Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

The Oka Crisis was a land dispute between the Mohawk nation and the town of Oka, Quebec which began on March 11, 1990, and lasted until September 26, 1990. It resulted in three deaths, and would be the first of a number of well-publicised violent conflicts between Indigenous people and the Canadian Government in the late 20th century.

Contents [hide]
1
2 Immediate causes
3 Crisis
4 Resolution
5 Repercussions
6 Legacy
7 See also
8 References
9 External links



[edit]
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The crisis developed from a dispute between the town of Oka and the Mohawk community of Kanesatake. For 260 years, the Mohawk nation had been pursuing a land claim which included a burial ground and a sacred grove of pine trees near Kanesatake, which is one of the oldest hand-planted stands in North America, created by the Mohawks' ancestors. This brought them into conflict with the town of Oka, which was developing plans to expand a golf course onto the disputed land.

In 1717, the governor of New France granted the lands encompassing the cemetery and the pines to a Catholic seminary to hold the land in trust for the Mohawk nation. The Church expanded this agreement to grant themselves sole ownership of the land, and proceeded to sell off the Mohawk peoples' land and timber. In 1868, one year after Confederation, the chief of the Oka Mohawk people, Joseph Onasakenrat, wrote a letter to the Church condemning them for illegally holding their land and demanding its return. The petition was ignored. In 1869, Onasakenrat returned with a small armed force of Mohawks and gave the missionaries eight days to return the land. The missionaries called in the police, who imprisoned the Mohawks. In 1936, the seminary sold the remaining territory and vacated the area. These sales were also protested vociferously by the Mohawks, but the protests produced no results.[1]

In 1961, a nine-hole golf course, le Club de golf d'Oka, was built on land claimed by the Mohawk People, who launched a legal protest against construction. Yet, by the time the case was heard, much of the land had already been cleared and construction had begun on a parking lot and golf greens adjacent to the Mohawk cemetery.

In 1977, the band filed an official land claim with the federal Office of Native Claims regarding the land. The claim was accepted for filing, and funds were provided for additional research of the claim. Nine years later, the claim was finally rejected for failing to meet key criteria. [2]

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Immediate causes
The mayor of Oka, Jean Ouellette, announced in 1989 that the remainder of the pines would be cleared to expand the members-only golf club's course to eighteen holes. Sixty luxury condominiums were also planned to be built in a section of the pines. The town of Oka stood to make money from the expansion and Mayor Ouellette was a member of the private club that stood to benefit most. However, none of these plans were made in consultation with the Mohawks.

As a protest against a court decision which allowed the golf course construction to proceed, some members of the Mohawk community erected a barricade blocking access to the area in question. Mayor Ouellette demanded compliance with the court order, but the protestors refused. Quebec's Minister for Native Affairs John Ciaccia wrote a letter of support for the natives, stating that "these people have seen their lands disappear without having been consulted or compensated, and that, in my opinion, is unfair and unjust, especially over a golf course."

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Crisis

Mohawk warrior stands atop an overturned Sûreté du Québec car as part of the barricadeDespite the letter, the mayor asked the Sûreté du Québec to intervene on July 11, citing Mohawk criminal activity around the barricade. The Mohawk people, in accordance with the Constitution of the Iroquois Confederacy, asked the women, the caretakers of the land and "progenitors of the nation", whether or not the arsenal they had amassed should remain. The women decreed that the weapons should be used only if the Sûreté du Québec opened fire first.

A police SWAT team swiftly attacked the barricade deploying tear gas canisters and flashbang grenades in an attempt to create confusion in the Mohawk ranks. It is unclear whether the police or Mohawks opened fire with gunshots first, but after a thirty-second firefight the police fell back, abandoning six cruisers and a bulldozer. During the gun battle, 31 year old Corporal Marcel Lemay of the Sûreté du Québec was shot in the face and died a short while later. After the funeral a few days later, the SQ and the Mohawks lowered their flags to half-mast. The Mohawks sent condolences but refused to accept responsibility for the death, blaming Mayor Ouellette for ordering the armed assault on the blockade.


Native Indians from the Seton Lake Indian Band blockade the BC Rail line in support of Oka, while an RCMP officer looks on.The situation escalated as the local Mohawks were joined by natives from across Canada and the United States. The natives refused to dismantle their barricade and the Sûreté du Québec established their own blockades to restrict access to Oka and Kanesatake. Other Mohawks at Kahnawake, in solidarity with the Kanesatake Mohawks, blockaded the Mercier Bridge between the Island of Montreal and the South Shore suburbs at the point where it passed through their territory. At the peak of the crisis, the Mercier Bridge and highways 132, 138 and 207 were all blocked. Enormous traffic jams and frayed tempers resulted as the crisis dragged on.

The Canadian federal government agreed to spend 5.3 million dollars to purchase the section of the pines where the expansion was to take place, to prevent any further development. This exchange left the Mohawks outraged as the problems that led to the situation had not been addressed - ownership of the land had simply moved from one level of government to another.

Racial hatred occasionally broke through the surface of the crisis as traffic frustration at the blockades grew into anger. The flames were fanned by radio host Gilles Proulx who repeatedly reminded his listeners that the Mohawks "couldn't even speak French" and the federal Member of Parliament for Chateauguay said that all the natives in Quebec should be shipped off to Labrador "if they wanted their own country so much".


Mohawk warrior Ronald "Lasagne" Cross confronts 'Van Doo' perimeter sentry while surrounded by mediaWhen it was apparent that the Sûreté du Québec had lost control of the situation, the RCMP was brought in but were soon overwhelmed by the Mohawks and mobs created by the blocked traffic. Ten constables were hospitalized and on 14 August Quebec premier Robert Bourassa requisitioned the assistance of the Canadian Forces in "aid to the civil power" by invoking the National Defence Act. Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney was reluctant, but had no choice as it was Bourassa's right under the Act to employ the military when required to maintain law and order, the same as Bourassa had done with earlier Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in the October Crisis in 1970. The Chief of the Defence Staff, General John de Chastelain accordingly placed Quebec-based troops in support of the provincial authorities. Some 2500 regular and reserve troops from the 34th and 35th Canadian Brigade Groups and the 5th Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group were put on notice and, on the morning of 20 August, 33 troops of the Quebec-based Royal 22e Regiment, the 'Van Doos', led by Major Alain Tremblay took three barricades and arrived at the final blockade leading to the disputed area. The Sûreté du Québec had established a no man's land of one and a half kilometres between themselves and the barricade at the Pines, but the army pushed this to within five metres.

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Resolution
On August 29, at the Mercier Bridge blockade, the Mohawks negotiated an end to their protest with Lieutenant Colonel Robin Gagnon, 'Van Doo' commander on the South Shore of Montreal. Then the siege of the Kahnawake reserve was over. The Mohawks at Oka felt betrayed at the loss of their most effective bargaining chip, for once traffic was flowing again, the Quebec government rejected all further negotiations.

On September 25, the final engagement of the crisis took place when a Mohawk warrior walked around the perimeter with a long stick, setting off the flares the army had set up to warn them of any escapes from the area. The army turned a hose on the man, but the hose lacked enough pressure to disperse a crowd. The Mohawks taunted the soldiers and then started throwing water balloons at them. Some Canadian soldiers responded by returning intact water balloons and a playful water fight ensued.

By September 26 the Mohawks had had enough. They dismantled their guns and threw them in a septic tank, ceremonially burned tobacco and then walked out of the pines and back to the reservation. Many were arrested by the army.

The Oka Crisis lasted seventy-eight days and resulted in the death of SQ Corporal Marcel Lemay. Two other deaths have also been indirectly attributed to the crisis: Joe Armstrong, a seventy-one-year-old World War II veteran who had died of a stress-induced heart attack after a confrontation with an angry Quebecois crowd; and an elderly Quebecois man who died after being exposed to tear gas on July 11.[citation needed]

The golf-course expansion, which had originally triggered the situation, was cancelled. The Oka Crisis eventually precipitated the development of Canada's First Nations Policing Policy.

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Repercussions
International response to the Oka Crisis was harsh. The International Federation of Human Rights has criticized the tactics of both the SQ and the Canadian Army.[citation needed] Amnesty International raised allegations of torture and abuses following the final arrest of six of the Mohawk people, and added Canada to its list of human rights violators.[citation needed]

Mayor of Oka, Jean Ouellette was reelected in a landslide victory in 1991 and said of the crisis, "If I had to do it all again, I would," citing his responsibilities as mayor.[citation needed]

A few years after the crisis, the Mohawks of Kahnawake established the Kahnawake Gaming Commission and started issuing "licences" to gambling operators who host their Internet gaming websites on their reserve. Both the Canadian and Quebec governments dispute the legality of this operation, but have not risked taking further action. The websites hosted by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission are the only gambling sites that have operated in North America without legal action being taken against them.

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Legacy
Canadian filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin has made several documentaries about the Oka Crisis, including Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance (1993) and Rocks at Whiskey Trench (2000). Another documentary by Alex MacLeod, called Acts of Defiance, also came out in 1993. All of these documentaries were produced by Canada's National Film Board.

Micheal Baxendale and Craig MacLaine have written a book on the crisis, This Land Is Our Land: The Mohawk Revolt at Oka. Geoffrey York and Loreen Pindera's People of the Pines: The people and the Legacy of Oka (1991) is considered the definitive text on the subject. Gerald R. Alfred, a Kahnawake Mohawk who was part of the band council during the crisis, and who later went on to become a professor of Political Science, wrote Heeding the Voices of our Ancestors: Kahnawake Mohawk Politics and the Rise of Native Nationalism (1995), based on his dissertation.

Robin Philpot has also written a book about the way the crisis was used as a political tool for English Canada, following the failed Meech Lake Accord: Oka: dernier alibi du Canada anglais (1991)

Canadian punk band Propagandhi recorded a song about the Oka Crisis for their 1998 release Where Quantity Is Job #1. The song was entitled "I Would Very Much Like to See What Happened in Oka in 1990 Happen Everywhere", and, as the title would indicate, praised the actions of the Mohawk people.

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Re: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Were the Oka Warriors, terrorists or just that, warriors protecting their nation when they were pushed to far.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

I have some sympathy for the MOhawks at Oka, they had reason to believe they had been ripped off. And the idiot major of the town, crying to the Surete du Quebec until THAT bunch of morons did a frontal assault, getting one of their own killed.

I also think the Indians were perfectly correct in their occupation of Ipperwash.

This latest mess, however, is just grandstanding. The bloody cops ought to get in there and kick some ass.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Natives are increasingly on the march in Canada and the locals are nervous. Canuck governments dither, can't take an unequivocal stand on any important issue and generally sit on their hands as their people suffer. Another reason why Canada is more involved in international 'peacekeeping' efforts. They offset the country's entirely clueless record at home.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

We will never see justice served in retribution for Mike Harris' involvement in Ipperwash which should be labelled Harriswhitewash.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Something has to be done to accelerate settlements and land claims etc. in Canada. Maybe then we can put pressure on the natives themselves to clean up their act, be better parents, be more supportive of their children's education, set a better role model at home. And get on with their lives. At the moment in reserves across the nation victimhood is the dominant culture. What the hell good is that?

Re: RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

As a son of the Six Nations, Onondaga, Klan of the Bear. Let me just explain a few things about our "victomhood".

Your comment was just a tad generalized. If I were to say the same about the African Canadian community, I would have a brand new hole torn in me for being racist.

I as a Native, I don't seem to live up to your generalization. I own my own business. My kids look up to me, I have done everything in my power to further their dreams and goals, like joining the Canadian Armed forces. My oldest strives to become a Pilot in the Air Force, my youngest has asperations of joining the Army.

I know you didn't say it, but we don't have alcohol in our home and all our gasoline goes in engines not "ingin's".

I was raised with the traditional ways. Maybe that's why I'm one of the lucky ones.

I am more then well aware of the corruption in our form of Government. I've seen it first hand and I have tried to fight it. The Federal Government seems to turn a blind eye to it and that just helps keep us down.

The leaders that want to change the status quo for the better are chastized and smeared. The leaders that are corrupt and have run their brothers into the ground, seem to have the undying support of the Government at every level.

As for Caladonia. Another mess created by dithering politians that ring their hands and watch and wait for their chance to make a sound bite that only bennefits themselves.

People need to see a northern rez and then they can actually comment on what the Native people themselves need to do about themselves. It's really hard to do much more then self-medicate, when you are 500 miles from nowhere and live on baron rock.

That's not to say that all Rez's are the same, they're not. But the stereotypes people focus on, come from those reservation that are isolated by wilderness and distance.

We are not without our own faults and misgivings, but many of us have strived to grow beyond the stereotypes and gone back to help those that can't help themselves. Generalizations only serve to hinder the process.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

If you're setting the example you say you are then you deserve praise. Granted the statements made about reserves are generalizations but they're also true. And I've said the same thing about Jamaican family groups and those statements are also true. We need more individuals like you in both communities to get things moving quickly in the right direction. Victimhood is a popular pastime of a number of Canadian communities and has been the signature cultural movement of the politically correct.
Interesting that you brought up the issue of isolated northern reserves. Can they ever offer their people more? Increasingly a push for integration is afoot in the land. If problems are to be solved we do need creative solutions. What say you?

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

I say on many levels it is time to rethink the reservation way of life and the policy of handouts.

The hardest part to over come is, some Native communities are so isolated that removing them would be like asking a fish to move to Time Square.

The way of life is to indelably eched into the peoples very being. It would take so much time, effort and money to begin a transformation via education of the next generation to enter school, as to be restrictive.

That and you would need to rid the system of the politians and corrupt leaders that have created and industry of plight and struggle within the communities to further their own agendas and ensure job protection.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

The way ahead will be rough but it has to be taken. I remain surprised that natives still can't understand that education alone would be a tremendous leap ahead. If a pool of energetic young natives could just stay in school, graduate and then offer their skills to transform their communities and draw investment, integration might not be an alternative at all. Until education becomes the goal of reserve life and families a lot that could be done won't.
I'd like to see education marketed more aggressively on reserves and rewards given to those who stay the course.
There has to be a way to alter traditional patterns and prepare the path for many others to follow.

Re: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Where i reside there is a large amount of native people who have taken higher secondary education and alot have become teachers and other people of high positions. And in Nunavut they just had their first class of Native lawyers graduate.

Now there are some who continue to have problems, with alcoholism, victimhood, and with relations to drugs and crime, a small reserve in Alberta for example, but that is because most Aboriginals now adays were not able to live in the traditional ways. And they are lost and until they find their spirituallity and because they don't have their spirituality they are 'lost' and economic prosperity just fuels, drugs, alcoholism, and other vices.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Absolutely Researcher

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

So is it the Natives, who decide to not take responsabilty for their lives that cause us issues? Because thats what I am kinda getting form CDN.

Re: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

No what he is saying is that they have to find themselves and they will step away from alcoholism and crime and all that stuff. He grew up in a traditional family, a strong native family that didn't have problems like alcoholism or residential schools, or not as strongly as others.

And that because he and his family is from a traditional background they can maintain Native heritage which is a connection to mother earth.

And that natives who have delved into crime and addictions and alcohol have to refind their spritituality and it will take a long time and they will begin to get connected and feel as a community again and get rid of the vices.

And that is what some white-Canadians don't get. Money needs to be there but their reconnection to what they had in the past has to occur as well.

Re: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Excellent agreed

Re: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

That is just my interpretation of what Bear is saying. Because that what I have seen when I have taken my FNAT or First Nations courses.

RE: Oka Crisis the first of mny bloody battles

Places I've either lived or visited:

Thunder Bay, Iqaluit, Resolute Bay, Churchill, Rankin Inlet, Arviat, Whale Cove, Kenora, Sioux Lookout, Pikangikum, Deer Lake, Sandy Lake, Sachigo Lake, Big Trout Lake, Weagamow, Bearskin Lake, Akwesasne...

I think I am qualified to offer non-native opinion on various First Nations.

Not all Reservations are alike. Some like Akwesasne had warrior problems. I don't know if they still do.

Researcher, you may want to read this in its entirety:
I don't have a problem with warriors as long as they fight the right battles.

Land rights are usually a righteous cause. Even though Mohawks have treaty rights regarding movement of goods and services, it shouldn't include the right to smuggle tobacco, alcohol, drugs and firearms. But I recognize that's a Mohawk problem, they must resolve or face outside interference from non-Native law enforcement agencies.

NATIVE AMERICAN FREE PASSAGE RIGHTS UNDER THE 1794 JAY TREATY
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I'll admit that the majority of people living in Akwesasne aren't problems to themselves or others. But the same cannot be said of many other First Nations. Some are a disgrace. I don't just mean a disgace to themselves, but a disgrace to Canada.

I can tell a community with substance abuse problems as soon as I walk off the plane. Some are neat and well kept. Others are littered with garbage and vandalized.

Boredom and hopelessness are a deadly combination:

I know what life is like in these communities:

I also believe in self help.

1) It is self sustaining.
2) Outsiders may have good intentions but they don't understand local culture as well as locals.
3) Creates employment.

These types of progams are most likely to be successful.

Most First Nations people still need the reservation system. Many new "property owners" would likely sell their inheritance. Also many First Nations still haven't signed a legal treaty with Canadians. (French, English and Canadian treaties are all legal).

Another problem is that the Canadian government oftens refuses to abide by its legal obligations as per legal treaties.

Until a First Nation has resolved these problems and has demonstrated good governance, the inhabitants of reserves must remain protected.

One last point:

Unemployment/poverty are big problems in the north. In some of these locations, tourism is about the only viable industry. So I'll post these links:

You are not wrong. I can't help but to be ashamed at times of my brothers and sisters. We won't so much, but are so unwilling to make the sacrifices nesseccary to do so.

I shake my head and wonder why we can not just move forward, then I read the tripe spewed forth by people like Dex, and think, that is the catylist. That is the thinking that incites Natives to act out, speak out, in ways not condusive to mature growth and I am just as guilty of taking those very same steps backwards.

On an interesting note, that has some relivance to the OP. I have in my livingroom, hanging on the wall with reverance and resect, a Mohawk Warriors flag that flew over the barricade at Oka. I also have a picture of my cousin Kevin on the lines.

I was warned by my father, that if I set one foot in Oka. I was never to come home. I was given the same instruction during Ipperwash, The lobster stand offs in N.B. and more recently, Caledonia. If I didn't have the responsiblities I have, to my family and my customers. I would likely be in Caledonia. It's another mess, just teeming with ignorance and intolerance, on both sides.

Our brothers and sisters will adapt given time.

(My ancestors all come from Europe as far as I know. But I see this as a Canadian problem too, not just a First Nation problem.)

We all have something to learn and something to teach.

For example:

The Iroquois confederacy was just as important an influence as ancient Roman and Greek democracies on the American Independance movement.

Modern Democratic Institutions around the world grew from the ancient Iroquois confederacy.

Who knows what other benefits may be derived from careful preservation of our First Nations heritage?