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12. “Recovering from Colonization”, supra note 2 at 34–
35.
13. Ibid.
14. Ibid at 46–47.
15. Department of Indian Affairs, circular dated October
21, 1918.
16. February 26, 1919 letter from JD McLean, Asst
Deputy and Secretary to Bishop of Victoria.
17. The Honourable HI Bird, “Some Early Personalities of
Bench and Bar: An Address by the Honourable Chief
Justice H.I. Bird” (1964) 22 Advocate 177 at 180.
18. “Romance of Indian Life: Marriage Customs of North
Tribe Have Bearing on Conviction”, Vancouver Daily
Province (10 February 1919).
19. Ibid. This is not the only story regarding Lyons and a
car. At one point in his career, Lyons practised out of
“an old high topped limousine motor car of doubtful
vintage”, which had apparently been his fee in one
case; during the Depression, he was “quite prepared
to take his fee in any form if cash was not available.
Hence the office, watches, false teeth, or anything
else that might later be redeemed”: Bird, supra note
17 at 180.
20. DeBeck wrote in his undated memorandum: “Of
course such an agreement is farcical on the face of it
– an agreement not to commit an offence against the
law. Why the very fact such an agreement is considered
implies that in the absence of the agreement
they might break the law! It is simply another
instance of the half-hearted enforcement of the law
(s 149).” DeBeck’s father had been an Indian agent
and DeBeck himself, then of the Vancouver firm
Dickie & DeBeck, later became Superintendent of
Brokers and then Clerk of the House (Legislative
Assembly of British Columbia): “Bench and Bar”
(1949) 7 Advocate 11.
21. There may be some issue with how the terms of the
agreement were translated for those signatories who
did not speak fluent English. One of the polarizing
figures in these events is the court interpreter, Jane
Constance Cook (Ga’axsta’las): for a nuanced view,
see Robertson, supra note 7. Gloria Cranmer Webster,
OC, describes Mrs Cook’s role in the prosecution
of the accused for the Cranmer potlatch in “The
Potlatch Collection Repatriation” (1995) UBC L Rev
137 at 138: “When the magistrate asked each of the
accused, ‘How do you plead, guilty or not guilty?’
she translated the question into our language as, ‘He
wants to know, were you there?’ Everyone, of course,
replied, ‘Yes.’”
22. “Charles Marius Barbeau”, Canadian Encyclopedia,
online: <www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/
article/ charles-marius-barbeau>; “Charles Marius
Barbeau”, Wikipedia, online: <en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Marius_Barbeau>.
23. University of Toronto & Université Laval, “Tupper, Sir
Charles Hibbert” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography
, online: <www.biographi.ca/en/bio/tupper_
charles_hibbert_15F.html>.
24. Online: <umistapotlatch.ca/potlatch-eng.php>. See
also Emma Louise Knight, “The Kwakwaka’wakw
Potlatch Collection and Its Many Social Contexts:
Constructing a Collection’s Object Biography” (Masters
of Museum Studies thesis, University of Toronto
Faculty of Information, 2013) at 34, note 6.
25. Halliday, supra note 11 at 191.
26. “Wealthy Red Man Coppered: Process Set the Family
Back $10,000, Chief Justice Hears”, Vancouver
Daily Province (20 January 1922).
27. See e.g. Tina Loo, “Dan Cranmer’s Potlatch: Law as
Coercion, Symbol and Rhetoric in British Columbia,
1884-1951” (1992) 73:2 Canadian Historical
Review 124.
28. Knight, supra note 24 at 32.
29. Douglas Cole & Ira Chaikin, An Iron Hand Upon the
People: The Law Against the Potlatch on the Northwest
Coast (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd,
1990) at 119 Cole & Chaikin, Iron Hand.
30. Cranmer Webster, supra note 21 at 138.
31. Cole & Chaikin, Iron Hand, supra note 29 at 119.
32. Knight, supra note 24 at 32.
33. Christopher Bracken, The Potlatch Papers: A Colonial
Case History (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1997) at 123. See also Daisy (My-yah-nelth)
Sewid-Smith, Prosecution or Persecution (Ny-Yum-
Beleess Society, 1979) at 4.
34. RCMP Crime Report (19 April 1922).
35. Joy Inglis & Harry Assu, Assu of Cape Mudge: Recollections
of a Coastal Indian Chief (Vancouver: UBC
Press, 1989) at 104, as quoted in Knight, supra note
24 at 33.
36. Sewid-Smith, supra note 33 at 4.
37. Cole & Chaikin, Iron Hand, supra note 29 at 122.
38. Sewid-Smith, supra note 33 at 57 (setting out the recollections
of Herbert Martin).
39. Ibid at 54–63; “Recovering from Colonization”,
supra note 2 at 56. Apart from degradations of
prison came others associated with Oakalla having
a farm. As Herbert Martin recounted, “To my surprise
I saw the Chieftains of the Kwakiutl, Highyahlth
kin (John Whonnok). Whonnock was feeding
the pigs. Also Billy McDuff was feeding the pigs.
James Knox the youngest was with them. Three of
them were feeding the pigs. Imagine! the great
Chieftains of the Kwakiutl degraded to feeding pigs”:
Sewid-Smith, supra note 33 at 61.
40. Sewid-Smith, supra note 33 at 63.
41. “Recovering from Colonization”, supra note 2 at 56.
42. Sewid-Smith, supra note 33 at 6.
43. Knight, supra note 24 at 3–4, 43.
44. Potlatch and Totem, supra note 11 at 192–93.
45. Knight, supra note 24 at 3–4.
46. Douglas Cole & Ira Chaikin, “A Worse than Useless
Custom: The Potlatch Law and Indian Resistance”
(1992) 5:2 W Legal Hist 187 at 209–10; Cranmer
Webster, supra note 21 at 139. In Potlatch and
Totem, supra note 11 at 194, Halliday remarked, in
what sounds like somewhat of a begrudging tone,
that while individual delivery of gifts did not attract
prosecution, “there was no éclat attached to the one
who gave it, and the affair would fall very flat”.
47. Cranmer Webster, supra note 21 at 139.
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