Paternalism, Loss of Autonomy, and Dependence

The paternalism of the Indian Act can be measured by a few historical events. The initial laws pertaining to Native persons gave the government extensive powers to control Indians living on reserve.

First of all, First Nations communities lost the political ability to determine who their members were. The government decided that only Indians entered in the register of the Department of Indian Affairs would be legally considered as Indians. Because the federal government established the rules determining who was and was not an Indian, the categories “status Indian” (or registered Indian) and “non-status Indian” (or non-registered Indian) assumed enormous importance.

Moreover, we have seen that the ultimate objective of the Act was enfranchisement, or rather the loss of status through enfranchisement. Different measures were proposed at different times to achieve this objective. Very early on, it was discrimination based on sex. As of 1869, any Indian woman who married a non-Indian man automatically lost her status as an Indian. Consequently, she had to leave the community and was denied participation in its political life and even the right to be buried among her own people. In addition, she was deprived of another fundamental human right – the right to maintain and pursue her own cultural life with the other members of her group. This exclusion applied to her and her descendants, but did not apply to Indian men who married non-Indian women. Those women moreover gained legal Indian status. It is often said that the Indian Act constituted a “denial of identity” for thousands of persons and their descendants (Jamieson 1978). It was not until 1985 – following relentless battles by Aboriginal women’s associations and a decision of the UN Human Rights Committee – that Canada was required to terminate this discrimination based on sex.

A Naskapi with a 3-metre-long toboggan at Fort Mackenzie, 1941.

Young Cree from Waswanipi proudly displays a swallow that he hunted with a slingshot, 1955.

Fundamentals of the Assimilation Policy

The assimilation policy was founded on four hypothetical (and incorrect) dehumanizing assumptions regarding Aboriginal peoples and their cultures:

They were inferior peoples.

They were unable to govern themselves, and colonial authorities were in the best position to know how to protect their interests and well-being.

The special relationship based on respect and sharing enshrined by treaties was a historical anomaly that was no longer valid.

European ideas of progress and development were obviously correct and could be imposed on Aboriginal peoples without taking into account the other values, opinions or rights they may have.

Reported in Canada, Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples 1996a

Certain loss-of-status provisions were shocking. In 1880, for example, an amendment to the Indian Act decreed that Native persons who obtained university degrees would be automatically enfranchised. From that point on they, their families and their descendants would no longer be considered Indians. A 1933 amendment went even further, empowering the Governor in Council to enfranchise Indians without their consent, upon the recommendation of the Superintendent General of Indian Affairs. Compulsory enfranchisement, although little used, remained in the Act until 1951, despite protests from Aboriginal people.

How Indian Status Was Eliminated – Enfranchisement from 1955 to 1975

Period	Voluntary Enfranchisement (Adult Indians enfranchised (Indian women enfranchised following (Enfranchised Indians) upon their application, along with their marriage to non-Indians, their unmarried minor children)		Involuntary Enfranchisement (Indian women enfranchised following their marriage to non-Indians, along with their unmarried children)		Total Number (Indiens émancipés)
	Adults	Children	Women	Children
1965-1975	1,313	963	4,274	1,175	7,725
1965-1975	263	127	4,263	772	5,425
Subtotal	1,576	1,090	8,537	1,947
Total	2,666		10,484		13,150

(Source: Hawthorn et Tremblay 1966, I : 292 ; Canada, 180 : 104)

Total Enfranchisements from 1876 to 1974

Period	Total
From 1876 to 1918	102
From 1918 to 1948	4 000
Fiscal years 1948 to 1968	13 670
Fiscal year 1968 – 1969	785
Fiscal year 1969 – 1970	714
Fiscal year 1970 – 1971	652
Fiscal year 1971 – 1972	304
Fiscal year 1972 – 1973	7
Fiscal year 1973 – 1974	460
Total	20 694

(Source: Jamieson 1978)

In 1923, a Mohawk woman was evicted from her community

On April 15, 1923, a Mohawk mother from Caughnawaga (now Kahnawake) was evicted from her community because she had married a white man 25 years before. With no money and speaking no French or English, Mrs. Joseph Boyer sought refuge in Montréal with her four children in tow. The description of this archival photo indicates that she was the first Indian woman married to a non-Indian to have been evicted from a reserve by the federal government.

Indian Parents Lose Responsibility for Educating Their Children

Recent amendments gave control to Indian Affairs and withdrew from Indian parents the responsibility for the care and education of their children, and the best interests of Indian children were promoted and fully protected.

Reported in the 1921 Annual Report of the Department of Indian Affairs and in Goodwill and Sluman 1984, 134

Famille indienne (Indian family), Val-d’Or, Québec.

Assimilation was far from being a hidden objective. In the 1920 House of Commons debates on the expediency of enacting compulsory enfranchisement, the great proponent of the procedure, Duncan Campbell Scott, expressed himself unequivocally:

Our object is to continue until there is not a single Indian that has not been absorbed into the body politic of Canada and there is no more Indian question. That is the whole purpose of our legislation.

PAC, R.G. 10, 1920

In accordance with the times, the laws respecting first nations peoples had evocative titles

Year	Title of the law
1857	An Act to Encourage the Gradual Civilization of the Indian Tribes in the Province and to Amend the Laws Respecting Indians.
1859	An Act Respecting the Civilization and Enfranchisement of Certain Indians.
1884	An Act for conferring certain privileges on the more advanced bands of Indians of Canada, with the view of training them for the exercise of municipal powers, or the Indian Advancement Act.
1927	An Act respecting Indians.