Price Paid: The Fight for First Nations Survival

by Bev Sellars

Awards for Bev Sellars' They Called Me Number One: Secrets and Survival at an Indian Residential School:

2014 George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature

2014 Burt Award for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Literature, third prize

Shortlisted for the 2014 Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize (British Columbia Book Prizes)

More than forty weeks on the BC Bestsellers list in 2013 and 2014!

Price Paid: Aboriginal Rights in Canada is the second book by award-winning author Bev Sellars. Based on a popular presentation Sellars often gave to treaty-makers, politicians, policymakers, and educators, Price Paid relates Canadian history from a First Nations point of view.

The book begins with glimpses of foods, medicines, and cultural practices North America's indigenous peoples have shared with the rest of the world. It documents the dark period of regulation by racist laws during the twentieth century, and then discusses new emergence in the twenty-first century into a re-establishment of Indigenous land and resource rights. The result is a candidly told, personal take on the history of Aboriginal rights in Canada.

Bev Sellars was first elected chief of the Xat'sull (Soda Creek) First Nation in Williams Lake, British Columbia, in 1987. She has spoken out on behalf of her community on racism and residential schools and on the environmental and social threats of mineral resource exploitation in her region. Having earned a degree in history from the University of Victoria and a law degree from the University of British Columbia, she has served as an advisor to the B.C. Treaty Commission.

Genres: Indigenous, Nonfiction, History, Politics, Canada

240 pages, Paperback

First published May 10, 2016

About the author

Bev Sellars is a Xat'sull writer of the award-winning book, They Called Me Number One: Secrets and Survival at an Indian Residential School, describing her experiences within the Canadian Indian residential school system. She is also a longtime-serving Chief of the Xat'sull First Nations.

Reviews

[Evelyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

"If you owned a house and you invited others who needed a place to stay to come and stay in your house, is it still your house?"
This book gives a very good picture of the many aspects of the way in which the Aboriginal people of Canada were treated over the 150 years (and earlier) that we have been a Nation. While I skimmed a couple of the more "legal jargon" sections, for the most part I found this book to be well written, and easy to read. I learned a lot, especially about the life on the reservation.

[Chloë · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s a new oral history of our nation – written down. Read it aloud!

Sellars’s knowledge and experience are vast, but what gets you is her style: you feel as though you are just sitting with her at her kitchen table. Some things seem repetitious – but they bear repeating. And every point is driven home with a punchy and memorable anecdote. Every Canadian will get something out of reading this.

Price Paid also acts as a perfect companion book to The Inconvenient Indian by Thomas King.

[Cordon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was a wonderful, informative, and engaging read. I feel Iearned a lot of new things and have a lot farther to go. Sellars' writing was clear and kept my attention throughout. I look forward to reading her other book.

This is a great book for any settlers in Canada to read, and especially those in BC, where a lot of her personal anicdotes are based.

[Katrina Sark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Foreward by Chief Bill Wilson

p.xviii – We are all familiar with the fiction that Columbus discovered America despite the truth that he was lost in the Caribbean only to be saved by the Native people already there. Many other myths, assumptions, stereotypes, prejudices, sophistries, and outright lies have whitewashed the real history of the continent. Now here is a book that reveals the truth about what really happened here after the immigrants “stumbled ashore.”

Preface by Bev Sellars

p.xxi – Historically politicians have ignored Aboriginal issues because fighting for the rights of First Nations, Inuit, and Metis people, while morally right to do so, would not win votes. My purpose in writing this history of Native-newcomer relations in Canada is to help the Canadian public become more aware of the injustice Aboriginal Canadians live with every day so together we can push our members of Parliament and members of the legislative assembly to resolve these issues.

Introduction

p.1 – Historical documents are the basis of much of our understanding of history, but given my experience I suggest they should be analysed thoroughly to determine how valid they are. Records can sometimes be distorted depending on the circumstances of the person, the time of writing, and the reasons for recording. There are too many silent voices that somehow have to be included in the equation. A good example of that is the Aboriginal voice.
We need to become the explorers of the explorers and government documents. We need to understand that the original message has gone through so much filtration or alternation. What we hear or see today may be completely different from the original incident. I see the transformation from historic moment to history text as vulnerable at any number of missteps, which should be questioned as follows:

p.2 – ORIGINAL EVENT
 Is the source of information a non-Aboriginal speaker or translator? If so, the message may have changed from one language to another.
 Is this an eyewitness report? Is it hearsay or rumour?
 Did the writer have any biases?
 Was the event recorded? If so, what did the recorder and the act of recording bring into the act of record keeping?
 For whom were the records written? Would the audience have affected the telling of the story?
 What is the date? Place? Time of the event? What were the circumstances?
 Were cultural differences taken into account?
 Were the original records altered by anyone?

p.3 – All the history textbooks we had used on high school and that my children brought home ignored Aboriginal history or treated it as almost meaningless. The first newcomers to the land, the English and the French, had created their own versions of history. I grew up hearing all the stereotypes: that Aboriginal people live on welfare; they pay no government tax; they are dirty, drunk, lazy, or stupid. But I knew otherwise. I knew that much of what was said about Aboriginal people wasn’t true. My grandmother told me many stories of the ways she and the generations before her had shared skills and knowledge the newcomers needed when they first came to this land. My grandmother told me stories of the first newcomers she saw as a child in her home community of Alexandria. She said many of them wandered the roads and her dad would sometimes help them with food or temporary shelter. None stayed long and Gram found them a curiosity. Later when my grandmother married and moved to Deep Creek she told stories of our people helping many of the newcomers. I knew from these stories that newcomer “history” told only one version of history.

p.8 – An older man at UVic when I was giving a presentation there said to me: “I was educated in the university system and I considered myself well read. How is it that at my age I knew nothing about the residential schools?” I got a phone call after my first book came out from a white woman who was exactly my age. She said that she knew nothing of residential schools and it really disturbed her that while I was going to the residential school and being subject to laws under the Indian Act that she was enjoying everything that Canada had to offer. She had attended a public school and her parents were fully involved in her education. She compared my life to hers year for year. She was very upset that in a country that allowed her to have so much, the First Peoples of this land were denied. She apologized for all that I had been through because of her ancestors.

p.9 – “I know you are not personally responsible for these laws and policies, but now that you are aware, you have a responsibility to help change the situation. You cannot turn a blind eye to this because, if you do, you will be doing the same thing as your ancestors.” That would be my message to all Canadians.
We lack sufficient educational funds to send our children off for higher learning. The minimum funds we are able to provide are insufficient to allow our students to study free of constant concern that they need to pay the bills. I was fortunate that my credit rating was good when I went to university as a mature student. I was able to get student loans and after seven years had accumulated $40,000 in debt. I was one of the lucky ones. Most Aboriginal students in this country cannot afford, and are not provided with the opportunity, to go on to any form of higher learning. I bristle when I hear non-Aboriginal people say that Indians get a free education. It is as wrong as those who say we do not pay taxes – while everyone else in the country profits from resources extracted on our territorial lands.

p.10 – There is no mystery about why most reserves are pockets of poverty. Reserves are like factories that the Department of Indian Affairs operates. At one end of the conveyor belt, government allocates billions of dollars to the Department of Indian Affairs. A huge chunk of money gets diverted off to pay the salaries of mostly non-Aboriginal people in big office towers in cities. Hundreds of millions of dollars keep travelling down the conveyor belt as the Department of Indian Affairs decides where to shovel money to ease our suffering – from education funding to economic development plans – yet Aboriginal people continue to live in poverty. The end product of the factory is very little because now product is expected.

p.11 – Aboriginal people were here to meet the first newcomers to this land and we continue to welcome them today despite continued oppression. I was proud to see some Aboriginal communities step up recently to help welcome the Syrian refugees in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, and Roseau River, Manitoba. I believe that Aboriginal peoples can relate to the suffering refugees experience and that is why, when we can, we are still helping newcomers today. It is the assumption of superiority on which this country’s history has been based that must change. A society will never achieve its full potential unless all members can exercise their human rights and achieve their full potential.

1 – Indian Givers: Aboriginal Contributions

p.16 – When the newcomers first came from Europe, Aboriginal people occupied the Americas from the North Pole to Cape Horn. Some estimates put the number of Aboriginal people in North, Central and South America between 90 and 112.5 million. Each Aboriginal group, from the Inuit in what today is Nunavut to the Yaghan in Tierra del Fuego, were strong, solid, and secure in their culture. They followed strict codes of conduct that governed every aspect of their lives. Births, deaths, marriages, land use, songs, dances, conflicts, and all personal matters were governed by sacred ceremonies that had existed for thousands of years.
Aboriginal societies engaged in an economy that respected the land and all its bounty, from the plants that grow in the earth to the animals that walk in the forests and the fish that swim in the waters. Over thousands of years of life in the Americas, we had developed an intimate knowledge of the land that led to thriving economies because we cared for and nurtured our world.
Our traditional belief is that we borrow the earth from our grandchildren and that we have to keep it healthy for seven generations ahead. It is common practice when we harvest anything from the forest to thank Mother Earth for providing the medicines and plants we need to survive. When we take an animal for food, we offer thanks to the animal for giving its life to feed us. Traditionally we were taught to take only what we need and to use everything we took. We were taught that, if we take care of Mother Earth, it would take care of us.

p.20 – With the introduction of corn, potatoes, and other American crops, the European population exploded. Before contact all empires in Europe and the East, from Greece and Rome to Persia and Egypt, had based success on their control of grain production. These empires, situated in the warmer southern countries where it was easier to grow grain crops, provided colder northern countries with food. Following the introduction of Aboriginal food crops such as potato, northern countries such as Germany and Russia rose as world powers because they had gained an independent food supply.

p.22 – Medicine in some parts of the world at this time had not risen above placing leeches on a sick person. The history books talk about George Washington, the first president of the United States, dying of a throat infection but it is more likely he died of blood letting. Since the European belief was that the bad stuff was in the blood, they took from him several pints of blood in a twenty-four-hour period. Blood banks today counsel donors not to give more than one pint every two months and only if we are well. George Washington probably would have recovered from the throat infection of they had not bled him.

p.23-24 – In our area, the Cariboo region of British Columbia, first contact took place 1793, when Alexander Mackenzie trekked through on his way to the sea. When Simon Fraser explored our territory in 1808, Secwepemc people shared our food and guided him by canoe on the Upper Fraser River. When Fort Alexandria was built in 1821, we supplied salmon, meat, berries, roots, and pitch for repairing canoes. In eastern North America, Aboriginal people supplied the forts with corn, maple sugar, wild rice, buffalo meat, and buffalo robes. Without the initial help and the sharing character of the Aboriginal people, the newcomers would never have survived. Most Europeans had never hunted.

p.25 – Aboriginal people knew their territory because successive generations had walked the land, named its plants, rocks, and animals, looked after it, and collectively owned it. Simon Fraser and other newcomers would never have found trails they followed to “discover” the continent without Aboriginal people showing where to find them. Nevertheless, newcomer culture believes the myth, perpetuated by popular TV shows like Daniel Boone, that “When we came here this was a savage land and we tamed it with our bare hands.”

2 – The Tilting Power: A Clash of Cultures in the Americas

p.33 – Aboriginal people had a culture of sharing within communities and between nations and, when the newcomers came, Aboriginal people shared with them as well. The newcomers traded steel, guns, and other goods with the Aboriginal people for fish, fur, and gold. The trade economy that resulted kept many of the Aboriginal people interested in developing and continuing a mutually beneficial relationship. Unfortunately the newcomers also brought diseases, foreign religions, and other “exchanges” that devastated the Aboriginal people.
People ask what Aboriginal communities need to do to heal. My answer is that healing has to occur on all sides and that recovery can begin only when all people are able to heal. Canadians have to abandon the deep-rooted opinion that some races are superior to others. This assumption led to the abuse of power that oppressed and displaced Aboriginal people. It is crucial for Canadians to understand the dark history of Canada and Aboriginal people. The average person needs to think about how he or she would feel and react had they been treated in a similar way.
Canada has done a good job keeping this part of its history hidden, but this is no longer possible in today’s world of digital information. For some time historians have been writing about certain aspects of Aboriginal history that do not fit the accepted view of Canada. Now Aboriginal peoples are putting forward history from their perspective.

p.35 – Another area of conflict related to women and our roles in Aboriginal society. Before contact, women were at least equal to men, and in matrilineal societies, women were expected to make the important decisions of the nation. The newcomer view was that women had no rights and were “chattels” of the men.
Despite what we’re shown in the typical Hollywood movie, the first newcomers were not heroes, nobles, or knights in shining armour. For the most part, they were poor peasants fleeing oppression in their homelands. Newcomers from monarchical societies in Europe lived in poverty and servitude while the royals owned the land and had unlimited access to its resources. Wealth allowed the royals to rule over their subjects, and consequently newcomers were accustomed to being literally “lorded over.” That, unfortunately, set the tone for their relationship with Aboriginal peoples. Once they were established in the Americas, instead of adopting the culture of sharing, newcomers imposed their culture of exploitation. Denied access to resources and wealth in their own countries, they found the abundant resources in the Americas irresistible.

p.40 – It is estimated that between 75 and 95 percent of the Aboriginal people were killed by diseases brought over by the newcomers. If one accepts the estimates of how many people were in the Americas that would mean that between 67.5 and 106.4 million Aboriginal people died. You don’t see that taught in the history books.

p.42 – James Daschuk, professor of kinesiology and health studies at the University of Regina: “The uncomfortable truth is that modern Canada is founded upon ethnic cleansing and genocide.”

3 – Case Study in Colonial Contact: History of the Xat’sull Community

p.48 – Government was by hereditary chief, who had responsibility for the well-being of all community members. In response, it was expected that everyone would share, and if you did not, that was breaking the Secwepemc law and you would be dealt with accordingly.
In the Secwepemc language, as in many other Aboriginal languages, there is no word for “please.” Xat’sull elder Cecilia De Rose, a fluent Secwepemctsin speaker, told me there is no word for please because Aboriginal people did not have to beg to get what they needed. The culture of sharing provided what each community member needed to get by.

p.51 – When British Columbia celebrated its 150th birthday in 2008 there was great emphasis put on the fact that Simon Fraser travelled the Fraser River by canoe. He was the first non-Aboriginal to explore the area down the Big River that the Secwepemc call Setekwe but that is now named the Fraser, taking the name of this newcomer explorer. What was not emphasized again is the fact that had it not been for Aboriginal guides, Aboriginal food supplies, Aboriginal transportation methods, Aboriginal medicines, and Aboriginal technology to mend canoes, Simon Fraser probably would have never achieved his goal. It is well established in our oral history that Logshom, the chief of my community, guided Simon Fraser more than three hundred kilometers through Secwepemc territory and turned him over to the Stl’atl’imx (Lillooet) people to guide him farther.

p.54 – By 1865, the Cariboo Gold Rush was dying down, but the region was now open for settlement by farmers, ranchers, and others. To ensure that most of the land was available to these newcomers and still set aside some land for our ancestors, the colonial government of British Columbia created “Indian reserves.”

p.58 – Coupled with the loss of our people through disease and the loss of our lands through European settlement, this alienation and abuse of our young people led to a sharp decline in the health of our community form the late nineteenth century, well into the twentieth century.

4 – Workarounds and Memorials: Early Effects of the Indian Act

p.62 – When the Indian Act was enacted in 1876, it was instituted without any input from Aboriginal people what they thought of the new legislation that would govern their lives. The government simply wrote the law and imposed it on us.
It was the British North America Act, 1867, that initiated the transfer of responsibility for Canada’s Aboriginal people under the Proclamation of 1763 from the British Crown to the colony. Then, in 1869, despite the Aboriginal people having their own government structures that had worked for them the Department of Indian Affairs imposed the election band council system. An Act for the Gradual Enfranchisement of Indians, 1869, imposed European-style elections, undermining the traditional structure of governance by hereditary chiefs. The 1876 Indian Act reinforced the elected band system. In response, the Aboriginal people simply elected their traditional or hereditary chiefs.

p.63 – This effectively removed Indian women from band political life. For matrilineal cultures this was devastating. Women had traditionally been leaders among Aboriginal people but under newcomer legislation, they had status only through marriage to men.

6 – Political Action Renewed: the Indian Act From 1951 Forward

p.99 – A report released by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 2014 marks the first time that police in Canada have attempted, at the national level, to identify how many First Nationals, Inuit, and Metis women and girls have been murdered or have gone missing – a problem that has been common knowledge in affected communities for many years. According to the report, 1,017 women and girls identified as Aboriginal were murdered between 1980 and 2012 – a homicide rate roughly four and a half times higher than that of all other women in Canada.

p.101 – The 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide or the “Genocide Convention,” Article 2e, declares that the forcible transfer of children from a protected group to another group is an act that amounts to genocide when it is conducted “with intent to destroy” the group “as such,” at least “in part” by “forcibly removing children and raising them in a foreign environment.” These terms clearly described the residential schools in Canada, and because the last residential schools did not close until the 1990s, Canada was in clear violation of the Genocide Convention.

p.102 – The Act of State Doctrine states that “a Nation is sovereign within its own borders and its domestic actions may not be questioned in the courts of another nation.” Canada realized that if they gave the Indians voting rights, then the residential-schools issue would become a domestic issue and the Indians would not be able to take the government of Canada to international court.

p.109 – We had the opportunity at one point to get rid of the Indian Act. This was when Pierre Elliott Trudeau was prime minister and Jean Chrétien was his minister of Indian Affairs. In 1969 they came up with the “White paper” that rejected the concept of special status for Aboriginal people within Confederation. They said that because Canada was a “Just Society,” the government should remove distinctions between Indians and other Canadians. That included doing away with any treaties that Canada had with the Aboriginal nations. The government argued that Aboriginal and treaty rights were irrelevant in today’s society.

[Abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great overview of Indigenous relations with “canada” over a significant period of time. Told through the lens of some great folks, with intense histories that have lasted generations.

[Thomas Land · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 Stars/ 85%

A really eloquent and heart rending tour through the history of oppression in Canada against the aboriginal First Nations, what has been done to suppress them, and what they are doing to stake their claim on history and the land that was once theirs.

Moving, sobering, and made me look at the Canadian landscape in a whole new lens.

[Marg Gorrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an interesting and easy-to-read book that conveys complex material in a straight forward fashion. A nice blend of the legislative context and Sellars' own experiences throughout recent decades of change. It helps me learn about federal and British Columbian policies that thwart not only First Nations development but Canadian development. It influences how I hear mainstream media coverage of news involving First Nations. For example, the Globe and Mail coverage of last week's announced federal government approval of the proposed Petronas LNG plant, in which the journalist notes the complexities of decision making in First Nations' creates confusion for industry. The journalist does not criticize the decision making processes of Petronas nor provide any information on how federal laws contribute to complexity in First Nations' decision making. I like how the story told by Sellars has helps me view issues, such as LNG development, from a more well informed perspective.

[Heather Ramsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

“What if you owned a house and a beautiful garden? Would you share it with others? Would you welcome them? . . . What if the newcomers began to fill the house and outnumber your family? Does that make the house theirs?” In Price Paid, Bev Sellars uses metaphor to bring the reality of the colonial juggarnaut that rolled over Indigenous lands to the reader’s attention. Deeply personal, with many anecdotes from her private life and her 12 years as chief of the Xat’sull (Soda Creek) First Nation, Sellars keeps the reader engaged and pushes them to take action. “Now that you know, you can’t turn a blind eye,” she says.

[Artemis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the information/terminology is a bit outdated now, and that is the only reason I wouldn't give this a higher rating.

Good book highlighting the various issues that Canada has had over its existence, and the impact this has had on Indigenous communities.

[Vontel]

At p 43, need to return to library. Will need to re-request. Always remember in any powerful book, there is a writer's bias and purpose.

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book should be part of our school curriculum.

[Norman Feliks Jezioranski · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every Canadian ought to read this book. You can read my review on the Broken Pencil website. http://www.brokenpencil.com/news/29213

[Rachel Anne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bev Sellers is great author, speaker and activist. This book puts Aboriginal issues into an easy to understand format and context. I think her work should honestly be mandatory reading in Canada.

[Coatesj · Rating 5 out of 5]

So informative and factual. It was good to learn new things; answered some important questions about our history and our future.

[Tara Borin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engagingly written and wide-ranging history of Indigenous people. Essential reading.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an eye-opening read. It infuriates and disgusts me how many political barriers and red tape indigenous people have had and continue to face in order to get what is rightly theirs. The cycle of poverty seems impossible to get out of when government officials and programs are just holding them back. Destruction of land and wildlife has always distressed me, but this painted an even darker picture - it is all extremely disheartening and frustrating. I think having these issues explicitly laid out for me was exactly what I needed. The calls for action in the TRC report now hold a lot more meaning.

I think this book could have benefited from a few more pictures, another round of editing, and I have to admit that the legal section had my eyes glazing over a bit (which is too bad, because it was close to the end and almost made me lower my rating. However, the book is structured chronologically, and it needed to be included - it’s just not exactly thrilling), but it’s a definite must read. A good companion to the TRC report summary.

[Jaysen Huculak · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you're Canadian you should read this.

This is a relatively short read that is packed with information and perspective on how first nations have been treated. This provides context on the ongoing injustices. Each chapter has an introduction using house guests and their behavior as a metaphor for how newcomers have treated first nations.

I learned so much even in the first chapter; "Indian Givers". It describes the VAST number of things that the indigenous peoples of the Americas have provided the world and yet have not profited from. The fact that the US constitution was influenced heavily by the Iroquois Constitution is fascinating to me. Food, land, water, culture, art, government. All of these things have been shared by and then stolen from them.

After so much help and trade was given, I do wonder at how many things we could have learned from these great cultures. If we support, listen and learn we still can.

[Gary Horst · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another important book helping us understand the First Nations experience in what is called Canada.
A few sentences from her concluding chapter:
"My point in all of this is that we do not have these social problems in Aboriginal communities today because we are !Aboriginal. It is because we are human, and we have experienced traumas. I have used Malcolm X's quote many times as a response when people so quickly condemn Aboriginal people for supposed weaknesses. He said, 'I have no respect for a society that will crush a man and then criticize him for not being able to stand up under the weight.'"

[Brenda Benham · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the most impactful book I have ever read. Combining the author’s personal experiences with the legislative framework was fascinating. I particularly loved the thought provoking questions that opened each section. This should be required reading in every high school and university. I would encourage every Canadian whether school age or not to read this book to understand the perspective of Aboriginal people in Canada.

[Eric Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pedantic and didactic to a fault at times. Awesome personal and historical insights. First half is very basic knowledge of issues and history for anyone well read and experienced in Indigenous history and current affairs. Informative nonetheless overall.

[Yaldaz Sadakova · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every non-Aboriginal Canadian should read this. It's a very informative book, and it's written in an accessible way, even though it references a lot of legal details.

[Shainu · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great oral history tying in with the Indian Act. So many facts I didn't know and believe should be part of the school curriculum.

[Dani · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for anyone, but especially for any Canadian. It was the perfect book to really introduce you to the entire situation. Starting at the beginning, Sellars explains the relationship with Indigenous people to the land and then the newcomers and all the way to current (at the time of publishing). Its well written and i have to say, I commend her ability to remain compassionate and caring because that's incredibly difficult to do when there's so much righteous rage. Beautifully told, educational, and helpful. This should be required reading in schools.