Tansi Nîtôtemtik,
The wampum belt is a symbol of sovereignty. Oneida Nation.
Retrieved from <www.oneidaindiannation.com/the-guswenta-two-row-wampum-belt-is-a-symbol-of-sovereignty>
Indigenous Governance requires recognizing sovereignty. As demonstrated in yesterday’s post, the Royal Proclamation of 1763 was an early recognition by the British Crown of the sovereignty of Indigenous nations. Early Crown-Indigenous treaties also recognized the sovereignty and right of governance for Indigenous peoples.
Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century treaties were “peace and friendship” agreements that sought allyship, defined territory, and established commercial and economic relationships.[1] Most treaties from the era did not involve cessation of land, but all treaties created relationships with rights and obligations on both sides and were the form of “diplomatic” relations between the European and Indigenous nations.[2]
When early treaties were negotiated, the colonizing powers of Great Britain and France believed that Indigenous nations “had sufficient independence and played a large enough role in North America for it to be good policy to maintain relations with them very close to those maintained between sovereign nations.”[3] The Supreme Court of Canada has acknowledged that the European powers’ use of treaties was a recognition of Indigenous nations as “independent.”[4] Two example of early treaties which recognized Indigenous sovereignty were the Treaties of Albany and Niagara.
The Treaty of Albany, negotiated in 1664, was “the first formal alliance between Aboriginal peoples in North America and the British Crown.”[5] The British, still a relatively weak power in North America, sought a powerful ally in the Iroquois Confederacy (Haudenosaunee) for economic and military aid against the French.[6] The agreement at Albany was an affirmation of Iroquois sovereignty and allowed the British and the Haudenosaunee to govern their own peoples, including the retention of exclusive jurisdiction for criminal law.[7] The agreement combined cultural elements from both nations – the British documented the treaty in written text and the Haudenosaunee recorded the agreement on a wampum belt “which was highly valuable and required great skill to fashion” and “demonstrated the sanctity with which they viewed their alliance with the British.”[8]
At the Treaty of Niagara negotiations in 1764, a “nation-to-nation relationship between settler and First Nations people was renewed and extended” and was again documented in both written text and on a wampum belt.[9] The written agreement was the Royal Proclamation of 1763 – the document became a treaty when the Haudenosaunee consented to it at Niagara.[10] The agreement also produced a culturally powerful two-row wampum belt that “recognizes interaction and separation of settler and First Nation societies.”[11] The wampum belt produced at Niagara illustrates a relationship of friendship between the Haudenosaunee and the British, but the parallel rows represent that each nation will remain distinct and “will not interfere with the internal affairs of the other.”[12] The Haudenosaunee cultural understanding of the wampum, read in conjunction with the Royal Proclamation, show that the parties agreed that each nation was to self-govern their own peoples.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has noted that treaties between “Indigenous nations and the Crown established the legal and constitutional foundations of this country”[13] – this foundation rests on mutual agreement between the British Crown and diverse Indigenous nations. Early Crown-Indigenous treaties, such as the Treaties of Albany and Niagara, highlight this recognition of sovereignty. The parties viewed themselves as distinct nations – like the separate but parallel rows on wampum – and these agreements show that the British Crown recognized Indigenous sovereignty and governance prior to Canadian Confederation.
Until Next Time,
Team ReconciliAction YEG
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[1]John J Borrows & Leonid I Rotman, Aboriginal Legal Issues: Cases, Materials & Commentary, 5th ed (Toronto: LexisNexis Canada Inc, 2018) at 285 [Borrows & Rotman].
[2] Ibid at 281.
[3] R v Sioui, [1990] 1 SCR 1025 at 1053.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Borrows & Rotman supra note 1 at 11.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid at 13.
[8] Ibid.
[9] John Borrows, “Wampum at Niagara: The Royal Proclamation, Canadian Legal History, and Self-Government” in Michael Asch, ed, Aboriginal and Treaty Rights in Canada: Essays on Law, Equity, and Respect for Difference (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1997) 155 at 161.
[10] Ibid.
[11] Ibid at 164.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, Honouring the Truth, Reconciling for the Future: Summary of the Final Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (Ottawa: Library and Archives Canada, 2015) at 249.
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