What Was La Grande Paix de Montréal?
The roots of the Aboriginal collective rights
in the Charter go back more than three centuries in Canada’s history. These negotiations
may have begun as early as 1697. In 1701, La Grande Paix de Montréal, The Great
Peace of Montréal, was signed.
Gathering to Solving a Problem When
colonists from France settled in North America, they began to trade in furs
with First Nations. The French set up many fur-trading posts in what is now
Québec and Ontario. First Nations who lived there, such as Algonquin and
Ouendat, became their trading partners and allies. Many of these Nations,
however, were enemies of the Oneida, Mohawk, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca who
lived to the south. As a result, there was warfare between the Haudenosaunee
and the French and their allies. The fighting disrupted the fur trade and
threatened the French settlement at Montréal, which at this time was a small
town of about 1200 inhabitants at the crossroads of fur-trading routes. Allies
are people or groups who work together. Words matter! The French had made
several treaties over the years with the Haudenosaunee to try to stop the
warfare and protect their trade. These had all broken down. In 1700, Louis-Hector
de Callière, the Governor of New France, had begun new peace talks with the Haudenosaunee.
Callière decided the only way this peace could work was if France’s First
Nations allies also agreed to it. To give all sides a chance to have input,
Callière sent messengers to approximately 40 First Nations—both the allies and
enemies of New France—inviting them to join in a new political and economic
partnership. The talks would be held in Montréal. Imagine the journey! In the
summer of 1701, some 1300 First Nations representatives travelled hundreds of
kilometres by foot, horseback, and canoe to Montréal. Some of them were ambassadors,
or representatives, and advisors, who had been sent by their Nation to talk
about the treaty. Others brought furs to trade at the summer trading fair.
When they arrived, they set up camp
outside the wooden stockade that surrounded the settlement. The French welcomed
them with great ceremony, and cannons were fired in their honour. Probably more
First Nations people would have attended, but an influenza epidemic broke out.
This disease, brought to North America by European settlers, spread rapidly
among First Nations. Callière’s reporter wrote: “Out of a fleet of a hundred
and eighty canoes... thirty were forced to put in to shore because of illness.”
Each of the First Nations had its own culture and traditions. Even the names of
the Nations told about the unique identity of each one. The Odawa, for example,
lived around the Great Lakes. Their name meant they were traders, a role that
was very important in that location. The Menominee were named for wild rice,
which grew in the region west of Lake Michigan where they lived.
Although First Nation peoples have
always had a strong collective identity, they have also regarded themselves as
individuals. First Nations people value the freedom of each individual to make
decisions without being controlled by someone else. However, it was expected at
this gathering that individuals would use their freedom to act responsibly and
for the good of the community. Consensus and Respect Over a period of two weeks
there were discussions about the terms of La Grande Paix de Montréal. The First
Nations who gathered in Montréal valued discussion, compromise, cooperation,
and consensus. In Chapter 4, you saw how the Iroquois used consensus to make
decisions at the Grand Council. The negotiations in Montréal were held
according to these First Nations traditions.
First Nations leaders and ambassadors who
came to Montréal were chosen because they were skilled at speaking on behalf of
their people. During a meeting, the representative would present a proposal and
try to persuade others to agree.
Everyone listened carefully without
interruption. If anyone had a question, the speaker thought carefully before
giving an answer. If the speaker had to consult with his advisors, the answer
was not given until the next day. Many historians agree that it was the
diplomacy of the First Nations representatives that made the treaty possible. After
considering the arguments, they agreed to give up some of their own wishes to
be fair to everyone involved. In this way, they were able to reach consensus on
the final terms of the treaty.
The
treaty was signed on August 4, 1701.
These
were its main terms:
1. The Nations agreed to be allies and
not make war on each other.
2. The Nations agreed that they could
all use the hunting grounds north and west of Lake Ontario.
3. In the case of any future
disagreements, all sides agreed that the French governor would have the
responsibility to settle them.
After the signing of La Grande Paix de
Montréal, Governor Callière gave each ambassador a wampum of the treaty to bring
back to his Nation. Callière and other French officials also invited the First
Nations ambassadors to smoke tobacco in a calumet.
La Grande Paix and the Charter La
Grande Paix de Montréal was a treaty that was written through respectful
negotiation. The negotiations and terms
of the treaty show that a number of important principles and beliefs were
shared by the parties that signed it.
• Each First Nation and the French were
recognized as equal and independent nations that had the right to make their own
decisions.
• The collective identity and
collective rights of each party that signed the treaty were recognized and
respected.
• The right of the First Nations to
their traditional territory was recognized by all parties to the peace treaty.
Over the centuries, as the First
Nations people and Francophones became minorities in Canada, many of their
collective rights were taken away and their collective identities were not
protected by law. Eventually many
Canadians saw that First Nation peoples and Francophones had been treated
unfairly. When the Charter was introduced in 1982, it offered a chance to correct past injustices to the First Nations.
For the first time treaty rights and the
rights of Canada’s first peoples were entrenched in the Constitution. They
could never be taken away again.
This encouraged First Nations and Inuit
across Canada to bargain with the federal government for the right to govern
themselves and to control their own lands. Remembering La Grande Paix In the
summer of 2001, the people of Montréal celebrated the 300-year-old treaty. They
marked the occasion with a reenactment that allowed them to take a new look at
an event that had almost been forgotten. An exhibition gave members of the
public a chance to see the actual treaty document as well as other artifacts
from the time. Newspapers called La Grand Paix de Montréal Canada’s first
multicultural gathering. They wrote about how different cultures had met to
work out a creative solution to their problems.
