Samson Cree Trial Decision: 365 days of trial end in disappointment for Samson Cree.

• Author: Fenwick, Fred R.
• Position: Aboriginal law - Victor Buffalo v. Her Majesty the Queen

On Friday, December 5, 2005, Justice Teitelbaum of the Federal Court (Trial Division) rendered his decision in Victor Buffalo v. Her Majesty the Queen, Docket Number T-2022-89. The court docket number itself tells quite a tale, the "89" means that the case was originally filed in the Federal Court in 1989. By my math that's 16 years from the start of the lawsuit to trial judgment. Along the way, having started out simple enough, it got complicated, and in the end (although the trial judgment is 368 pages), it got simple again.

A long story needs to start with some history: history of the Cree people in Alberta and some recent judicial history. Both had major impacts on the development of this case.

With the usual apologies to the Samson Cree people, and the litigators on both sides of the case who know the nuanced detail, the short history is ...

The Cree inhabited northern and parts of central Alberta at the time of European settlement right after Confederation in 1867. The exact extent of their history in the area is a matter of some historical controversy; and eventually became one of the key disputed facts in the trial. The Cree were undoubtedly the native Canadian partners in the fur trade in the west and increased their presence in the west as the fur trade expanded from the forest lands out into the prairies. They certainly had a major presence in central and northern Alberta at the signing of Treaty 6 in August of 1876. Whether they had lived here from time immemorial or had come out with the fur trade was to become a major issue in the trial. But we get just a bit ahead of ourselves.

Back in about 1870, use and occupation of the west was at a crucial turning point. The prairies had been occupied by the powerful, organized, and warlike Blackfoot confederacy, which had effectively excluded major inroads by either white settlers or the Cree-mediated fur trade. But everyone knew that the buffalo herds were rapidly diminishing. Metis dissatisfaction with the sale of western Canada (Rupert's Land) from the Hudson's Bay Company to Canada--and Metis exclusion from the deal--led to the Red River Rebellion in 1869-70. Meanwhile the Americans were solving their western Indian challenges with a series of "Indian Wars," which might be referred to today as ethnic cleansing. In addition, the railroad, and accompanying massive European settlement, was on the way.

The Cree and the Blackfoot could see what was happening with the buffalo and what was going on in the US. The Canadian government wanted to keep peace with the Aboriginal people, although their motives were not exclusively altruistic. The Canadians could see how much the wars were costing the Americans and Canadian officials estimated...