Frontier Justice: Colonial Govemmentalities and 19th Century "Law and Order" in the North-West. by Jeffrey Monaghan A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Affairs in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Legal Studies Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario © 2011 Jeffrey Monaghan Library and Archives Bibliotheque et 1*1 Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-81638-7 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-81638-7 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduce, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distribute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non­ support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. 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While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. 1+1 Canada Abstract I define "frontier justice" as the ordering of frontier according to the normative values of settler colonialism. Detailing materials surrounding the 1885 North-West Rebellion, I examine "colonial governmentalities" that shaped early colonial strategies in Canada's North-West Territories. Developing on ideas of Foucault's, I argue that colonial governmentalities balance techniques of sovereign as well as biopolitical power in the process of ordering the frontier. In particular, this demonstrates how indigenous populations are incorporated by processes of state formation and categorized along a continuum of "good" and "bad" conduct. While the settlement of the Canadian prairies is often depicted through myths of "empty origins" or as a "bloodless revolution," the transformation of the North-West was replete with violence and injustice. Reviewing archival records helps interrogate practices at work in the North-West and, in revealing how frontier justice is not remote or historical, demonstrates the continuity of these rationalities in the colonial present. i Table of Contents Chapter One: Conceptualizing Frontier Justice 1 Introduction Frontiers, Sovereignty, Jurisdiction Foucault, Populations, and the Apparatus of Security Race/Racism, Colonial Governmentality, Normalizing Society Why a "Canadian" Account of "Frontier Justice"? Chapter Outline Chapter Two: To Feed Them or Fight Them: Dangerousness, Internal Enemies, and Biopower 35 The Frontier Context: Indian Policy in the Prairies, 1870-1885 Peter Ballendine: Surveillance and Dangerousness in the Frontier The Craig Incident, 1884 To Feed Them or Fight Them: Discussion and Analysis Chapter Three: Mounties in the Frontier: Circulations, Anxieties, Myths 76 The North-West Mounted Police and the 1885 Rebellion Patrols and Lookouts Otherness in the Frontier Settler and Police Anxieties Frontier Justice: NWMP Patrols, Law's Violence, and Mountie Myths Conclusion: Frontier Justice: Past and Present 112 Frontier Justice and the Colonial Present Bibliography 126 ii Chapter One Conceptualizing Frontier Justice "Under no circumstances should one pay attention to those who tell one: 'Don't criticize, since you're not capable of carrying out reform.' That's ministerial cabinet talk. Critique doesn't have to be the premise of a deduction which concludes: this then is what needs to be done. It should be an instrument for those who fight, those who resist what is. Its use should be in processes of conflict and confrontations, essays in refusal. It doesn't have to lay down the law for the law... It is a challenge to what is." -Michel Foucault.' Introduction Accounts of Canadian history invariably valorize certain icons of Canadiana: the peacekeeper, the pioneer, the Mountie. Self-congratulory and ubiquitous, these narratives represent the "foundational fictions" - in the words of Doris Sommer (1991) - of Canada's colonial imaginary. Dominant accounts of Canadian identity reflect histories that celebrate open and unclaimed nature, the "discovery" of land, pioneering spirits, or the romantic coexistence of les coureurs des bois (Francis, 1997). Legal and historical professions in particular have incorporated foundational fictions as the basis of their institutional cultures (Knafla, 2005). Unfortunately, however, legacies of inequality and injustice that stem from Canada's practices of settler colonialism are rarely addressed. Although a healthy critical scholarship contrasts mythologies of Canadiana with less celebratory histories of European settlement/conquest, these critical portrayals often do not enter dominant representations of Canadian identity. This study contributes to vital efforts that grapple with the unfolding implications of settler society, presenting an alternative to the dominant imagination of Canada as a country that, in the words of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, has "no history of colonialism."2 ' Foucault, 1991b:84. 2 Prime Minister Harper made these comments during a news conference at G20 meetings in Pittsburgh, USA, in September, 2009. While detailing Canadian virtues he said: "We also have no history of colonialism. So we have all of the things that many people admire about the great powers but none of the 1 Contributing to the field of "colonial governmentalities" (Scott, 1995; 1999; 2005),3 my research presents a particular way to interpret colonial policies of conquest. I focus on various strategies and instrumentalities - through the ideas of Michael Foucault - that were deployed in domesticating the Western frontiers in Canada.4 Looking specifically at the period of time immediately surrounding the North-West Rebellion of 1885,1 examine archival records that speak directly to the emergence of particular practices of colonial power that unfolded within this unique period of time and space. Within the framework of "Frontier Justice" outlined herein, I examine colonial programs that target indigenous people as a particular subject-population to be imagined, disciplined, rewarded, governed. Moreover, I treat conquest as a process of normalization: where colonialism establishes the norms of settler society. Subsequently, expressions of indigeneity - culture, language, self-determination, i.e. behaviours and practices - are perceived as dangers or "internal enemies" (Foucault, 2003) to the prosperity of the settler state. These dangers and abnormalities are then targetted by processes of ordering and neutralization. Canada's newly formed North-West Territories are an ideal site to explore processes of ordering and state formation. The North-West Rebellion was an armed uprising that spread across Manitoba and the North-West in the spring and summer of things that threaten or bother them." The comments were widely reported and, subsequently, indigenous leaders demanded an apology from the Prime Minister. Harper offered no apology. 3 Scott (1995) was an article that appeared in the journal Social Text. The article was slightly refined to become the introduction of his 1999 book Refashioning Futures: Criticism after Postcoloniality. That introduction was subsequently reprinted in Inda (2005). Throughout this thesis I cite primarily from his work presented first in the Social Text article (1995). 4 Scott (1995; 1999; 2005) cued the term "colonial governmentality", which has produced a very small literature (see Dutton, 2010; Ibrahim, 1997; Kalpagam, 2002; Kalpagam, 2000; Legg, 2005). This is particularly evident in contrast to the very broad post-Foucault "governmentality" literature (see Rose et al, 2006). Although my project adopts Scott's theoretical framework of "colonial governmentality," 1 prefer to use a plural "colonial governmentalities" in recognition of the complex and sometimes contradictory nature that animate strategies of rule. 2 1885. It is associated mostly commonly with the unsuccessful declaration of an independent government led by Louis Riel (as well as Riel's subsequent execution). More broadly, I discuss the Rebellion, as well as the Canadian government's manipulative response, as the culmination of a 15-year effort, largely under Prime Minister John A. Macdonald's National Policy, to transform the vast territories of Rupert's Land into the settler dominion of Canada and suppress Indian