Alexander Morris

The Treaties of Canada with the Indians of Manitoba and the North West Territories Alexander Morris

The Council of Keewatin was an unelected legislative body and territorial government for the District of Keewatin in Canada. Lieutenant Governor Alexander Morris convinced the government that the new territorial government of the North West Territories would be unable to effectively administer land to the north and east of Manitoba. The preface reads, ôThe question of the relations of the Dominion of Canada to the Indians of the North-West, is one of great practical importance The work, of obtaining their good will, by entering into treaties of alliance with them, has now been completed in all the region from Lake Superior to the foot of the Rocky Mountains. As an aid to the other and equally important duty--that of carrying out, in their integrity, the obligations of these treaties, and devising means whereby the Indian population of the Fertile Belt can be rescued from the hard fate which otherwise awaits them, owing to the speedy destruction of the buffalo, hitherto the principal food supply of the Plain Indians, and that they may be induced to become, by the adoption of agricultural and pastoral pursuits, a self supporting community--I have prepared this collection of the treaties made with them, and of information, relating to the negotiations, on which these treaties were based, in the hope that I may thereby contribute to the completion of a work, in which I had considerable part, that, of, by treaties, securing the good will of the Indian tribes, and by the helpful hand of the Dominion, opening up to them, a future of promise, based upon the foundations of instruction and the many other advantages of civilized life.ö