Sept 8, 2007
Kingston Whig Standard
Re: the editorial "Aboriginals and anarchy" (Sept. 4). Sorry, Whig-Standard. The Indian-as-uncivilized-savage metaphors just don't cut it anymore. Laws are the foundation of indigenous societies, too.
Check the Encyclopedia Britannica and you might be surprised to learn that the framers of the U.S. constitution borrowed their division of federal and state powers from the Haudenosaunee, who had incorporated the concept in their Great Law almost 1,000 years ago.
Anishinabek peoples had societal codes forbidding family intermarriage when the crowned heads of Europe were as inbred as poodles.
The Mayans were probing such natural laws as the movement of the stars when Roman Catholics were burning scholars at the stake for suggesting that the Earth revolved around the sun.
Midewiwin taught the one-Creator gospel at a time when the Greeks and Romans were grovelling before idols of humans depicted with wings, horns and multiple bosoms.
No, the Whig's attempt to dismiss aboriginals as recalcitrant trouble-makers flouting the "rule of law" just doesn't cut it.
The newspaper betrays its ignorance of the concept of aboriginal rights by comparing the Algonquins' struggle to keep uranium-mining squatters off their traditional territory to a spat between divorced spouses.
First Nations citizens have never been "married" to Canadians; the Royal Proclamation of 1763 respected them as distinct "nations," a concept regularly upheld by Canada's courts and constitution.
But if the Whig insists on sticking with its absurd attempt to oversimplify this complex topic, at least it should do it right.
Consider that you are the spouse of a husband who is determined to deprive you of any share of the fruits of your marriage.
He hires the most expensive lawyers money can buy, wins possession of your house and gets the judge to issue a court order that results in a bailiff tossing you out onto the street with no money to buy your children food or pay for health care or schooling. You also learn that he has infected you with a life-threatening venereal disease.
Then you learn that he has sold your marital home and property for $2 million to a land developer who has been coveting the site for years. In divorce court, another judge says you and your children are not entitled to any of the proceeds.
And, oh yes, your legal outcome is similar to that experienced by all women in your family since 1867.
Your options are to say "ho-hum - guess I'll respect the rule of law" or to take whatever action you feel necessary to protect you and your children.
In the landmark report of the Ipperwash Inquiry into the death of unarmed native protester Dudley George, Justice Sidney Linden pleaded for the Canadian and Ontario governments to end "centuries of discrimination and dispossession."
For this to happen, institutions such as The Kingston Whig-Standard need to have a much greater understanding of native issues than they apparently do now.
Maurice Switzer
Director of Communications
Union of Ontario Indians
North Bay