100 years ago this month, the Allied Tribes of British Columbia petitioned Parliament to shut down the report of the Indian Reserve Commission.

BC has very quietly set up a public consultation process on its plans to embed First Nations local governments within its Lands Act.

The lead is buried pretty deep: BC’s original assumption of control of all the land (without treaty or constructive arrangement) was in 1874. It was patently unconstitutional, and, at first, Canada’s Attorney General disallowed it.

What unfolded then was: replacement of the troublesome AG – Telesphore Fournier, with Edward Blake who allowed a new 1875 BC Lands Act, equally unconstitutional and an act of wholesale annexation, on the basis of settler convenience. Then Canada passed the Indian Act, locking Indigenous Peoples into a second-class-state of outlaw and criminalization. Meanwhile the Province of British Columbia sold off and settled prime Indigenous real estate, fencing communities decimated by smallpox into an-acre-a-person Reserves.

Fifty years of protest, petition, and physical defense of the land (1874-1924) did nothing to remedy the situation at the time, but increased BC and Canada’s resolve to the point of legislating the tiny Reserve Boundaries and making litigation on behalf of Indians… illegal (1927).

A hundred years ago this month, the Allied Tribes of British Columbia petitioned Parliament to shut down the report of the Indian Reserve Commission. BC and Canada had set out to finalize the Indian Land question in 1912, with the McKenna-McBride Commission, and unilaterally “quiet the Indian title,” all the while diplomatically shutting the land issue out of courts and the Privy Council forum.

In their 1926 Petition, the Allied Tribes wrote:

14. By Memorandum which was presented to the Government of Canada on 29th February, 1924, the Allied Tribes opposed the passing of Order-in-Council of the Government of Canada adopting the Report of the Royal Commission upon the ground, among other grounds, that no matter whatever relating to Indian affairs in British Columbia having been fully adjusted and important matters such as foreshore rights, fishing rights and water rights not having been to any extent adjusted, the professed purpose of the Agreement and the Act had not been accomplished.
15. By Order-in-Council passed 19th July, 1924, the Government of Canada, acting under Chapter 51 of the Statutes of the year 1920 and upon recommendation of the Minister of the Interior adopted the Report of the Royal Commission.

50 years before that, the Petition of the Douglas Tribes was brutally clear about the Indian Reserve crisis. And the Reserve boundaries have rarely, and barely, shifted since the final cuts of 1924.

The BC plan now, apparently, is to gain the consent of the Indigenous nations, in the form of the individual Indian Bands / First Nations, to their Lands Act after all.

It is appearing like a visitation of the 2009 BC Recognition and Reconciliation Legislation, which was put to death, in ceremony, in 2009 – once the grassroots people caught wind of it. The grassroots people tend to be very cautious about allowing their elected representatives to sign-on with government initiatives, and acknowledge the crown as the legitimate source of power over their lands, peoples, and futures.

However, little is known about this 2024 draft legislation except that it is proceeding as quickly and mysteriously as the 2009 event, which suddenly surfaced early in the Spring and was submerged by the end of summer.

For more information, you can check the:

BC government’s public consultation process

The BC Treaty Negotiating Times – Summer 2009 Analysis and report on the Proposed Recognition and Reconciliation Legislation, opposition, and events.

And this Blog’s timeline of docs under “Land Claims – policy and protest.” for more on the 2009 legislation, Indigenous Alliances and protest of government assumptions.

Check out Archive Quarterly – a new publication featuring newly digitized history that informs the present here in British Columbia. The first issue arrives April 2024. Every issue features key archival papers and artifacts; quotes and interviews with Elders on the issues; and relatable commentary to connect past and present.

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