1. Aboriginal Experiences in Canada

3. ATTEMPTS AT ASSIMILATION Legislated Colonization These social control aspects of the Indian Act placed Indians in the position of a colonized people. As Harold Cardinal asserted "Instead of implementing the treaties and offering much needed protection to Indian rights the Indian Act subjugated to colonial rule the very people whose rights if was supposed to protect".

4. Concentrated GOVERNMENT Authority  The Indian Act extended speaking dispute power to government to regulate and control the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada.  It was, and still is a piece of social legislation of very broad scope which regulates and controls virtually every aspect of Native Life.  The act was administered directly in Aboriginal committees by the Indian agent.  These new white chiefs were to displace traditional Aboriginal leaders in order to bring in a new way of living which was in line with the governments.  They had extraordinary administrative and discretionary power. Clause 25 of the Act obtained the governments guardianship over Indian lands.

5. Land Treaties With the signing of land cession treaties with the Aboriginal peoples and with the adoption of a succession of Indian Acts, the government of Canada changed its relationship with the continent's first inhabitants in the later nineteenth century.

7. THE INDIAN ACT spelled out a process of enfranchisement Indians could acquire full Canadian citizenship by relinquishing their ties to their community. Process: Giving up their culture and traditions Giving up any rights to land. Cost: SURPASSED the cost for a immigrant from ANOTHER country. The government of Canada saw the Indian Act as a temporary measure to control Aboriginal Peoples until they were fully assimilated through enfranchisement. Results: The rate of enfranchisement was extremely low. 1960s Policy Change: Indians were granted the right to vote in federal elections. This was the first time the Canadian government acknowledged citizenship for Aboriginal Peoples without the condition of the assimilation into the Canadian white society.

9. Indian Red Paper

10. Aboriginal people in Canada took hope with the election of Pierre Trudeau's Liberals in 1968. They were outraged when the White Paper introduced by Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs Jean Chretien a year later amounted to an assimilation program: the repeal of the Indian Act, the transfer of Indian affairs to the provinces, the elimination of separate legal status native people. The Unjust Society, Cree leader Harold Cardinal's stinging rebuttal, was an immediate best-seller, and it remains one of the most important books ever published. Cardinal summed up the government's approach as "The only good Indian is a non-Indian." He coined the term "buckskin curtain" to describe the barriers that indifference, ignorance and bigotry had placed in the way of his people. He insisted on his right to remain "a red tile in the Canadian mosaic." Above all, he called for radical changes in policy on aboriginal rights, education, social programs and economic development. The Unjust Society heralded a profound change in the political landscape. Thirty years later, however, the buckskin curtain has still not disappeared. Canada's First Nations continue their fight for justice. And Harold Cardinal's vision is as compelling and powerful as ever.

11. Cardinal: SUMMED UP the government's approach as "The only good Indian is a non-Indian.“ COINED the term "buckskin curtain" to describe the barriers that indifference, ignorance and bigotry had placed in the way of his people. INSISTED on his right to remain "a red tile in the Canadian mosaic." Above all, CALLED FOR RADICAL changes in policy on aboriginal rights, education, social programs and economic development.

12. The Indian Red Paper: Taking a Stand against assimilation: National Indian Brotherhood published: “Citizen Plus” See page 311 of your text. Aboriginals responded with their own document, named Citizens Plus, in 1970. This became more commonly known as the Red Paper. The Red Paper countered all of the proposals of the White Paper. An Aboriginal delegation, backed by other Canadian citizens, met with the government and successfully convinced it to radically change its policies and positions.Red Paper