aboriginal policy studies aps Article Daniels vs. Canada: Origins, Intentions, Futures Joseph Eliot Magnet, Professor, Faculty of Law University of Ottawa aboriginal policy studies Vol. 6, no. 2, 2017, pp. 26-47 This article can be found at: http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/aps/article/view/28316 ISSN: 1923-3299 Article DOI: https://doi.org/10.5663/aps.v6i2.28316 aboriginal policy studies is an online, peer-reviewed and multidisciplinary journal that publishes origi- nal, scholarly, and policy-relevant research on issues relevant to Métis, non-status Indians and urban Aboriginal people in Canada. For more information, please contact us at
[email protected] or visit our website at www.nativestudies.ualberta.ca/research/aboriginal-policy-studies-aps. Daniels vs. Canada: Origins, Intentions, Futures Joseph Eliot Magnet1 University of Ottawa On April 14, 2016, the Supreme Court of Canada decided Daniels v. Canada,2 one of the most transformative indigenous constitutional cases, if not the most transformative case, of this generation. The Daniels decision is the culmination of a 17-year legal odyssey that began in 1999. The case is unusual in that plaintiffs sought and obtained a declaration as to constitutional authority as a means to reconstruct the situation of Non-Status Indige- nous (NSI) people in Canada. In the pages that follow, I will describe the issues that motivated a national Aboriginal organization to seek this atypical remedy. I will explain why the plaintiffs believed that a declaration as to constitutional jurisdiction was necessary to alleviate the underdevelopment that typifies Non-Status Aboriginal people in Canada (NSI slightly outnumber Status Indians).