Edward Danziger author & professor; Paul Williams Unions of Ontario Indians; Tape 1, Treaty 1954; Sept 29, 1979

OK at this point of today Speaker he is a professor of history author of I'm sure correct me if I'm wrong the chip was on Lake Superior. At Bowling Green Ohio. Edmund then and there. As a non-Indian person I feel not only very pleased but very honored to be invited this weekend to share this celebration with you and I hope. To make some pertinent and interesting remarks in my book on the Chippewa of Lake Superior. I took the year 1854 as what I thought was the turning point. One of the major turning points in the history of the Chippewa Indian people. The year 1854 I'd like to focus back on today and to try to fit what happened in that year in historical perspective. And

again I hope that my comments will be useful to you. As a way of perhaps adding a little bit of a dimension to the celebration this weekend. Turning back the clock one hundred and twenty five years. We find the Chippewa people faced the removal pressures which were mentioned a little while ago which up rooted dozens and dozens of woodland tribes from east of the Mississippi to areas beyond the Father of Waters. Historians in the United States today are just beginning to realize the large number of Indian Graves upon which flourished the famous age of Andrew Jackson in the 1830s and 1840s. The remove all and the resettlement of some of the Southern Indian tribes for example ripped apart tribes and killed something like thirty

thousand Indian people. Of the approximately 100000 Eastern woodland Indians who were removed. To reservations west of the Mississippi between eight hundred twenty four and eight hundred forty four. One fourth to one third of those Indians died on the way or shortly there after. Many of the white people. Living east of the Mississippi River are looked upon Indian Removal as the final solution. To the so-called Indian problem. Chippewa people in this part of the country were very very fearful and concerned that the same thing was going to happen to them. In the treaties of 1837 and 1840 to Indian lands and central Minnesota northern and central Wisconsin

and northern Michigan were sold to Uncle Sam. However the Mississippi River Chippewa bands on the Lake Superior bands retain the right to remain temporarily in the ceded area at the pleasure of the president. Then in the late 1840s the Indian bureau began to put pressure on the Chippewa bands in this area to move west either north into Canada or west to the northern plains. Tribal leaders we know from comments that were made in letters sent off to Washington were very fearful claiming that removal to Canada or West among the Plains tribes was tantamount to a death sentence for Chippewa people. Others who oppose the removal of the Chippewa people in the 1840s and early 1850s included some of their non Indian friends.

So it's as Leonard wheeler from Dana who was supported during that time by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions a congregational Presbyterian group headquartered in Boston. They maintained a mission station at the Dana. They didn't want to lose all of the not only the physical property which they had there but they were very concerned about the welfare of Chippewa people. They emphasized to you in the correspondence objecting to removal pressures that many of the white people living in the SHU Amadan Bay Area also were opposed to removing their Chippewa friends. So my point is that not only were the Indians fearful but they had many white friends in this area who were also opposed to there being a prude Among these were the legislature of the state of Michigan which in 1853 said a joint resolution to Washington asking

that many of the Chippewa people not be sent off. In eighteen fifty three. The Indian agent Henry S. Gilbert Warner Washington that the Indians quote will sooner submit to extermination than comply unquote with removal. So the Indian people from this area and their white friends really began to dig in their heels and put pressure on Washington not to remove them indeed. An Indian delegation which has been mentioned already this afternoon went to Washington in 1850 to visit President Millard Filmore in Washington. And finally convinced him not to push Chippewa removal and so plans could best be laid for the famous LaPointe gathering across the bay at Madeline Island.

But it must be underscored I think in order to understand the significance of that treaty as it fits in the broader story of this nation that what happened in 1854 was an exception. But it was really a reversal of what Washington had planned for the Chippewa people. Washington also had a plan by the way that the Indians all be concentrated on one or at the most two reserves that not the scattering of Tahn that was mentioned in the treaty that eventually worked its way out. Most of the tribes in the United eastern part of the United States who dug in their heels and tried to fight to prevent removal failed. Even the Cherokee Indians who waged one of the most famous battles of all and actually won a Supreme Court decision Chief John Marshall said they what they were to be protected in Georgia. But Andrew Jackson refused to carry out that decision. So what happened to the Chippewa was very unusual.

Well why were the Chippewa people so successful and maintaining a portion of their homeland compared with some of the other tribes. Well my feelings are and of course I would be happy to have your opinion and also challenges or additions to this reading of the record that I have but my feeling is that unlike many of the other Indian tribes in the eastern part of the United States the Chippewa were not known to the people living in this area as having fought generation upon generation of bloody wars against the advancing white people they had a very very close relationship with the French which has already been mentioned they played a very intricate part so there wasn't this history in this area of strong anti indian feeling an anti-white feeling on both sides it was much more cooperation among the races than was to be found in other areas.

So far as I can tell so local whites from week as we can read from the record were not constantly bombarding Washington with letters to get rid of the Chippewa as opposed to that as I've mentioned many of the whites fought to help keep the Chippewa in this area. So there were at least one hundred and fifty years of a close working relationship with the sort of business relationships that Mr Hall is talking about between the Chippewa and their white Indian neighbors. Finally in the 1850s at least we did not have the situation here that was the case down in the Cherokee country. There was later to be the case in the Sioux lands in the western Dakotas and also at a nose pers country whereby rich mineral deposits were found right smack in the middle of Indian country. To be sure there was some copper mining going on here in the 19th century but not the gold discoveries that help to drive out Cherokee and the Sioux and the

purse. So there wasn't any gold fever at work and in fact most bureaucrats didn't appreciate how valuable this country was in the 1850s this too helps to explain why the Chippewa were permitted to stay. The treaty of 1854 I'm sure you're all familiar with maybe it's a just a couple of words about the negotiations and what happened to refresh. Perhaps one or two memories in this room. It was negotiated on behalf of the United States government by Agent Gilbert who I mentioned before who travelled up here from Detroit which was headquarters for the Makah Indian Agency which embrace all of the Michigan Indians as well as those living around Lake Superior. He was met here by Agent David Harriman who came over from Minnesota bringing along some of the Chippewa bands living along the Mississippi River in central Minnesota

who together with the Lake Superior bands jointly had seeded this area. The clear geographic divisions between them were not yet clear and so they were both represented. Negotiations opened in September of 1854 in the middle of the month. As you recall the point across the bay here had been a focal point for white settlement on Lake Superior and for the fur trade for many many years it was an appropriate place for the Treaty Council to occur according to the records about 400 people lived in the town and houses scattered along Front Street I assume there still was a Front Street in the town of the point. Other prominent structures in the town of the point included Julius Austrians door two churches a hotel and some of the remnants of the American Fur Company complex a long period of big red warehouse

and several other structures for storing for. The government. Agents and their interpreters were met on the island with approximately 4000 by approximately 4000 Indian head men and their followers. So this was a gigantic gathering and were celebrating the 100 25th anniversary of thousands and thousands of Chippewa people from all over northern Michigan Wisconsin and Minnesota were gathered across in the point one hundred twenty five years ago today. They were cared for during this two week period and so forth subsidized subsisted by the agents of the federal government who spent several thousand dollars during that two week period. What the government was after primarily in calling this treaty worthy mineral lands on the north shore of Lake Superior.

The Arrowhead region of Minnesota that's why they call the Indians together this time as well as so many other times they want something. They realize however that in return they were going to have to give up something to the Indians and they didn't want to have to give up very much. As it turned out however the Indians felt so strongly about remaining in their homeland and having many reservations at specific areas as they are today that the government agents wrote to Washington. We simply cannot have a treaty unless we accede to their demands. So the Indians were standing forthright in their refusal to give up this country. And so one hundred and twenty five years ago today the two Indian agents from Minnesota and from Detroit succeeded to the Indian. Demands and agreed to these reservations and they purchased in the process

that part of northeastern Minnesota also the Chippewa from this area and the Chippewa from Minnesota came to an agreement as to where their eastern and western boundary was somewhere just west of Duluth. They came to an agreement on dividing up the annuity payments from the Treaty of eight hundred thirty seven and forty two. The president of the United States was given the right which he later followed through allotting Indian reservations and during the late nineteenth century as you all know this happened but the right to a lot Indian reservations was established in the Treaty of eighteen fifty four into 80 acre parcels. The annuity schedule for the sale of the lands on the North Shore was agreed to and for the 20 years following the treaty of 1850 for these annuity monies were parceled out. This included coins but also

agricultural implements and so forth and so on September 30th 1850 for one hundred twenty five years ago. Sunday. After nearly two weeks of bargaining over endless issues 85 Chippewa chiefs and head men gathered on the lawn of the Charles Oaks house in downtown the point on Front Street and formally endorse the treaty. A few months later the treaty was accepted by the United States Senate and President Pierce proclaimed the treaty and late January 18 55 and it officially became a covenant between Chippewa people and the federal government. I'd like to say something first about the Treaty of 1854 as general significance before again saying a few

words about my judgement on its significance for Indian people. Obviously you Indian people gathered here have your own points of view and I have heard some of them already and I'd be happy of course to share additional ones later on. I think it's appropriate that non Indian people be not only invited here today and over the weekend but also attend. There ought to be in fact as many non Indian people here as Indian people in the sense that this treaty was of crucial significance to the development of the whole Lake Superior region. It isn't just of significance to Indian people. For example the whole North Shore economic boom which was still going was made possible by the sale of the North Shore mineral range by Chippewa people. And all of those or boats still passing back and forth around the lakes today. I come from Ohio and they still pour into Cleveland and Toledo and

in the lower lake ports that was all stemming from this treaty and the opening up of this area. Secondly valuable pine temblor land was opened up by this treaty and the lumber industry had its foundation laid up here. During this time. Also let's look at the role which was played by has been played by Indian people over the last hundred years Suppose they had been removed from this area there were had there had been no Indians here over the last 25 years. Hundred in 25 years how history would have changed just a couple of examples one would be in the area of economics. The fact that the Indians remained in this area were not removed meant that they could play a valuable and very very important role in the history of lumber in this area not only selling the temper off of their reserves but also if you read the records of

corporations from this area how many Indians worked on the crews over the years they worked on Lake shipping vessels. They worked in the mines in this area. They worked on railroad construction crews. They worked in fishing fleets they provided a very very crucial labor knowledgeable labor force for the development of this whole area. Chippewa residents have also proven to be very important in the attracting of tourist dollars to this area. Chippewa people have also been to a degree successful and very important in bringing in federal and state programs and dollars to this area. They have provided a cultural and Richmond and addition to this area which makes it a much more beautiful and richer place to live as a result they've been good neighbors I would contend. I went through the records of the CCC Indian Division during the

1930s and read about all the work that Indian people did in the forests around this area and on their own reserves. I've read through many of the military records from World War 2 and read about the record rate of volunteers for the fighting forces the amount of bumper crops which were raised in this area on Indian reservations during the war. The work that Indian people did over here at superior in the boat yards and so for the endian people from this area led the way statistically in terms of the percentage of volunteers and support in the war effort during World War 2. So I would contend that the keeping of Indian people here in this area ought to be a source of celebration for the non Indian people. For the non Indian neighbors of these reservations during this week and I hope many area non Indian residents recognise this and will come to help you celebrate.

Well why do I think the treaty of 1854 was so significant in the history of Indian people from this area. Aside from the obvious ones that we're all familiar with. First of all looking back at what happened before 18 54 I think one can say eight hundred fifty four marks a turning point in the sense that it was an end of an era of relative freedom for Indian people. On the in the Lake Superior country. Prior to 1850 for the Indians It had a great deal of freedom in their relationship with a white man in the sense that. They are engaging in the fur trade gave them the freedom to select that which they want to from the white man's way of life. And they selected

quite a bit to be sure there was a a revolution in the material culture of the Indian people according to the records of observers during the 18th and 19th century. The Indian people were quick to accept the white man's tools and weapons and so forth. And yet we also know from the records of this period that the Indian culture had maintained itself to a large degree Indian language and lifestyles and so forth. So the fur trade prior to 1854 and also the activities of the Indian bureau and the missionaries like Leonard Wheeler although they had had some impact in the Ashland area. And at Grand Portage and over a key one off day they had just be gone a very modest modification of Indian life. So the year 1854. Was a period in

which Indian people were still in many many ways living their traditional lives as they had for hundreds and hundreds of years before they had a close working relationship with area white neighbors. And but this was to and to a large degree in the year 1854. Because even though in some ways the Indian leaders who signed the treaty had a right to be optimistic and hopeful some things began in 1854 which meant that the Indian people in my judgment were entering a new era. By. Confiding themselves or concentrating themselves on these reservations although in some ways they were fortunate to have been not the victims of removal that other tribes face they became much more vulnerable to what has been. We can see the major theme

in Indian white relations over the last century and that has been the fact that once the federal government got Indian people located on reserves a new type of warfare began. That was cultural warfare. The official policy of the federal government was to destroy Indian culture. To divide up the reservations into individual family allotments. To drag the children off to boarding schools away from the unfortunate influence of their parents and to beat the Indian culture out of them in some cases the change them into little brown faced white men who would go back and farm their plots of land be self-sufficient economically as farmers no longer hunters gathers fisherman to be self-sufficient and also to be. Christianize so Christianization and civilization was the official goal

of the federal government. And up until the mid 20th century this was the policy of cultural warfare which was waged on Chippewa people and they were beginning in 1854 much more vulnerable to this sort of thing than ever before. And the records of the Indian bureau from each of the reservations around here show what a vicious. Attack this was. And so Chippewa people who prior to 1854 had the luxury of accepting what they wanted from the white man drifting away when they didn't like it. We're now kind of in some ways boxed in even though they weren't forced to live on their reserves to be sure. In many ways by the end of the 19th century. They were boxed in on those reservations. Let's look at what happened just two examples in the realm of economics and in the realm of education. What happened to

Chippewa people over the last century on these reservations. With their being forced to live on the reservations after 1854 with Indian police and other federal agents putting pressure on them to live there so they could not follow the traditional way of life. For the first 20 years they were very very dependent upon the annuity payments which came out of the Treaty of 1850 for when these lapsed in the mid 1870s there was kind of an economic crisis. And it was at this point that the government in order to generate some new income for Indian people and to get them on the road toward farming began to encourage allotment of Indian land reservation land carving up the reservations into the 80 acre allotments which has caused untold headaches over the last century for

those trying to get control of those 80 acre plots so that they could develop them. The land was a lot of it and then under the paternalistic leadership of the Bureau of Indian Affairs logging teams were brought in and the Indians were allowed to sell off the timber from the allotments and places like Dana had sawmills going day and night around the clock for 20 or 30 years you were never out of the sound of screeching sawmills again along the lines of federal paternalism and Uncle Sam over on the Potomac knows what's best for the Indians out here in Wisconsin. When the land was a lot of good and the temblor sold off the Indians were not allowed to have control of that money. The Bureau of Indian Affairs Indian agent kept control of that money and an Indian had to apply to the Indian bureau for permission to use his own money that he got from his allotment. Farming once the pine trees were lobbed off and

the stumps were grubbed the federal government pushed farming very heavily in the early 20th century there were mobs of farms over and over Dana and there were train loads of people going out of Ashland each summer for the big agricultural fairs over and over Dana. They were model farms there and many of them seemed to be flourishing until the Depression came along. Unsuccessful farming efforts limited jobs off of the reservation dominance of tribal economic affairs by white bureaucrats by white tourists and white businessman. Led by the mid 20th century to a great deal of poverty and high unemployment on reservations throughout the Great Lakes country. So Economic Affairs up until just about 10 years ago was the story again of

Washington deciding what was best for Chippewa people in the next. To the extent that they were on reservations easily manipulable Uncle Sam could send out his Indian agents and force upon Indian people these policies. We can also see this in the realm of education where Indian children were taken off to boarding schools or Indian children were sent off to day schools where people from the federal government decided what was best for Indian children to learn the sort of Indian feedback our Indian cooperative programs which have developed in the 1970s were unique. In the 70s for 100 and so years prior to that Indian people were not consulted by educators about what they would like their children to learn. And as a result one reads reports from school officials over the last century about the high Indian dropout rate.

It's interesting when one talks Indian people they refer to it as a push out rate being pushed out of school by conditions they don't like dropout rate however is something that's gotten into the state and federal jargon but irregular attendance high dropout rate and relatively low scholastic achievement was something that was complained about by schoolteachers in the 1870s in the 1890s in the 1920s in the 1940s and in the 1960s and finally this culminated with the famous Kennedy report on Indian education across the country in 1969 which triggered congressional interest in and eventually the passage of the two Indian Education acts in the 1970s. But this sort of character unfortunate heritage in education and economic development comes from is one of say the bitter harvest of the

Treaty of 1854. I also in the book which I wrote traced to what happened in terms of federal programs in areas of housing and health federal dominance of political life again prior to the 20th century. Eighty eight point nine FM service of the Public Broadcasting Corporation is proud to present this series on the Treaty of 1854. So I second significance I think of the Treaty of 1854 when we look back at one hundred twenty five years is that it made Indian people in this area very vulnerable to as Indians were around the country vulnerable to this sort of cultural warfare which the federal government waged for over a century.

And third significance of the Treaty of 1854 in my judgment is that it has left many questions unanswered much like the Constitution of the United States we have to call in the courts to try to find out what the Founding Fathers meant when they wrote the Constitution. Indian people and others have to go to the courts today to find out what was meant by a particular vague phrase in the Treaty of 1850 form. For example. The state of Wisconsin concent is currently at loggerheads with people from the coup de re about the meaning of the Treaty of fifty four hours. Statements about. Or non statements really about who controls the riverbeds of navigable waters on the couter a reservation. The question is does the state or the tribe have exclusive jurisdiction to

regulate non-Indian hunting and fishing activities on navigable waters located in the vicinity of the reservation. This is a question which is in the courts of the state of Wisconsin today. The question is going to be resolved ultimately when a judge or somebody figures out what did the people who signed the treaty over there a hundred twenty five years ago have in their mind at the time about this issue. What about the legal status of the people over at Waters meet. I got a call from Tom Smithson about a week ago asking me to do some work in that in that in that order provides on the store information in order to get federal recognition of for that group. And this is again one of another holdover question that comes out of the Treaty of 1854 So it does have significance for Indian people and non Indian people.

One hundred and twenty five years later and again I think it speaks well to a gathering like this and a refocusing of attention on such a momentous document. A final reason I think for focusing on the 1854 treaty again in my judgment. Is what it can tell us about Chippewa people personally and as groups over the last century and a quarter about the remarkable persistence of their cultural and personality characteristics. About the ethnic identity of Chippewa people in the face of white conquest. And one hundred and twenty five years of coercive acculturation one hundred twenty five years of cultural warfare. Being waged against them. Indeed I've written in my book the resistant remnants of a tattered culture have assumed great importance lately. They are now the firm

foundation upon which rests the plans of present day tribal leaders for economic development better living conditions a more efficient delivery of health services cross-cultural education for all ages and self-government. Anthropologists today are still going around scratching their heads when they read about this federal cultural warfare they still cannot understand how Indian people survived. If you look at the the living conditions and the health situation on these reserves at the turn of the century the extent of overcrowded housing smallpox tuberculosis and the rest you wonder how they survived physically. One is amazed at how Indian culture has survived at all in the face of everything from brain washing to physical beatings. So I think this is something else that one needs to think about one hundred twenty five years later a Chippewa people were kind of

set up for this new policy by the Treaty of 1854. But the fact that they have emerged in many ways victorious despite it all is a great source for pride. I should think. Chippewa people to look. Maybe for a minute the future Chippewa people cannot succeed in the future without I believe turning once again to their friends. The same sort of friends they have one hundred twenty five years ago who helped them to retain much of their ancestral land. The American Indian policy review commission which was established by Congress to study Indian Affairs in the 20th century it was an Indian staffed Research Group reported to Congress two years ago. That the central question is is the American nation now 200 years old one hundred years beyond the Little

Big Horn. And we might add today one hundred and twenty five years beyond the LaPointe document yet mature enough and secure enough to tolerate even to encourage within the larger culture societies of Indian people who wish to maintain their own unique tribal governments cultures and religions. All I can say today is I sure hope so. And thank you very much for inviting me to speak. Thank you. Thank you Mr Danziger. We began. This past summer to try and plan for that event. And what we intended to do was to provide an atmosphere and provide a reason for people to come back to that sacred Island.

In the process of doing that we found out we needed many more things about the reasons for going back. The reasons for gathering on that island so thus we have. A. Treaty we can instead of just a celebration of the actual signing. On September 30th. Yesterday again we did historical culture today the focus is on the legal and contemporary implications. And ass backs and probably even the future. With regard to the LaPointe document. The treaty of 54 and hopefully looking at some of the other documents that we find ourselves living under. We are a nation. We have always been. We are on. In a legal sense. The western hemisphere. We had all of the attributes the full complement.

Of a society and of a nation. We are recognized by international law as having sovereign powers as a sovereign people. And we had rights to give away. So when people talk about treaty rights. Let it be understood clearly that treaty rights are rights given by. Indian people to non Indian people. We gave the right to explore expand and exploit North America and South America. We had those rights. We gave the right for timber and mineral resources. We we had all of those rights we gave those out that is a knowledge by international law. It's acknowledged by the Constitution of the United States when we defend our understandings and our perceptions and our rights that we didn't give up which was self-government and other specific rights like hunting and fishing. We defend the no solemn binding agreements between the United States. Its

constitution and the constitutions and the precepts and the ideals. Of the sovereign nations and in this case the Ojibway nation. We gave up many rights the last giving up occurred on Madeline Island at a low point in eighteen. Fifty four. We have knowledge in 1842. That the United States. Perceive that they get that they got 19 million acres of land the tribal people didn't believe that. Historical documentation indicates that that they thought they gave up two types of rights hunting rights. Excuse me mineral rights and timber rights under the treaty of 1840 to over 19 million acres of land. After that treaty was signed in 1840 to. The

president of the United States issued to remove the order. Told the tribes that they could no longer be in the homelands. They have always lived in. And. Refused to pay. For the mineral rights and timber rights that they usually did on Madeline Island that LaPointe and thus told the people that they would have to go to northern northwestern Minnesota as we know it in order to receive the payments for those rights that they gave up. At that time they were told that. They would no longer be able to live in their homeland they asked why they said because you signed the treaty of 1842 in which you did you ceded that territory they said we didn't think we did. They held a war council on the St. Louis river in Fond du Lac. And as was stated yesterday. Looking at the practical

realities of survival they decided that negotiation was better than extermination. As a result of that negotiation they travel to Washington D.C. In 1852 got an audience with the president of the United States who rescinded the removal order. They in turn acknowledged that land session of 1842. Which resulted in the creation of the reservations as we know them today. It also though resulted in other things and it also validated other things the treaty of 1840 to validate the adroit for self-government the right to hunt and fish and survive in the traditional homelands. We will have people here today talking about some of the legal understanding's of that some of the political implications of that. We hope.

That we yesterday and today will draw a broad and clear understanding as to why we're celebrating or commemorating that anniversary date. It in many ways is a vision a dream but most importantly. It shows the foresight of the people at that time to hand down a legacy if not the entire sovereignty rights issues that we had held at one time. They have given us a legacy and I'm proud to be here as a member of the Redcliffe. To be part of that living legacy. And I hope that the responsibilities of ourselves our fellow tribal. People. And those of the people who are working for us. Will continue to understand and share and support the handing down of that legacy in the years to come. At this time I would like to. Begin.

The afternoons program by. Having. A friend from across the lake. Open up as we did yesterday with Basil Johnston. Open up and begin talking about his perceptions the perceptions that are talked about. Across the lake. As they relate as the impact upon. The nation on the other side of that lake. He is a he is an attorney he works in research and writes with the union of Ontario Indians. Who represent 50 bands. In the province of Ontario. Within those boundaries. And like to call upon him to begin this afternoon's proceedings Paul Williams. I guess when you talk about a treaty you're really talking about a number of different things. And when we talk about the first treaties we don't go back to

1854. We don't go back to the. Seventeen hundreds we go back to the sixteen hundreds. And when you look at what happened here in 1854. In Ontario there was a treaty in 1854 too and it's much the same. It just says we the Indians give up so much land what you're going to sell. And we keep. These little pieces of land for ourselves. And you're going to give us so much money. And that's about it. Well that's one kind of treaty that's just a real estate deal and a lot of ways. And the fact that the Ojibway people have survived so many of those real estate deals. Is. A remarkable thing in itself. But the earliest treaties on both sides of the lake. And people here didn't just have treaties with the United States people here had treaties with Britain.

With the French some contact with the Dutch with the Spanish. Those treaties don't read like real estate deals. I'll give you an example. From this book which is treaties and agreements of the Chippewa Indians and it starts in 1785. This is only treaties and agreements with the United States but it starts off saying. The Indian nations do acknowledge themselves and all their tribes to be under the protection of the United States and no other suffering whatsoever. The boundary lines between the United States and the Indian nations shall begin at such and such a place. We're talking about separate nations and they're talking about a relationship of protection. And. If you go back a little further we have something. Which no doubt you've heard too. Sometimes we call it speech one a where an Indian politician gets up and says once all this

great land was ours and we gave it to you. In exchange for certain promises and you owe us protection from now on. Well in a lot of ways that's exactly what happened that two nations deliberately got into an a relationship. Where the strong one would protect the weak one. And originally the strong one was the Indian nation and gradually as more boat people came over. The relationship became one of the United States or Britain or of Canada protecting the Indian nation. And only much later as settlers moved further and further west and people get into these real estate deals. The original treaty was an agreement between two nations sometimes to live together. Sometimes one nation would agree to let the other nation take over. Control of. Trade. Or control of. A criminal jurisdiction. But none of these Indian nations ever said we agree

we're never going to be a nation anymore. We give up our nationhood. They never said that. And when we look at treaties on the other side of the lake. We have those two kinds too we have the kind where there's a deal between two nations on how they're going to live together. And then we have the later kind which is a deal involving real estate will give you so much land. You give us so much money. And you leave us with so much. And a lot of times on. The other side of the lake the judges keep talking about were the Indians given. Fishing rights by this treaty. And we have a heck of a time saying no no the fishing rights were there to start with. The treaty didn't deal with fishing rights that means they weren't given up. If I make a deal with somebody to sell in my house. And two years later he says I've got your car too because you didn't say you were keeping it.

That's the same kind of reasoning that's involved. And having made this distinction between the two kinds of treaties between the real estate deal and the international. Relationship. We go a little bit further and we look at what do those treaties mean today. And on the other side of the lake I guess we're a little bit lucky because the Canadian government has broken very many of the few promises it made. In the real estate deals. And in the original relationship deals. And we're using. Those broken promises. As building blocks for a future. What's. Probably the next. Year or so. They're going to be over 22 million acres of Ontario under some form of Indian land claim.

That's a lot of land and people. In this country when you talk about Indian land claims you say. Do the Indians want all that land. There's a problem of interpreting to judges and to Moyers and to virtually anybody what people meant in 1054. Or 1785 or 16th 64 sixteen or nine or however far you want to go back. The courts in the states have a rule that you interpret a treaty the way the Indians would have understood it. The courts in Canada don't have that rule. They interpret the treaty whatever way they want to in a lot of ways. And that's another reason we stay out of court. But I said that what we're using the treaties for today is not for what they say. But for what they're going to build for the future and what they're building for the future what these claims are going to end up with we hope. Is enough land. Because if you look across the lake you

find. Reserves of 28 acres with 300 people on them. Of one square mile with 600 people on them. They're very small. People don't have enough land to live on. And make a good life out of it. And we'd use these claims to get enough money to build on an economic base. And then to get enough political power to keep it. So that's. That's a real balance there. The idea of building a future so that program itis or dependency on the government for handouts and anything not just people employed by programs but. People who expect the government to pay for their housing. To pay for them getting a job to take care of them from the moment they're born to the moment they die. And the incredible. I don't know the anthropologists call it a loss of pride I guess. But whatever it is that keeps people down keeps people depending on the government for everything

and keeps them away from thinking and doing things for themselves. That's what we want to use those land claims for. And the treaty that was made right on the other side of the lake was made in 1850. And maybe if I explain what we've done with that one. You can see what we mean by using the treaties. Even in the way they were written and the way they are today. In 1850 the Ojibwe people on the north shore of Lake Superior were getting awful tired of the government of Canada. And at that point it was a colonial government allowing the lumberman and the miners to come into their territory to do some blasting on the rock and scare off the game and clear cut the woods. Because they remembered very clearly that when they made their original treaty with the British 1764 the British said we won't take your land unless you sell it to us. And most of the time the Chiefs weren't saying get off our land.

They were saying when are you going to come and buy our land. And in 1849 a commission came up and investigated and said. Each one of these bands up here has its own territory and its own chiefs and you're going to have to deal with them and buy the land from them. But you have to be careful because they don't have any idea how much their land is worth. And they're going to trust the government to set a fair price because they say the government is their father and takes care of them. And a year later a representative of the government came up and made a real estate deal. And the first thing that came out of the real estate deal he paid a certain amount of cash. Which was approximately one sixth the amount of profit that the government had already got off that land. But the Chiefs trusted the government to pay them a fair price. Well. In Canada the courts haven't accepted the idea of any universal trust relationship. So that when Indian people end up in

courting candidates usually the Department of Justice against instead of the Department of Justice supplying the money or supplying the lawyers. The other thing that happened in the making of that treaty when we completed our historical research we realized that out of the five bands. That shared the land north of Lake Superior. Two of the bands weren't even involved in the negotiation of the treaty. Their chiefs weren't there. Their people weren't there. They didn't get reserves. And somehow or other a couple of years later when the annuity money started being handed out at Hudson Bay Company posts the members of those bands heard about it and they showed up and they started getting free money. And it's only within the past two years or so that we've been telling people. Hold on you're not Lake Superior treaty Indians you've never signed any treaty with the Canadian government giving up your land. That all this money you've been getting every year you should've been getting in the first place. You just took it because it was free and you didn't know any better

at that time. And this past summer when the treaty money was going to be handed out. The bands that didn't sign the treaty refused to take their treaty money for the first time. Now we're pretty lucky with that because the promise was that the Treaty Money would increase if the government ever made any profit from the land. And in fact the Treaty Money did increase it went up to $4 per person per year. In 1973 and it stayed that way. And if it was any more than $4 a year there be a lot of hesitation from people refusing at that $4 a year made it pretty easy for dollars doesn't buy as much as it did in 873 for that matter. One thing we learned earlier this year was the idea that it's possible for non Indian people to live on Indian land under Indian jurisdiction. And we couldn't even imagine that on the Canadian side. There's no such thing there's reserve and there's not

reserve and there's nothing in between and you keep non-Indians out. If it's reserved. And if it's not reserved it's just not Indian country and that's it. But we boarded a leaf from the State of the law here and we said to the Canadian government that all this 12 million acres that's not been surrendered. To the north of Lake Superior. That's an surrendered Indian land and anybody who lives there is living on Indian land and should be looking to an Indian government. And that leads us into the whole question of Indian government. And what is Indian government what is the Ojibway nation. And in a legal sense the Ojibwe nation is. Some kind of entity that had a government made up of chiefs that made certain agreements with the United States with Great Britain. With France. A lot of those agreements aren't even in writing a lot of those

agreements around 100 belts. And it's very hard to get a court to think that. Just because you don't have something in writing. Doesn't mean you don't have an agreement that if you pull out a belt made of shell beads. But that's just as much evidence of what happened. As the written page. And you look to those old agreements and you see that the Ojibway people. From all around the lakes. Looked upon themselves as one nation. And in the work that I do which is much more historical research than than legal we find that the old people are telling us the same thing. There is no border really that all the people on both sides of the lake are one nation. And we found that again. For the first time a number

of our chiefs. Came to Wisconsin for the first time in a long time. This past April and some of our chiefs of these people speak the same way we do the same dialect. And we didn't even know about them we knew there were Indians down here but we didn't know they were just the same as us. And I guess that leads to the last thing I want to mention which is. The reason we're down here in the first place. The reason we're here is because. People in Wisconsin. Have many of the same problems that Ojibwe people in Canada have. And many of the same rights. And much of the same history. And the problems that. People in Canada have now. With health care. You had those problems 10 years ago and we're learning from the successes

that people here had and were also learning from your mistakes. And the problems you're having with hunting and fishing rights. Sometimes the problems in Canada are a little bit ahead sometimes they're a little bit behind. But they're the same problems. And if you travel across the lake you'll see the same problems with education and housing. And the kind of government and each one of the reserves and how it may or may not work for the people it may not fit what the people want. And you look at how people deal with the government it's the same way. There's so little difference. That that's really what it's what's amazing it isn't that after 100 years of being split by this border. That there are so many differences. The amazing thing is how similar the situation is even though the two countries are so different. How similar the Ojibwe

people ended up being. After being forced apart for a hundred years. Or. So we have a lot to share. Thank you thank. You. I thank you.