This book has three main components: A short essay on policy 1870-1930; Appendix I. ("A listing of land use regulations") a comprehensive listing of orders in council which defined land use regulations to 1930; and Appendix II ("Selected legislation") an arrangement of selected acts of Parliament and orders in council. Together these survey the main elements of federal policy regarding Crown lands.
Immigration and Settlement, 1870-1939 includes twenty articles organized under the following topics: the "Opening of the Prairie West," First Nations and the Policy of Containment, Patterns of Settlement, and Ethnic Relations and Identity in the New West. The second volume in the History of the Prairie West Series, Immigration and Settlement includes chapters on early immigration patterns including transportation routes and ethnic blocks, as well as the policy of containing First Nations on reserves. Other chapters grapple with the various identities, preferences, and prejudices of settlers and their complex relationships with each other as well as the larger polity.
The administration of public lands in the three prairie provinces of the Canadian West was the most important activity of the federal government for sixty years after the acquisition of the region in 1870. Martin studies the policies devised by politicians and officials for the disposal of public lands, and the granting of concessions to individuals and business interests for exploiting the other natural resources of the area.
Land settlement schemes, sponsored by national governments and businesses, such as the Ford Corporation and the Hudson’s Bay Company, took place in locations as diverse as the Canadian Prairies, the Dutch polders, and the Amazonian rainforests. This novel contribution evaluates a diverse range of these initiatives. By 1900, any land that remained available for agricultural settlement was often far from the settlers’ homes and located in challenging physical environments. Over the course of the twentieth century, governments, corporations and frequently desperate individuals sought out new places to settle across the globe from Alberta to Papua New Guinea. This book offers vivid reports of the difficulties faced by many of these settlers, including the experiences of East European Jewish refugees, New Zealand soldier settlers and urban families from Yorkshire. This book considers how and why these settlement schemes succeeded, found other pathways to sustainability or succumbed to failure and even oblivion. In doing so, the book indicates pathways for the achievement of more economically, socially and environmentally sustainable forms of human settlement in marginal areas. This engaging collection will be of interest to individuals in the fields of historical geography, environmental history and development studies.
“Natives and Settlers provides a beginning to what should be (and should have been) a continuing, respectful discussion.” —Blanca Schorcht, Associate Professor, University of Northern British Columbia. Is Canada truly postcolonial? Burdened by a past that remains ‘refracted’ in its understanding and treatment of Native peoples, this collection reinterprets treaty making and land claims from Aboriginal perspectives. These five essays not only provide fresh insights to the interpretations of treaties and treaty-making processes, but also examine land claims still under negotiation. Natives and Settlers reclaims the vitality of Aboriginal laws and paradigms in Canada, a country new to decolonization.
In 1885, Louis Riel was charged with high treason, found guilty, and consequently executed for his role in Saskatchewan's North-West Rebellion. During his trial, the Métis leader gave two speeches, passionately defending the interests of the Métis in western Canada as well as his own life. Riel's Defence studies these speeches, demonstrating the range of Riel's political and personal concerns. The first and better known of the two speeches addresses the jury, while Riel's second speech - rarely reprinted - addresses the court following his guilty verdict. Both orations have been edited, annotated, and reprinted, and are followed by essays from diverse perspectives including philosophy, law, history, political science, religion, and communication studies. Through the course of their inquiry, contributors come to understand more about Riel's personal character and political thought, as well as his arguments supporting Métis land claims, grievances against the federal government, and his immigration plan for the North-West. Evaluating the rhetorical quality, legal merit, and cultural stakes of his speeches, Riel's Defence reveals the significance of the last public statements made by a man who indelibly shaped Canada’s history by combining his personal vision with a national vision.
In conventional histories of the Canadian prairies, Native people disappear from view after the Riel Rebellions. In this groundbreaking study, Frank Tough examines the role of Native peoples, both Indian and Metis, in the economy of northern Manitoba from Treaty 1 to the Depression. He argues that they did not become economically obsolete but rather played an important role in the transitional era between the mercantile fur trade and the emerging industrial economy of the mid-twentieth century.
