Treaties of Canada with Aboriginal Peoples

The treaties of what is now modern day Canada began since European contact in 1492 to a recent year of 2003. A treaty is an agreement or arrangement made by negotiation (Webster’s Dictionary). The treaties made with the Native population by the Europeans were deceitful because, the Europeans gained many benefits while the Natives lost much of their land and pride. Many of the treaties made with the Natives involved underhanded methods such as alcohol use to make the Aboriginals agree with ridiculous negotiations with the Europeans. During the many treaties of 1400's to the late 1700's, aboriginals were used to oral treaties with each other.  The type of treaties that the Europeans used were written treaties, the Natives were not used to this. Since many of the things they talked about were not written down, the things that were written down in the treaties were what they talked about, but only the things that benefited the Europeans.  An example of this is Treaties numbers 1-5 when the Europeans wanted to secure aboriginal land for their settlement, in these treaties the Aboriginals were to give up their land forever without consulting about it. Another incidence with the treaties is that they were very racist. In the Indian act of 1876 they the Aboriginals were described under the eyes of the law; the act stated that any “half-breed” Indians was not entitled to Indian status. This is discriminating against the Metis People. The Metis people are seen as “half-breeds” which in its self is discriminatory.  They were not able to benefit from anything, and yet most of them lived on reserves like the rest of their family and relatives. They were seen in the government’s eyes as white, this lead to another issue of assimilation where natives were forced into white society. The treaties of the past were deceitful many ways. The fact that the Europeans took advantage of the Natives through lies, loop holes, and alcohol shows these treaties were only for European benefit. These underhanded moves by the Europeans lead to a build-up of anger in the Native peoples.  This lead up to uneasy relations between the Natives and the Europeans/Government. This conflict still exists today and many problems that occur are due to land claims and being coned into signing treaties where they would not benefit form.  Efforts today have been made to undo what has been done today. Most of these efforts have been somewhat successful in regaining lost land and lost rights of the Aboriginals many years ago. Treaties have been one of the worst things to happen to Natives in Canada. Although the Natives may have been tricked into signing these treaties, today they can fight back at the misfortunes of their ancestors.