Tangled Webs of History: Indians and the Law in Canada's Pacific Coast Fisheries

John Van West is a policy analyst at the Ontario Native Affairs
Secretariat.

This study explores how government policy and the law have affected the
involvement of the aboriginal people of British Columbia in Canada’s
Pacific Coast fisheries. Newell’s book breaks new ground in its
examination of the decline of these aboriginal peoples’ participation
in fisheries to which they have persistently claimed a continuing
aboriginal title. British Columbia’s fisheries were arguably never
surrendered by them; yet as industrial fishing interests gained a
central berth along the Pacific Coast, the interests of capital and the
state began to converge. This was to result in the criminalization of
aboriginal fisheries that were harvested for food, trade, barter, and
ceremonial purposes. Since the development of Canada’s industrial
fisheries, British Columbia’s Native peoples, along with Native
peoples in other provinces, have been legally restricted to harvesting
fish for food only.

This extraordinary book tells a sorrowful story of the progressive
marginalization of British Columbia’s First Peoples. It is not,
however, a book written without hope. Recent court decisions concerning
aboriginal fishing rights have, with some exceptions, adjudicated in
favor of the aboriginal plaintiffs. These decisions have been
fundamental in altering the legal landscape in Canada regarding the
aboriginal right to fish. Newell examines how recent case law (in
particular, Regina v. Sparrow and Delgamuukw et al. v. The Queen) has
further defined the nature and scope of aboriginal fishing rights.

Numerous well-laid-out maps depict language groups and place names of
British Columbia’s First Peoples, as well as the site locations of
selected canneries. Illustrations serve to complement and enrich this
reasoned, persuasive, and well-written contribution to the study of
aboriginal fishing rights issues. It should be read.