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The people left out of Treaty 8

The story of how and why the Canadian government negotiated Treaty 8 with First Nations living in north-western Canada, and its attitude toward the people whom it casually left out of treaty, provide an excellent example of how the Canadian government approached treaty negotiations in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Treaty 8 is both typical of the other numbered treaties negotiated with First Nations in the late nineteenth century in western Canada as well as different, in that it was the first of the "northern" numbered treaties negotiated with First Nations.<p>
This thesis looks at Treaty 8 in both ways: how it illustrates a common approach to treaty making on the part of the Canadian government, and how it differs from other treaties and other treaty negotiation processes. The thesis also tells the story of the people left out of Treaty 8 negotiations in northern Alberta and north-western Saskatchewan, as well as their struggles to obtain justice for this governmental oversight.<p>
This thesis looks at a number of issues related to Treaty 8 which earlier historians have either not focused on or overlooked. The first is that the territory covered by Treaty 8 is greater than the area into which treaty commissioners were sent in 1899 and 1900. The second related point is that the government policy of the time that treaties should be negotiated at as little expense and cost to the government as possible meant that people were left out of treaty negotiations.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:SSU.etd-07102007-091310
Date23 July 2007
CreatorsSmillie, Christine Mary
ContributorsMiller, James R.
PublisherUniversity of Saskatchewan
Source SetsLibrary and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
Sourcehttp://library.usask.ca/theses/available/etd-07102007-091310/
Rightsunrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Saskatchewan or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report.

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