the Treaty
11 land area began to appear,
did younger Dene began to
question their elders’ view
that there was little more
than peace and friendship
involved. Some elders, trusting
in the oral version, simply
did not believe the written
version of Treaty 11 when
it was read to them. Very
hard feelings resulted in
some communities when it
became clear that Dene land
title might have been surrendered.
When the move to build the
Mackenzie Valley Pipeline
began in the 1970’s, other
northern peoples realized
that without reserves or
other land bases their futures
were gravely threatened.
They pushed hard for comprehensive
settlements of their claims
to win the possibility of
economic self-sufficiency
through resource royalties.
In
the native view, ten years
of negotiations ended badly
in March 1987, when the
federal cabinet indicated
that the settlement would
consist not of land and
royalties but of a cash
payment over a 20-year period.
That meant only perpetual
poverty to many northern
natives.
The
essential legal demand of
the northern aboriginal
peoples, including the Métis
Association of the N.W.T.,
the Dene Nation, the Inuit
Tapirisat and the Committee
for Original Peoples Entitlement
(COPE), is that particular
areas of the North should
be designated as governmental
units. Those governments
should then be delegated
responsibility for some
matters of importance to
their native residents.
The organizations argue
that native people enjoy
rights to lands occupied
by them since time immemorial
and that accordingly "the
customary law of native
people [must] be protected
and recognized."
Some
observers believe that,
if a reasonable accommodation
of native views is not recognized
quickly by Southern Canadians,
Northern Canada could become
a new centre of major separatist
activity.
A
significant breakthrough
in longstanding northern
land claims was reached
in September, 1988, when
Prime Minister Brian Mulroney
and representatives of 15,000
Dene and Métis signed an
agreement-in-principle.
The agreement provides the
natives of the Mackenzie
River Valley with ownership
of 10,000 square kilometres,
surface rights to an additional
170,000, and a $500 million
settlement in cash. The
agreement, which took 15
years to achieve, is welcome.
It represents a large step
forward in resolving northern
land claims even though
some critical areas remain
to be settled, particularly
those dealing with aboriginal
rights and self-government.
A pattern for future settlements
with other northern native
groups has been established,
and the way is open to settle
Canada’s account with our
aboriginal peoples honourably.
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