Introduction

• Author: Gib van Ert
• Pages: 1-11

1 Introduction

Canada’s achievement of independence in internationa l aairs is a fact

to which Canadian law is still reconci ling itself. For decades after t he

inception of Confederation in , and in the centuries of embryonic

development before that, foreign relations and the laws t hat govern

them were little concern of ours.

e original i nhabitants of these lands were, of course, unaware of

European conceptions of the law of nations, though parallels ex isted

in their own legal traditions. e arrival of the colonists did not add

much to the stock of international legal think ing here, for the new-

comers mostly ignored the precepts of their own i nternationa l laws or,

when they did turn t heir minds to the matter, invoked intern ational

law doctrines to thei r own advantage. Some recognition of the nation-

to-nation context of Indigenous-set tlor relations can be seen in the use

of the international law ter m “treaty” to describe agreements between

the Indigenous peoples and the newcomers. Yet as British control of

these lands solidi ed, any suggestion of Indigenous sovereig nty, as

that concept was understood in internat ional law, was loudly denied

or quietly ignored.

Also rejected for a time were the occa sional colonial cl aims to

self-government, partly for fear that if the imperial authorities ceded

control of the colonies’ domestic aairs they would eventually have to

grant extern al independence, too. Such fears proved to be well found-

ed. In , Canada  nally gained f ull statehood under inter national

law. Yet centuries of relative isolation from international l aw left the

Canadian bench and bar unprepared for the duties of statehood Can-

ada had now assumed. As l ate as , one senses incredulity in the

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