The following presentation was made August
23, 2002, at the annual Council of Georgist Organizations
conference held in London, Ontario, Canada. In Canada the
name First Nations generally replaces the term Indian
for the native tribes who lived for many centuries on the
land of southern Canada and northern America before the
Europeans arrived.
LEGAL CLAIMS, LEGAL CHALLENGES, AND SOLVING
SOCIAL PROBLEMS
Joe Miskokoman (the name means Red Night) is the
Chief of the Chippewas of the Thames, and he is the
son of a chief, who was the son of a chief, going back as
far as 1847. Many of the Chippewa left the Reserve in
Ontario province prior to World War II. Mishkokoman's
father and mother went to Detroit to work. When WW II
broke out, many Indians returned to their Reserves to join
the military. Mishkokomon was good at sports, worked to
pay for the college degree he earned, ended up with a
Ph.D., and started out as a high school teacher in London,
Ontario. He developed one of the first Native study
courses in Canada that was accredited. Highlights
follow from his presentation.
The Chippewa treatied most of this territory to the
British, with whom they were allies and equals of the Crown
and a military force to reckoned with in essentially
defending their territory from invasion by the colonial
powers of the then United States. The size and magnitude
of land and resources that the Anishinabe people
controlled, in a confederacy of 250 tribes, ran from
Wisconsin/Manitoba to the East Coast with the Cree and
Innuit to the north and Iroquois to the south.
The British Crown needed an alliance with the First
Nations people in order to control that amount of territory
when European powers were taking foothold in North America.
As the tribal Reserves were established, much of history
has been relegated to historical footnotes.
There were more identifiable First Nation persons
that went to war in World War I and World War II than any
other identifiable group in Canada, continuing the
relationship established hundreds of years ago with the
British Crown. Many of the WW II warriors came back and
were confronted with racism. The Canada Veterans Act was
to allow veterans to reestablish their homes, by buying
homes in cities or getting rent or loan money to
establish themselves in farming communities, particularly
in western Canada. But the Indians were not allowed then
to take part in the money granted. Only as of June 21,
2002, did the Ministry of Veterans Affairs stand up
in Canada and apologize to the First Nations of Canada.
Since then there has been a ruling by Canada, arbitrarily
and without negotiations, that they are prepared to
compensate to as high as $20,000 to the veterans or the
surviving spouses of the veterans of those soldiers.
Their theory is that if you took the money that could have
been offered in 1947 and rolled it forward it would only
accumulate to approximately $20,000. One would think that
the maximum Veterans Affairs $6,000 grant for a person
coming out of WW II after 1947 would have accumulated more
than that.
When Miskokomon went to the University in the early
1970s, there was 217 First Nations people there that year.
Today there are 27,000 First Nations people in universities
and colleges across this country. We understand the value
of education and Miskokomon has dedicated the last 30 years
of his life trying to reestablish the First Nation people
into a socially responsible group.
When he was the elected Grand Council Chief of 47
First Nations people throughout the province of Ontario,
Miskokomon's job was to go to communities and warn people
of pending problems in legislative form. In early 1979 to
1982 he was in London, England, because the First Nations
leadership asked him to go there to lobby against the
Repatriate Constitution Act of Canada. At the time the
government of Canada, Prime Minister Trudeau, with Jean
Chretien as his understudy, believed that the treaties were
nothing more than antiquated documents only to be looked
at. Of the 33 hours in the Repatriation process, 28 hours
were devoted to Indian treaties.
Canada took the position that the treaties prior to
1867 were no longer the responsibility of Canada because
that was when the British North American Act was first
drafted. First Nations' question then was whose
responsibility was it. The Eastern seaboard to central
Ontario and beyond was treatied prior to 1850. Whose
responsibility was it to uphold the treaties if
not Canada. First Nations went to court in Britain, and
Lord Demming in the lower court ruled that the treaties
were English responsibility and that was transferred to
Canada de facto by the British North American Act of 1867
and Statutes of Westminister of 1862 and by the
Constitution Repatriation.
This created a dilemma for First Nations with Canada
denying responsibility prior to 1867 and then the court of
England saying we hold no responsibiliity because we
transferred it to you. Of the two major countries, one
holds the land, the other colonized the land, and both
claim they hold no responsibility. An enormous amount of
resources wealth was involved, from the fur trade, minerals
and wood, to the gold strike on the north shore of
Lake Superior in Canada. Yet First Nations has yet to
secure jobs in the gold mines within their treaty
territory. The treaty says the resources will be shared
equally.
Who owns the water resources that are being sold? In
Ontario province the government claims to own the water
resources of the Thames river. That was the ancesteral
highway to the Great Lakes, and First Nations holds that
the river bed is our territory because we find historically
that while our people treatied the land, they always used
the river as the boundary line. There are a series of
treaties that lie along this river. There is no historical
document that ever said that we treatied the river bed,
Miskokomon pointed out. Our ancesters would have no reason
to treaty away our highway where
they fished and moved goods back and forth from interior
southern Ontario to the Great Lakes. The Ministry of
Natural Resources in Southern Ontario says they own the
water and now it is classified as a navigable waterway.
But the Department of Fisheries and Oceans on the Federal
side says it is under their jurisdiction. Who owns what?
The City of London for the past ten years has been
developing what is to called the southside pollution plant.
They said it would be used only for residential waste but
in reality it is being used as a dumping ground for
industrial waste. There are approximately 74 million
gallons of water that goes past any point of that river in
any 24 hour period. They are building a sewage plant that
will dump 74 millions of gallons of water additionally into
that river. Why not talk about tertiary treatment in terms
of wetlands and natural filtration? What happens to the
flora, fauna, and fish? First Nations has been monitoring
this for a number of years, because its intake system is
going to be less than 10 kilometers downstream from the
proposed site. The nitrates and phosphates in that water
are at an unacceptable level to the point where there
could be another Walkerton outbreak. At Walkerton,
Ontario, seven people died and hundreds more became ill
from e-coli water contamination when animal waste
got into the Walkerton water system. First Nations'
concern is the land, the environment, and preparation of
land without contamination. The Ojibwa are not at all
anti-development, but want sustainable development without
having repercussions of environment destruction.
In August 2002, the longest compensation land claim
in Canada, which started in 1845, was settled. First
Nations were denied access to the courts in 1898 and in
1906. Their claim was rejected by the government of Canada
in 1972, in 1976, and in 1978 when it was resubmitted. It
was accepted as a claim in 1985, and negotiations started
in November 2001. It took 152 years to get to the table,
but the negotiations were short, being resolved with $15
million being awarded to First Nations (Chippewa of the
Thames). It is intended to turn the $15 million into a war
chest to challenge some of the other claims in this
territory.
Another claim took First Nations 25 years of
negotiations and was resolved for $5 million. Now our
trust fund has grown to nearly $12 million in a portfolio
diversified with real estate, bonds, debentures, and
equity, Miskokomon commented. We bought back 1600 acres of
land, paying the municipalities the taxes on that land. We
will return that land to our own territory to expand our
territory and use it for economic purposes and for housing.
One of the major issues facing Indians is that they
are barred from borrowing money from the bank. They are
the only people that are denied that and young couples have
to come up with cash to build homes. Yet the natives are
the fastest growing population in the country. We told the
banks, "doesn't it make good business sense to invest in
us?" We could pull out the $12 million we have sitting in
the bank, Miskokomon said. The banks said you are right,
and we took $500,000 and put it in a trust fund,
establishing a mortgage loan program for our young people.
This is a revolving fund that continues to expand. In five
years with 23 obligations there has not been any default.
First Nations people are denied the opportunity to
contribute to the Canada pension plan. Our elders are
living in senior poverty, noted Miskokomon, so we developed
our community pension fund, setting up a specific trust
designed for our elders who are 65 years of age. We are
contributing from our own resources, starting out modestly
with $400,000.
First Nations has a multi-stream approach, relying on
education and legal challenges we must face in order to
solve social challenges. We are relying on our own history
and background, and relying on what we intend to do and on
our future, Miskokoman said. We have already started
working on economic development, entrepreneurship, and the
ability to create wealth internally within our own people.
We missed the industrial revolution. We are not going to
miss the technological revolution. We believe sharing of
information is key to reestablishing the relationship
between our government and people.
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Editors note: Chief Joe Miskokomon, Chippewas of
the Thames First Nations, Muncey, Ontario, Canada, may be
emailed at chippewa@mnsi.net