The Nisga'a Final Agreement , also known as the Nisga'a Treaty , is a treaty that was settled between the Nisg̱a'a , the government of British Columbia , and the Government of Canada . It was signed on 27 May 1998 and came into effect on May 11, 2000. As part of the settlement in the Nass River valley nearly 2,000 km (800 sq mi) of land was officially recognized as Nisg̱a'a, and a 300,000 cubic decametres (1.1 × 10 cu ft) (approx. 240,000 acre-feet) water reservation was also created. Bear Glacier Provincial Park was also created as a result of this agreement. Thirty-one Nisga'a placenames in the territory became official names. The land-claim settlement was the first formal modern day comprehensive treaty in the province— the first signed by a First Nation in British Columbia since the Douglas Treaties in 1854 (pertaining to areas on Vancouver Island) and Treaty 8 in 1899 (pertaining to northeastern British Columbia). The agreement gives the Nisga'a control over their land, including the forestry and fishing resources contained in it.
22-623: The agreement was signed on 27 May 1998 by Joseph Gosnell , Nelson Leeson and Edmond Wright of the Nisg̱a'a Nation and by Premier Glen Clark for the Province of British Columbia. Then Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Jane Stewart signed the agreement for the Canadian federal government on 4 May 1999. In 1887, the Nisga'a met with the then-Premier of British Columbia to challenge
44-656: A village while the people of Qoona formed another. This story tells of Gitxon's niece Dzilakons (variously spelled) and her engagement with a prince of the opposite moiety which led to a war between the two sides, spurring the Gitxon people's migration to the Nisga'a homeland on the Nass River , to the Tsimshian villages of Kitkatla and Kitsumkalum , and to the Cape Fox (in Nisga'a Laxsee'le ) tribe of Tlingits in what
66-602: Is now Alaska. Other versions of Gitxon migrations tell of movements from the Charlottes to the Nass, from the Nass to the Charlottes and back again, from Kitsumkalum to the Charlottes and back again, or from Kitselas to Kitamaat to the Charlottes and back again. The Charlottes and Alaska both arise as possible originary points for this group. In 1947, Edmund Patalas ("belonging to the Kitamat tribe at Hartley Bay") described to
88-602: Is the name for the Eagle "clan" (phratry) in the language of the Tsimshian nation of British Columbia , Canada, and southeast Alaska . It is considered analogous or identical to identically named groups among the neighboring Gitksan and Nisga'a nations and also to lineages in the Haida nation. The name Laxsgiik derives from xsgiik, the word for eagle in the Tsimshian, Gitksan, and Nisga'a languages. The chief crest of
110-502: The Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruled for first time, that aboriginal title to land existed prior to the colonization of North America. Thomas Berger successfully argued that the Nisga'a title to their traditional lands had never been extinguished. Calder was the first of a number of land claims negotiated in favour of the rights of aboriginal peoples. The 1999 Nisga'a Treaty acknowledged that "the Nisga'a people have lived in
132-590: The Haida Gwaii , homeland of the Haida nation. Gitxon is popularly etymologized as git (people of) + x (to eat) + hoon (salmon), yielding the meaning "salmon eaters." The anthropologist Marius Barbeau , whose writings are the best introduction to Laxsgiik histories, calls this group's ancestral histories "the Salmon-Eater tradition." Members of the Gitxon group can be found among the Nisga'a , among
154-890: The National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation , now Indspire. In 2001, he was named an Officer of the Order of Canada and was promoted to Companion in 2006. In 2002 he received the Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal . In 2012, he served as the first Visiting Distinguished Indigenous Scholar in Residence at the Vancouver School of Theology . On May 31, 2019 he was sworn in as the University of Northern British Columbia's seventh Chancellor. Laxsgiik The Laxsgiik (variously spelled)
176-871: The Open Learning Agency in Burnaby on May 7, 1999; a third from Simon Fraser University in 2000; and the last from the University of Northern British Columbia on May 26, 2000. He received the Humanitarian Award from the Canadian Labour Congress in Toronto on May 6, 1999. In 1999 he received the Order of British Columbia . In 2000, Chief Gosnell received the Lifetime Achievement Award from
198-522: The Eagle crest to the influence of Russian traders' heraldic emblems during the fur trade.) In 1927 in Kincolith, B.C. , Barbeau recorded from the Nisga'a "Chief Mountain" (Sga'niism Sim'oogit, a.k.a. Saga'wan), a story ( adaawak in Nisga'a) of the origin of the Gitxon people which records their arrival on Haida Gwaii , homeland of the Haida , where the Gitxon Eagles came to form one moiety of
220-941: The Laxsgiik is the Eagle. Beaver and Halibut are also common Laxsgiik crests. Tsimshian, Gitksan, and Nisga'a matrilineal houses belonging to the Laxsgiik tend to belong to one of two groups, the Gwinhuut and the Gitxon. The Gwinhuut (meaning literally "refugees") are according to tradition descended from migrations from the Eagle-clan peoples of the Tlingit nation in what is now Alaska. Gwinhuut houses are more numerous than Gitxon ones, and they are related to various Tlingit Eagle groups. All Gitksan Laxsgiik are Gwinhuut, as are most Tsimshian and Nisga'a Laxsgiik houses. Gwinhuut houses include: The Gitxon (also spelled Gitxhoon) group mostly claim descent from ancient migrations from
242-606: The Nass River Valley since time immemorial". The Final Agreement recognized that the hereditary chiefs Simgigat (hereditary chiefs) and Sigidimhaanak (matriarchs), Adaawak (oral histories) continued to play an important role in accordance with the Ayuuk (Nisga'a traditional laws and practices). The constitutional legality of the Nisga'a Final Agreement was challenged by some Nisga'a under Laxsgiik chief James Robinson (Sga'nisim Sim'oogit) and Mercy Thomas, particularly
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#1732801677276264-527: The Nisga'a Tribal Council, of which he was elected President in 1992. In these various positions he was instrumental in bringing modern medical care, education, and resource management to the Nass River Valley. He was the chief Nisga'a representative in the negotiations that led to the signing of the Nisga'a Treaty on 4 August 1998, the first modern treaty between a British Columbian First Nation , Canada, and British Columbia. In November, 2000 he
286-577: The Nisga'a sent a Petition to the British Privy Council in London requesting that their land claims be addressed by the King. In response, the Canadian federal government passed a law making it illegal for First Nations to "retain counsel to pursue land claims". In 1973, Frank Arthur Calder and the Nisga'a Nation Tribal Council won the landmark case, Calder v British Columbia (AG) in which
308-677: The Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshianic -speakers (Tsimshian, Gitksan, and Nisga'a) than is now known to be possible for any Amerindian group—included an assertion that the Gitxon people migrated from Siberia , via the Aleutian Islands and Kodiak Island in Alaska, "only a few centuries ago" (as he phrased it in the Preface to his Totem Poles ). (Barbeau also, controversially and by today's standards erroneously, attributed their adoption of
330-640: The Tsimshian ethnologist William Beynon the origins of the people of the "Gitxon" group who migrated from the land of the Queen Charlottes first to Kitamaat and then to the Gitga'ata people, where a branch of this group, the House of Sinaxeet, is now considered "the royal Eagle house of Kitkata." In 1952, Barbeau recorded a Nass elder's statement that the Gitxons at the Tsimshian village of Hartley Bay were
352-573: The Tsimshian tribes of Kitselas and Gitga'ata , among the Haisla nation at Kitamaat , and at Skidegate on the Queen Charlottes. Gitxon houses frequently are headed by chiefs named Gitxon. At Hartley Bay , where the Gitga'ata live, the group is known as the House of Sinaxeet. Barbeau's now discredited theories about the peopling of the Americas —he claimed a far more recent Siberian ancestry for
374-645: The fur trade and that the Kitselas Gitxons borrowed members from the Gispaxlo'ots Laxsgiik to perpetuate their lineage during the 20th century. The Kitselas House of Gitxon and Niisgitloop today is a Kitselas house closely associated with the Kitsumkalum community. In 1924, the Gitxon of the Kitselas tribe was Samuel Wise. Barbeau interviewed him at Port Essington, B.C. , in 1924. His version of
396-493: The most numerous, while the Gitxon populations at the Tsimshian villages of Kitsumkalum and Lax Kw'alaams were nearly extinct. The Gitxon people at Kitsumkalum, who are referred to in stories, were not part of the Kitsumkalum tribe by the time Barbeau interviewed Kitsumkalum elders on the subject in the 1920s. The anthropologist James McDonald speculates that the Kitsumkalum Gitxons may have become extinct during
418-581: The self-government and law-making powers of Nisga’a government. On October 19, 2011 the Supreme Court of British Columbia handed down its decision upholding the constitutional validity of the Nisga’a Final Agreement. Joseph Gosnell Joseph Arthur Gosnell Sr. CC OBC (June 21, 1936 – August 18, 2020) was a Canadian politician who led the Nisga'a people of northern British Columbia . The son of Eli and Mary Gosnell, he
440-759: The way in which the Chief Commissioner of Land and Works for the Colony of British Columbia was distributing much of Nisga'a traditional land in the Nass River valley to western settlers, in spite of the Royal Proclamation of 1763 , which recognized Aboriginal title in British North America and acknowledged the existence and continuity of Aboriginal self-government. By 1890, the Nisga'a Land Committee had been established. In 1913
462-663: Was born at Arrandale Cannery , and grew up in the village of New Aiyansh . He received his formal education at St. Michael's Residential School in Port Alberni , British Columbia. As a young man, he worked as a fisherman. He later served as band councillor and became active in the Native Brotherhood of British Columbia , of which he eventually became chairman. He was also a member of the Pacific Salmon Commission . He served for many years on
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#1732801677276484-740: Was elected President of the new Nisga'a Lisms government. A fluent speaker of the Nisga'a language , he was a member of the Gitlaxt’aamiks Ceremonial Dancers , and held the noble name of Sim'oogit Hleek . He was married to the former Audrey Adele Munroe with whom he had seven children: Marilyn Arlene, Joseph Wayne, Sharon Marjorie, Theodore Allen, Frank Curtis, Keith Andrew and Kevin Wesley. He had received four Honorary Doctorate of Laws degrees. One from Royal Roads University in Colwood , near Victoria on October 17, 1997; another from
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