Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

"Everything Promised Had Been Included In The Writing" Indian Reserve Farming And The Spirit And Intent Of Treaty Six Reconsidered, Derek Whitehouse-Strong

Great Plains Quarterly

In December 2005, a Canadian federal court justice dismissed a six-hundred-million-dollar claim by the Samson Cree related to alleged mismanagement of its energy royalties. In newspaper interviews, a lawyer for the Samson Cree expressed disbelief and stated that the justice "discounted the testimony of our elders" and "followed essentially the word of the white man and the written word of the white man."

He continued: "It's as if the white man cannot be biased, but the Indians might be biased in their recounting of history." Interestingly, 120 years before the justice dismissed the Samson Cree case, the Canadian Department of …