The Supreme Court of Canada is currently hearing arguments from the federal government and the Manitoba Métis Federation regarding a federal promise between the two groups made 141 years ago.
The essence of the case revolves around whether the federal government failed to follow through on an 1870 land deal promise — to set aside 5,565 square kilometres of land in Manitoba for 7,000 Métis children — for the conclusion of the Red River Métis rebellion.
The Supreme Court case is the Manitoba Métis Federation’s last legal attempt to right what it calls the “betrayal of a generation of Métis children, who lost their land and birthright.” The case was originally launched in 1981 and has now reached the Supreme Court.
The promise of land if delivered more than a century ago would have helped to establish a Métis homeland within Manitoba, an area of Canada that after Confederation was being overwhelmed with white settlers moving into traditional First Nations and Métis territory.
At the time, the fledgling federal government was in land-deal negotiations with the Hudson Bay Company. A Métis homeland would have been the fulfillment of Louis Riel’s dream for his people, the passionate spark at the heart of the North-West Rebellion of 1885 and the Red River Rebellion of 1869 (known collectively as the Riel Rebellions).
As part of the Red River Rebellion, Riel formed a provisional Métis government in 1870 to negotiate with the federal government. As a result of the negotiations that would end the rebellion, the federal government passed the Manitoba Act which became part of Canada’s constitution.
The Manitoba Act (1870) created the province and government of Manitoba and the Northwest Territories. The act was based on demands Riel made to Ottawa to protect Métis rights, including a promise that 5,565 square kilometres of land would be set aside for the 7,000 children of the Red River Métis of Manitoba.
Despite the Manitoba Act’s provision that guaranteed title to the Métis and their children, it took 15 years to distribute the land while arriving settlers received their land right away upon arrival and were openly hostile towards the Métis.
Prime Minister John A. MacDonald sent the British military into the region to administrate after the rebellion, causing many Métis families to flee to Saskatchewan and Métis rebel leader Riel to the United States. The federal government ultimately distributed the land through a random lottery, destroying any chance of a Métis homeland. The parcels of land, when finally distributed, were never guaranteed through the Act to be next to one another.
According to paragraph 200 in the Manitoba Métis Federation’s Factum, “By the time the grants were finally issued in the names of the children the Metis had been in Macdonald’s phrase, ‘swamped by the influx of settlers.’ The Metis had become marginalized and were now, to a great extent, a landless minority. It may be that half the Metis population had left Manitoba by 1881.”
More than a century later, the federal government is currently arguing in Supreme Court that the case should be thrown out because the statute of limitations has long since passed into history. It also argues that the Métis were in fact consulted during that time regarding the land distribution process and the land ultimately distributed.
In court documents submitted, the federal government claims it cannot accurately understand the history and context of a century old. “Proceeding to consider the claims forces the defendant… to respond to allegations made on the basis of a documentary record alone without witnesses who could explain the facts or fill in the gaps. Assessing this century-old documentary record against modern legal standards compounds the potential for unfairness.”
Lawyers for the Manitoba Métis Federation argue instead that the federal government never lived up to the 1870 deal that settled the Red River Rebellion; therefore failing in its constitutional duty agreed upon by Riel that paved the way for Manitoba to enter the Confederation. This essentially robbed the Métis of the possibility of establishing a homeland within Manitoba and any further potential for the Métis as operate as a geographical and political state.
The Manitoba Metis Federation (MMF), “in showing that there was an inexcusable delay in implementing the original promises, argues that there was a breach of fiduciary obligation by Canada, which left the Metis a marginalized minority in the province. The breach by Canada was a breach of a constitutional obligation.
1. The Manitoba government then passed a series of laws which the MMF alleges were designed to ensure the children’s grants passed from Metis ownership to non-Metis ownership. The MMF contends that these laws were unconstitutional.
2. The MMF will argue that since the federal government had a constitutional obligation to the Metis and their children that it failed to fulfill, the Supreme Court of Canada, notwithstanding the passage of time, can rule on the question, since it involves the rightful place of the Metis within the constitutional system.”
Winning this court battle could open up new land claims. David Chartrand, president of the Manitoba Métis Federation, stated at the beginning of the court case, “John A. Macdonald said our people would be vanished in 100 years. Riel said my people would rise in 100 years … It’s 100 years now — and we’re rising.”
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