charter.rights

Good then you agree with me. Aboriginal people have a right to bear arms and are not limited by gun registration or hunting laws outside of their own nations. Of courser we're not so lucky.

See? You have fallen into the trap of trying to interpret the Proclamation from only a colonial point of view. The Supreme Court has not been so naive. In fact the Court has stated on a number of occasions that the interpretation must consider, sometimes with equal or better weight, the oral promises made in the negotiation of those treaties. And since the Proclamation did not nullify any treaties made previously there are lots of external considerations that MUST be applied in interpreting the Proclamation. So over time the SCoC has refined the interpretations and clarified meaning or many parts, in favour of aboriginal rights. Those colonies did not include any land or natives outside of the limits of said boundaries and so sovereignty was limited to the same area. No, they wouldn't. Clearly the treaties leading up to the Proclamation recognized sovereignty of Six Nations in particular, when they took possession of the territory in the Nanfan treaty of 1701. In fact the term "sovereign protection" (do you see the resemblance here?) was first coined in the Howard Treaty of 1684 which provided Six Nations clear passage through all territories into Canada for trade and it guaranteed that the British would keep the Algonquin out of New England. That treaty did not take authority over Six Nations but GB used its sovereignty (which at that point was not clearly defined) to protect Six Nations interests. Nope. The assumption of sovereignty is not the same thing as being sovereign over aboriginal people. IF the Crown intended to take possession of Indians and their lands, they would have treatied with them over it. There are no such treaties that pre-exist the Proclamation. Lord Denning 1982: “Our long experience of these matters taught us how to treat the indigenous peoples. As a matter of public policy, it was of the first importance to pay great respect to their laws and customs, and never interfere with them except when necessary in the interests of peace and good order. It was the responsibility of the Crown of England, and those representing the Crown, to see that the rights of indigenous people were secured to them, and that they were not imposed on by the selfish or the thoughtless or the ruthless. Witness the impeachment of Warren Hastings in Westminister Hall for his conduct of affairs as Governor General of Bengal.” The Crown would have follow custom and held some great ceremony, if their intention was to declare sovereignty over Indian Lands. They did not. I am not taking the Mitchell Map on its own. The fact is the Royal Proclamation declared 7 years later just happened to include the "Boundaries of Six Nations" as including all of southern Ontario. You would think that if the Crown did not intend to recognize Six Nations territorial sovereignty, would, not have so clearly stated it on the map, included with the Royal Proclamtion. They did not. If you can find a treaty or quote in history where any Indian nations capitulated please feel free to quote it. Do you see the problem. From your colonial mindset, all you can see is the legal magic created to make you believe that the King took sovereignty over Indians and their lands. They did not, and it is a fact that Six Nations has a long history exerting their claim to be sovereign, and having control over their lands apart from the Crown. One's assumption does not negate the sovereignty of another, not in international law and not in the common law of the day. Lord Mansfield C J in 1774: “A country conquered by the British arms becomes a Dominion of the King in the right of his Crown: and, therefore, necessarily subject to the legislature, the Parliament of Great Britain....that the laws of a conquered country continue in force until they are altered by the conqueror...” So Dominion only comes to the King when a country is conquered. N.A. was not conquered and it was reinforced by Lord Denning when he saod that we did not conquer aboriginal people, but treated them with respect and non-interference. There was no need to because the Royal Proclamation was clearly and unequivocally aimed only at British subjects: We have thought fit, with the Advice of our Privy Council. to issue this our Royal Proclamation, hereby to publish and declare to all our loving Subjects... One would have to assume before the Proclamation that any Indian nation gave away its sovereignty to Great Britain. Again, if you can show where this was the case, then please feel free to provide it.

Actually it was much more than a Proclamation and went beyond treaties in its guarantees. Lord Denning High Court, 1982....continued: “To my mind the Royal Proclamation of 1763 was equivalent to an entrenched provision in the constitution of the colonies n North America. It was binding on the Crown ‘so long as the sun rises and the river flows’. I find myself in agreement with what was said a few years ago in the Supreme Court of Canada in Calder v. A-G of British Columbia (1973) 34 DLR (3d) 145 at 203, in a judgement in which Laskin J concurred with Hall J and said: “This Proclamation was an Executive Order having the force and effect of an Act of Parliament and was described by Gwynne, J … as the “Indian Bill of Rights”…its force as a statute to the status of Magna Carta which has always been considered to be the law throughout the Empire. It was a law which followed the flag as England assumed jurisdiction over newly discovered or acquired lands or territories… In respect of this Proclamation, it can be said that when other exploring nations were showing a ruthless disregard of native rights England adopted a remarkably enlightened attitude towards the Indians of North America. The Proclamation must be regarded as a fundamental document upon any just determination of original rights rests.”

It is part of that $200 billion to $1 trillion trust we owe Six Nations.

Nope. There are only two thoughts mentioned above and your mythical, xenophobic opinion is not one of them. We could renegotiate Confederation and the Constitution that is true, but the act itself would tear the country apart and create greater divisions and polarized entrenchments. However, we cannot put all claims and titles on the table without also questioning the validity of the Constitution, and the foundation of myths that Canada is build upon. So we are back to the two thoughts on inclusiveness - recognition and reconciliation.

You make the same mistake most people make by trying to hang an opinion on snippets of the proclamation and not the entire proclamation. The assertion of sovereignty, in the first part of your quote, hangs on the first paragraph of the Proclamation: Whereas We have taken into Our Royal Consideration the extensive and valuable Acquisitions in America, secured to our Crown by the late Definitive Treaty of Peace, concluded at Paris the 10th Day of February last; and being desirous that all Our loving Subjects, as well of our Kingdom as of our Colonies in America, may avail themselves with all convenient Speed, of the great Benefits and Advantages which must accrue therefrom to their Commerce, Manufactures, and Navigation, We have thought fit, with the Advice of our Privy Council. to issue this our Royal Proclamation, hereby to publish and declare to all our loving Subjects, that we have, with the Advice of our Said Privy Council, granted our Letters Patent, under our Great Seal of Great Britain, to erect, within the Countries and Islands ceded and confirmed to Us by the said Treaty, Four distinct and separate Governments, styled and called by the names of Quebec, East Florida, West Florida and Grenada, and limited and bounded as follows, viz. [emphasis added] So the Proclamation was an assertion of sovereignty only over subjects of Great Britain and only over the specific colonies of Quebec, East Florida, West Florida and Grenada. The fact at the time was that even though the British were claiming sovereignty over those four colonies, much of the territory within them had still not been ceded by the Indians and so the Crown gave notice that Indians living and moving within those colonial territories "...not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them. or any of them, as their Hunting Grounds..." were free to move and hunt and fish without interference. So for instance, the Royal Proclamation was not implying in this part that Indians or their lands in all of North America were subject to Great Britain's control or sovereignty. In the second part of your quote: And We do further declare it to be Our Royal Will and Pleasure, for the present as aforesaid, to reserve under our Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion, for the use of the said Indians, all the Lands and Territories not included within the Limits of Our said Three {notice the anomaly here...Three vs. Four in the first paragraph is likely because the surrender of Quebec was hastily added after the Proclamation was prepared}new Governments, or within the Limits of the Territory granted to the Hudson's Bay Company, as also all the Lands and Territories lying to the Westward of the Sources of the Rivers which fall into the Sea from the West and North West as aforesaid. Also has its limitations. In order to understand what the British were saying here, especially the part "to reserve under our Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion", one must understand what led up to the the Royal Proclamation, mainly a series of Silver Covenant Chain Treaties which GB uses the sames kinds of language to address Six Nations' complaints of encroachment into their territories. What this particular part really implies is that the crown will use its "Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion" to guarantee that the lands will remain Indian lands, apart and separate from the Crown lands under the proclamation. To confirm this the Proclamation goes further in prohibiting all British subjects from occupancy or use: And We do hereby strictly forbid, on Pain of our Displeasure, all our loving Subjects from making any Purchases or Settlements whatever, or taking Possession of any of the Lands above reserved, without our especial leave and Licence for that Purpose first obtained. And they also guarantee through the proclamation for the sake of those same Indians they are protecting that those who have moved onto their territories will be removed: And We do further strictly enjoin and require all Persons whatever who have either wilfully or inadvertently seated themselves upon any Lands within the Countries above described. or upon any other Lands which, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are still reserved to the said Indians as aforesaid, forthwith to remove themselves from such Settlements. and, And whereas great Frauds and Abuses have been committed in purchasing Lands of the Indians, to the great Prejudice of our Interests. and to the great Dissatisfaction of the said Indians: In order, therefore, to prevent such Irregularities for the future, and to the end that the Indians may be convinced of our Justice and determined Resolution to remove all reasonable Cause of Discontent, We do, with the Advice of our Privy Council strictly enjoin and require, that no private Person do presume to make any purchase from the said Indians of any Lands reserved to the said Indians, within those parts of our Colonies where We have thought proper to allow Settlement: but that, if at any Time any of the Said Indians should be inclined to dispose of the said Lands, the same shall be Purchased only for Us, in our Name, at some public Meeting or Assembly of the said Indians... The limits of the Colonial to those 4 colonies also limit the jurisdiction of GB over N.A.. In 1757 GB created the Mitchell Map which identifies all the non-colonial lands as specific Indian tribes boundaries, and not that all of what is now Southern Ontario is Six Nations territory. The Royal Proclamation Maps, while less detailed, show the same things. So the point all in all, is that the Crown did not take or hold sovereignty over Indians, or their lands. And to adequately illustrate this I refer to Lord Denning of the High Court in 1982 (prior to repatriation of the Constitution) when he states that aboriginal title under the Royal Proclamation was a "plenum dominium" and "superior to all others". As well, the the Charter of Rights and Freedoms confirms that aboriginal people are sovereign, albeit in a round about way in Sect. 35 35. (1) The existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal peoples of Canada are hereby recognized and affirmed. Acknowledging this means that Indians had the independence, autonomy and sovereignty to make nation to nation treaties with the Crown for surrender of the "personal and usufructary" rights at their will. The SCoC further reinforces this when it ruled in the Chippewas of Sarnia v. Canada, by extracting mandatory components that had to be present in order to determine whether they would consider if a surrender was valid. One of those prerequisites was that the First Nations and to fully desire and initiate a surrender on their own, without influence from the Indian agents, or any other party. So there is no doubt that the Crown saw the Indians as separate and independent people apart from the sovereignty of the Crown.

Our garden produces enough to freeze, can and dry to last us until about May of the following year. Not only do we know where all that food comes from but our 'store' is only about 20 feet from our kitchen. I am presently working on expanding a small deep water culture hydroponic experiment that I am hoping will provide us with fresh greens all winter long. There are lots of things to learn about growing, preserving and reconstituting foods that we all should be learning. However, waiting for a major event, when the internet is no longer accessible, or when the food stores are exhausted will be too late. That is why as much as possible we need to reject import food and instead rely upon local producers for fresh produce, meats and dairy. They are far more reliable than waiting for e-coli infested Mexican lettuce hits the shelves of SaveMart and 100,000 people get sick before anyone notices where the sickness came from...The 100 mile diet is a good philosophy but eh 10 mile, or 25 mile diet is even better...even if it costs us a bit more...

You are still too deep in the thicket to understand. Tax free status is not given to them. The Crown and the government cannot impose taxes on them because our sovereign of the day, King George III guaranteed their independence and sovereignty from the Crown. Both the High Court of Great Britain and our Supreme Court have ruled that we are responsible to uphold those agreements AND the Proclamation forms a critical part of our constitution. Aboriginal people belong to independent nations we legally have no control over. They own outright or control 80% of the land base Canada lays claim to. In the case of taxes we can no more compel First Nations to pay tax to us - a foreign government - than we can compel American citizens to pay tax to us for the enjoyment of their homes and land. Nor can we control Americans or require permits and licenses when they hunt or fish in the US. There are two streams of scholarly thought in attempting to understand how aboriginal people fit with Canada. One considers that we must recognize their rights, comply with the law that allows them freedom and autonomy and allow them whatever government and structure they need to form parallel systems of law and order. The second suggests that we must reconcile aboriginal rights and freedoms with ours such that we have to compromise our society to allow them their freedoms, and to negotiate new more modern treaties which provide a place for them under the Canadian constitutional framework. However, the problem in this school of thought is that we can not reconcile our differences unless and until we recognize their rights, freedoms and autonomy. So no matter what we are stuck with having to recognize and educate the general public about the real history that took place in Canada - how Sir John A. McDonald assassinated aboriginal leaders and how the Family Compact movement lied, stole, forged history to suit their own nefarious purposes and set out laws and policies intended to destroy aboriginal people. And we must learn how those policies and laws were carried forward to today and remain relatively untouched both in intention and application. All Canadians must come to understand we have no choice in recognizing or accepting aboriginal rights because we are in their country, their nation and that the Crown and citizenship is only over us and not their land, and not their resources, and not their laws. If we need to reconcile with aboriginal people (after recognition has fully commenced) then I suggest that we migrate to their customs, their forms of government and seek redress as equals under their laws and principles. We would have a far better future planned for us if we did, since their societies are more effective, forgiving and understanding, their government systems more democratic and their rights fully intact since first contact. The government has continued over the decades and centuries to erode our rights and subvert our self-regulation that is a precept of common law, and according to the principles of peace, order, and good government. Our government has resorted to corruption and self-service over the public good. Our institutions are in perpetual failure, not working, poorly managed and grossly expensive and self-indulging. Our infrastructure is slowly eroding away with successive governments passing the buck onto some day in the future. Our corporations are lawless and corrupt stealing from us, and profiting at the expense of low-income and marginalized peoples. The American Revolution, and the American Civil Wars were started for fewer reasons that we have today to toss out government and recreate ourselves as self-realized nation of people. We could accommodate aboriginal people on their terms if only we first understood what those terms were that were entrenched in the Section 25 and 35 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms without having to wait 10 years for each case to reach the Supreme Court of Canada for a ruling. Rather, if we simply asked aboriginal people what the treaties and agreements really meant and qualified it with the history and legal records the government refuses to show us or refuses to acknowledge even exist, I'm sure we could get to the bottom it. (Take for example the Royal Proclamation 1763, which was codification into British statute of all the terms of a number of treaties made with First Nations in the 100 years previous...) There is an "Indian Industry" but neither are native people to blame for it or are they profiting from it. Rather it is an industry filled with colonial lawyers, some claiming to defend native rights and the others claiming to defend the interests of Canada dragging out disagreements that after $100s of millions spent end up at a Supreme Court who is so clouded in their own colonial bias that they will not recognize aboriginal people apart from Canada - using a legal magic to suggest that even though there is no evidence of sovereignty over them, the government and the Crown still hold them as subordinates to the constitution and laws of Canada. So if anyone is going to become incensed, aim it at the government of the day and demand that we stop ignoring our legal duty and find ways to understand and negotiate with aboriginal people to a peaceful end. Because if we don't do that, then we can expect a very tumultuous future and as identified by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, we face a violent and economically disruptive future. [/~Rick Mercer~ styled rant]

Especially enraging since the things she claims never actually happened. Like: Never ever happened. Period. Maybe ask Harper why, after 180 years the Plank Road has not been settled. When the government asked Six Nations to negotiate instead of litigate in 1996 there was a promise they would seriously consider the issue. The Courts have recognized that Six Nations did not surrender the Plank Road, and were prepared to hear the case when the government asked for negotiation. Yet in 11 years very little happened because the government was never ready. So I would agree with your sentiment. How is it that the government can ignore the law to consult, negotiate, accommodate and reconcile for so long and those who stand up to the tyranny of government are criminalized instead? Gary McHale deserved to be arrested. So did all the rest of the yahoos that were disturbing the peace and security of Caledonia. The OPP were upholding the law. The Occupation of DCE in Caledonia was a international dispute and the only role for the OPP was to keep the peace. It wasn't to remove the protesters. Nor was it to arrest those who were protesting and blocking roads. They did what they were required to do and along with Six Nation arrests that were made for a couple of punch-outs there were just as many Caledonia residents who deserved to be arrested as well.

It is all about perspective.... I like farming. I also support cuts to government funding to farms. I don't think that is conflicting. Farms and money....two different things. Farmers who think they are entitled to tax payers money do not earn my respect. There is nothing free or altruistic about such people. Or how about: I like corporations. I also support cuts to government funding to corporations. I don't think that is conflicting. Corporations and money....two different things. Corporatists who think they are entitled to tax payers money do not earn my respect. There is nothing free or democratic about such people. We could go on. But with the Conservatives they prefer to pay their friends and attack their perceived enemies.

Six Nations IS a sovereign independent nation, so yes we should get out of their business. We don't "give" Six Nations billion of dollars. WE OWE Six Nations hundreds of billions on their trust that we hold on their behalf. The fact is that just the interests alone on that trust amounts to more than the entire INAC budget. That's a good point. Hold long can Canada justify living off the avails of stolen land and resources and refuse to comply with the Supreme Law. The Canadian government is bound by the constitution and in fact the is the primary purpose of the constitution - to limit the tyranny of government. This government has ignored the law, and ignore the fact that we do no own the land. Six Nations entire history has always recorded their assertion of sovereignty. The stark reality is they never ever gave up their nationhood, or submitted to Canada. And the assumption they did is nothing more than myth. BTW, that opinion comes from an Assistant Crown Attorney. Personally I think you need an education BUT being as obstinate as you are, an enema would been needed first to clear your mind.

No one is building a wall.... But emergency planning must always consider such scenarios and plan according. Governments don't see the need I'm sure to plan for food issues but they have no problem planning for a nuclear meltdown (and the evacuation of 500,000 residents) of a CANDU reactor with 12 automatic safety shutdown systems, 4 monitoring computers and and 1 in 25,000,000 possibility of ever happening. Do you get where I'm going with this? Food and water are not commodities that we can play with or trade away. They are human necessities that should be entrenched as rights in any law.....meaning access to food and clean water should be guaranteed, complete with back-up systems in the event of a failure. Let's go back to the nuclear stuff, again. Do you realize that about 10 years ago Ontario Power Generation spilled about 5000 gallons of tritiated heavy water into Lake Ontario and never told anyone about it for about 10 hours. The plume of radioactive water by this time had already started to have been taken up by the water treatment plants in Ajax and Whitby and was heading towards water. The problem: there was no action plan - no emergency plan - because no one ever though it would have been a possibility, nor had they considered that the water treatment plants were down current from Pickering GS. That one glitch at Pickering could have affected about 300,000 people in a 10 hour period and the only saving grace is the they managed to get the spill under control and limit the amounts diluted to high but acceptable limits.

The state fully and arbitrarily imposes itself on reserves. It undermines self-government processes and interferes with decisions those at INAC disagree with. The lack of structure and the underground economy are a result of the Indian Act which does not facilitate economic growth and interferes with self-reliance in the ways I mentioned earlier in the thread. Self-government - real self-government - that FN are entitled to is not a government under Canada, but a sovereign government independent of Canada and sovereign over the lands we have no claim to....all those lands which have not been surrendered under the requirement of the Royal Proclamation 1763, and the fruits, and resources therein. The Government of Canada holds a trust for Six Nations that amounts between $200billion and $1trillion in value. If the government were to pay the annual interest owed to Six Nations' trust directly that would amount to between $6 billion and $30 billion annually. What do you think that would do for the Six Nations people? And what do you think Six Nations would say about our constant interference in their affairs keeping in mind that the annual transfers to Six Nations amount to only $100million each year, and that most services are underfunded by over 50% of the costs we pay our cities and towns for the same service? The reality is that economic disruption and interference, poverty and housing underfunding is a weapon used to keep Six Nations people from fully asserting their right to kick out the industry in Southern Ontario and start taxing us for our homes on their land. The reality is that the government won't recognize self-government because it would raise suspicions of the mythical authority they invented over Indians, in order to steal their lands and resources without resistance.

A strike by fuel transportation companies. A fertilizer shortage due to US embargoes. A break-down of the banking and financial system - ie a full blown depression. There are lots of little glitches that could end up having devastating food supply problems.

No. What I am talking about is glitches in our system, with no back-up of critical information or replacements. Try to run a computer network without the kinds of fail-safes we have in our food supply and you could easily bankrupt a billion dollar corporation ins a matter of weeks. We not only have given our food industry over to foreign production but we have surrendered to factory produced foods as well as genetic modification of our most simple staples. All it would take is a glitch and the entire system would begin to fall apart.

You are not honestly that detached from reality to ask such a question.... 80% of our food in Canada is imported from somewhere else. Much of what is produced here is not produced locally and is truck 100's of miles just to make it to the store. Almost 100% of food consumed in the city comes from outside the city and has to be trucked in on a daily basis. If there is just an interruption in the transportation for 3 days, the entire city would be beginning to starve and hoard food. In the rural areas they could fair a bit better, but since the majority of food consumed there still comes from foreign sources the result would be the same. The reality is neither the rural areas or the country as a whole produces enough food to sustain even a fraction of our population, and there isn't enough in natural food sources to sustain large populations. Shut down the internet tomorrow and see how many people would be dead in a month.

Funny thing is there is enough to eat in the backyards of most suburban homes if you have the knowledge. As well things that most people wouldn't touch (like stinging nettle) can be eaten. You just have to know where to find it and how to identify it. Guns are useless as prolonged hunting weapons because they need replenishment of ammunition. With most city folks poor shots how long to you think it would take for them to run out? So, yes survival skills are a good thing but unless you are willing to go into hunter-gatherer mode and spend the rest of your life on the move, understanding that agriculture can be viable in the middle of the forest is a much better arrangement. Plus there is no competition for the same food sources, which will quickly run out with urban pressures on it.

Quote good in my favour. It isn't food I'm hoarding (although we do have our cache), it is knowledge. Like I said most people would die of starvation in a field of cow corn.

Most of the consultants are non-natives. The extent of expertise required to meet INAC criteria for funding often means FN have to shop away from their reserves for consultants. You do understand that the use of consultants is not a FN prerogative? Indian Affairs is to blame for trying to micro-manage reserves from Ottawa. On one reserve I deal with regularly, the school had been without potable water for 2 1/2 years because INAC required consultant after consultant to "study" the problem. IN the end the fix was under $5000. The cost of INAC appointed consultants (because schools are a direct INAC responsibility and not a Band responsibility) was about $75,000. On the same reserve, INAC required a consultant to do energy audits on Band housing to consider upgrades. The cost of the non-native consultants was about $100k. The energy auditor recommended certain upgrades like changing windows and doors, which when put to tender amounted to about $800,000 for 100 houses (about $8k per house). Based on oil and gas prices, the net savings in energy for each of those house would be about $40 per year. INAC paid the whole shot, with no cost to the Band. INAC programs are not controlled by FN. While the money flows through a Band they cannot divert it or amend the funding. They only have the choice of accepting it or refusing it,that's all.

I am ready and set for such an outcome, as well as my children. The problem is that 80% of the city people would die a slow starvation death while standing in the middle of a corn field. They haven't a clue.

Then again, maybe you just got taken in by the hype and propaganda of someone whose sensationalism adds to her profits?

I wanted to expand a bit on the sui generis of aboriginal title. According to Justice Lamer of the Supreme Court of Canada aboriginal title can be view in this way. DELGAMUUKW v. BRITISH COLUMBIA Lamer C.J. identified the sui generis [i.e., unique] nature of Aboriginal title as the unifying principle underlying its various dimensions. These are: • inalienability, in that lands held pursuant to Aboriginal title may be transferred or surrendered only to the Crown: this does not mean, however, that Aboriginal title "is a non-proprietary interest which amounts to no more than a licence to use and occupy the land and cannot compete on an equal footing with other proprietary interests" (par. 113); • source, in that Aboriginal title arises from (1) occupation of Canada by Aboriginal peoples prior to the Royal Proclamation of 1763: under common law principles, the physical fact of occupation is proof of possession in law; and (2) the relationship between common law and pre-existing systems of Aboriginal law; • communal nature, in that Aboriginal title is a collective right to land held by all members of an Aboriginal nation. These features cannot be explained fully under either common law rules of real property, or property rules of Aboriginal legal systems. Inalienability. This means that title cannot be usurped by law, or by agreements or treaties that do not meet the tests set out by the Court for a surrender. That provides that where there has been no surrender, as stated by the British High Court, that title is superior to all others, and the "fruits of the land" belong to native people. Source. This means that the only test required to determine if aboriginal title is superior is to establish that a particular group occupied and used the territory when the Royal Proclamation 1763 was made. There is no need for other proof, or argument that a particular band may have re-settled before that. Communal in nature. This means that aboriginal groups have a personal and usufructary right to the land and resources, and that no surrender could be held valid unless there was full consent from all members of the band. The fact that not only the British High Court, or the Supreme Court recognize this usufrutary right both before and after surrender treaties, but it also means that title to the land is never severed. Only the ~some~ use of land - part of the usufruct - is surrendered, and not the land itself. This is an important fact, since there are many cases where territories overlapped. It seems that the Court realizes that it could not obtain title to land when the aboriginal title was also held in common (in communion) with other aboriginal groups. Thus when it comes to harvesting, resources or extended use of lands such as industrial development aboriginal people may very well have a say in how that evolves even where a treaty by one group surrendered some of their rights to the land. Now back to Caledonia..... There have been a number of assertions - legal magic - which people claim were indications that Six Nations has no right to stop development in the Haldimand. Let's first be clear: Six Nations has never surrendered their rights or made a treaty for lands in all of southern Ontario that the Crown recognized under the Royal Proclamation 1763. Fact. And when the Crown met with the Mississauga and Six Nations at Burlington to discuss the Haldimand Tract settlement, it neither met the prerequisites for a bona fide surrender, nor could the Mississauga have surrendered Six Nations' aboriginal title to any part of Six Nations. So the meeting was for ~something~ else, other than a surrender. The Proclamation 1763 required a surrender of the aboriginal usufruct in order to settle upon or occupy any part of a territory. That cannot mean that the Crown can seek only the surrender from one nation when there are many more competing interests in the land. Rather for a surrender to be held valid it must include all nations who held occupancy both at the time of the Proclamation and at the time of the proposed treaties. So it is clear that Six Nations hold superior title to all of southern Ontario. So the Plank Road surrender having not met the burden required for surrender cannot be valid. And as Caledonia (as well as Brantford, Toronto, Ottawa and all other places between) sits on Six Nations territory, no development can take place unless Six Nations agrees to it. That also means that if they have a requirement for fees or any other conditions to be met, then there is no choice. Six Nations protesters lawfully stopped development of DCE and reclaimed it as their own. End of story.

You majored in 'Ignorance" in college, didn't you..... Eghhhhhhhhh. Wrong. The Plank Road claim goes back to 1842 when the colonial government first came to Six Nations requesting that they allow the government to put a road - the Plank Road - through their territory. The government said it had to be surrendered. Six Nations refused and instead agreed to lease the land and the 1 mile on either side for merchant purposes. By 1844 the Indian Agent had a signed agreement in his hand saying that Six Nations had surrender the land, even though the document only contained 20 of the requisite 50 Chiefs signatures (and of the 20 only a handful were actually chiefs). Six Nations objected and by 1855 had sent a letter to the government saying they had never intended to sell the land and that any agreement made was thereby rescinded. The purported surrender does not meet the test set out by the Supreme Court to qualify as a surrender. So there this is a land dispute - one that is nearly 175 years old. The title for all of southern Ontario was recognized by the Crown in 1701 when Six Nations surrender a portion of their lands south of the Great Lakes to Great Britain in the Nafan Treaty. This also was a recognition that their lands north of the Great Lakes (which according to archaeology had been occupied for about 1000 years by Confederacy Iroquois). By 1757 Six Nations sovereignty was recognized on the Mitchell Map as being south of the Ottawa River and Nippissing, west to Lake Huron, east to Montreal and south to Lakes Ontario and Erie. In 1763 the Royal Proclamation identified this territory as Indian Lands - reserved for them exclusively where settlement and use was prohibited. No where since 1763 have the lands been surrendered. Your dumb degree goes with an ignorance major, I guess.... Hyperbole and outright bulls@it. All natives are sovereign and have never capitulated to the Crown. Nor under international law toady or then could one nation assumed jurisdiction over another. The Crown uses "legal magic" to support their claim sovereignty. It doesn't exist. Canada has no sovereignty to land. All land has an underlying aboriginal title and is a plenum dominium until it is surrendered. Even still the SCoC has stated that aboriginal title is sui generis, not understood under common law and according to the British High Court in 1940 is a title superior to all else. Next time you are at the res make sure you take someone smart along with you. You'll need it to communicate with superior beings.

If you joined an Indian Tribe you would have property rights, since such things are not only guaranteed in their Constitution, but their aboriginal and land title rights are entrenched in our Constitution, as well. Prior to about 190 years ago, settlers enjoyed those rights - the rights to use and occupy a parcel of land, and to freely earn a reasonable living off that land, and the common lands reserved for Indians. However just about 190 years ago the Family Compact movement was born and in its attempts to subvert government and law and turn it to their advantage, they rewrote history to suit their agenda, and created laws that seriously limited the rights - including property rights- in order to maximize a few elitist's profits. Thus we have a Victorian era that in history show a distinct change not only in the way government dealt with Indians, but in the way settlers were treated. By removing rights and placing the control of settlers in the approval of the government oligarchy they were able to steal land and resources uncontested. And when someone like Louis Riel stood up to them, as a leader of a foreign nation resisting their expansion into Manitoba, he was assassinated (well actually he was tried and hung for treason, which not being a Canadian citizen makes it an assassination). The parallels between the Family Compact movement and the Conservative / Reform agenda is staggering. Harper is doing no less than Sir John A. McDonald did in killing, and ignoring rights of citizens to further his own selfish agenda.

Just like in Caledonia the railroad was correctly targeted, not by Shawn Brant but by a hoard of about 50 protesters from Tyendinaga. The CN was so mad that they tried to sue Shawn Brant and the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte Band Council for the loss of revenue...$300 million I believe....but ended up withdrawing it when they realized that natives can't be sued and collected from. The fact is that Shawn Brant was not a leader nor was he responsible for the 50 or so protesters. He was merely the spokesperson for them. That is clearly evident in the testimony and copies of the illegal wiretap recordings played in court at their trials - which by the way was conditionally discharged because they were exercising their rights on their own Mohawk Territory. So Bill, your anger and resentment is displaced. The protesters were in the right according to the court. Now the reality in Caledonia is that citizens were not "targeted" as your myth-making suggests. Rather they injected themselves between a lawful exercise of proprietary estoppel. And even after the police made a failed attempt to serve an illegal injunction, the protesters created a safety line and even a buffer zone between them and the residents and set up security patrols to monitor them. But what happened next was that some boneheads from Caledonia decided the protesters had no right and tried to take the law into their own hands, by attempting to move inside the police and protester boundaries they set up. There were rallies as an weekly event for no other purpose but to raise tensions. There were cases were people from the reserve were harassed and assaulted as they attempted to go to town for supplies. There were golf balls hit at protesters from the backyards of those same residents where Six Nations protesters agreed to maintain a buffer zone. Clearly, Caledonia residents injected themselves into the foray in every attempt to create violence and mayhem, which the police had to intervene. Last of all we have Gary McHale who brings in 30 or 40 skinheads into the peaceful community for no other reason but to get a pound of flesh. Do you think that McHale, and Vandermaas came there for Sunday tea? Of course not. Like a pair of frenzied squirrels at a peanut harvest they incited people to violence. However, once it got out what these two nefarious white supremacists were up to, their support quickly dwindled, and people started to go home. And things started to calm down. Caledonia still suffers from their support for Gary McHale as many Six Nations people continue to refuse to shop there. Even you cannot ignore or dismiss the claims. Six Nations has been on record for over 150 years that the Plank Road claim was invalid and I can't believe how conveniently you skipped over that fact while selectively reading the media. And it is the government continuing to ignore land claims and aboriginal rights that is at the centre of every native protest. So what if some Caledonians had to travel another 6 minutes around the by-pass to go to work. So what if a few Caledonians had to look at some lights at night, or the police line in the morning. That is the nature of protest - someone gets put out for a just cause. It truly was a tragedy that anyone on either side got punched out when anger and tensions rose. However, that is nothing new after the Friday night punch-outs that regularly occurred in the bars around town. I have even less sympathy for someone who lies about it. Your anger and disillusionment is of no concern here. The problem isn't the protest or their methods and tactics. The real problem lies in your inability to separate fact from fantasy and then your getting incensed at things that never happened. Instead of lowering yourself to the likes of Gary McHale and Mark Vandermaas I suggest that you stop relying on sensational crap like Blatchford is trying to sell and do some thorough research on the history of the claims and the actions that have been ignored over the last 200 years. It is a hell of a lot more interesting than that self-pity and consternation you are trying to portray.