Since the publication of Talk Treaty to Me: Understanding the Basics of Treaties and Land in Canada, I have spent a great deal of time talking about treaties with audiences across Canada, and I have enjoyed every moment of it. Unsurprisingly, people often ask remarkably similar questions. They want to know what treaties are, why they matter today and what treaty relationships mean in practice.
Earlier this month, The Quad published Florence Glanfield’s “Understanding the Concept of Treaty,” which encouraged readers to think about treaty as an ongoing relationship rather than a historical event. Yet one question surfaces repeatedly in my own conversations: if treaties were supposed to establish respectful relationships between Indigenous Peoples and newcomers, how do we reconcile that history with the Indian Act? This year, that question is urgent.
In 2026, both Treaty 6 and the Indian Act mark their 150th anniversaries. This overlap is striking. One commemorates a treaty relationship that First Nations continue to uphold and renew. The other marks the passage of legislation that became one of the most significant instruments of colonial control and genocide in Canadian history. How can both be true?
The answer begins by recognizing that treaties and the Indian Act emerged from fundamentally different visions of Indigenous-newcomer relations. Yet for much of the last century and a half, Canadians have viewed treaties through the lens of the Indian Act. In doing so, we have often confused a relationship with a bureaucracy.
Treaty 6 was signed in 1876 between First Nations and representatives of the Crown across what is now central Alberta and Saskatchewan. First Nations leaders entered treaty negotiations seeking to secure the future of their peoples in an uncertain and rapidly changing world.
A growing body of scholarship invites us to think differently about treaties. Cree scholars Gina Starblanket and Matthew Wildcat argue that treaties should be understood as constitutional agreements that continue to structure relationships between Indigenous nations and the Canadian state. Similarly, Shalene Jobin’s work on Indigenous nationhood and governance reminds us that treaties did not erase Indigenous political authority, while Darcy Lindberg challenges Canadians to recognize treaties as living agreements that continue to generate responsibilities in the present.
Taken together, this scholarship represents a profound shift in how many Indigenous and non-Indigenous scholars understand treaties. As Glanfield reminded us, treaty is not merely a document housed in an archive. Treaty is a relationship. It is a framework for living together that creates obligations that extend across generations.
The Indian Act emerged from a very different set of assumptions. Also passed in 1876, the Indian Act was not negotiated. The legislation was imposed by the federal government and consolidated earlier colonial laws designed to regulate First Nations. The distinction is important because treaties and the Indian Act were attempting to accomplish different things. Treaties established relationships between peoples. The Indian Act sought to manage Indians within the Canadian state.
Yet the two became entangled. For generations, many Indigenous Peoples encountered the Crown primarily through Indian Act institutions. Band councils created under the Indian Act became the primary governmental bodies recognized by Ottawa. As a result, the day-to-day experience of treaty was increasingly filtered through colonial administrative structures.
At a recent Yellowhead Institute Fire, Cree legal scholar Sharon Venne argued that amendments to the Indian Act in 1951 further blurred the distinction between treaty and legislation. Treaty beneficiaries increasingly came to be understood through the statutory category of “Status Indian.” As a result, treaty relationships were increasingly interpreted through the administrative machinery of the Indian Act.
When public debates emerge about treaty rights, self-government, land claims, taxation or Indigenous jurisdiction, people frequently conflate treaty relationships with Indian Act administration. They assume that treaties created the systems they see around them. In reality, many of those systems emerged from federal legislation rather than treaty commitments.
This confusion has consequences. When Canadians interpret treaty relationships through Indian Act institutions, treaty itself can become reduced to questions of status, taxation, reserve administration, funding arrangements or federal programs. Important as these issues are, they are not the sum of treaty. Such a narrow understanding obscures the larger questions that treaties were intended to address: how peoples share territory, how relationships are maintained across generations and what responsibilities accompany coexistence.
These are treaty questions. They remain just as relevant today as they were when treaty was first negotiated.
Treaty 6 and the Indian Act were born in the same year, but they pointed toward different futures. One reflected a vision of coexistence rooted in relationships and mutual obligations. The other reflected a vision of administration rooted in hierarchy, control and genocide.
As Canadians reflect on both anniversaries, perhaps the most important task is learning to distinguish between these two legacies. If treaties remain living relationships, as First Nations have long maintained, then treaty is not simply history. It is a framework for the future.
For readers interested in a longer version of this discussion, an expanded essay is available through Shekon Neechie.
