Election A done deal, But far from Boring
Elections approach in Kahnawake as quiet progress made in reclaiming lands
Voters in Kahnawake won’t cast their ballots until July 7, but they already know who the next grand chief will be.
Joseph Norton is running unopposed in his 13th bid to preside over the Mohawk Council of Kahnawake. If you think that makes for a boring election, consider this: Norton is one of only two people to be elected grand chief of the territory since 1980.
The only other grand chief who served during that period, Michael Delisle Jr., is running for a seat on council this year.
“Boring ? Politics in Kahnawake can be exciting, immensely frustrating, but never boring,” Delisle said. “Some of the issues we deal with are about our survival as a people. We’re fighting for our languages, our culture and our land.
“There’s nothing boring about that.”
Band council chiefs have a set of responsibilities that go beyond making sure garbage is picked up and potholes are filled. Because Kahnawake is a sovereign entity, chiefs are in charge of education, health care and a slew of services ordinarily covered by Quebec or Canada.
On the South Shore territory, council is also fighting the government over 45,000 acres of Mohawk land taken to build a seaway, railroads, power lines and highways for neighbouring cities.
Despite such high stakes, voter turnout floats somewhere around 25 per cent.
But this only serves as a reminder of how complex politics are on the territory. Some Mohawk traditionalists take sovereignty so seriously they believe voting in a band council election would only legitimize Canada’s authority over Kahnawake.
Instead, they subscribe to the Haudenosaunee Longhouse, a 1,000-year-old form of government established by the six nations that form the Iroquois Confederacy.
Kenneth Deer, a Mohawk traditionalist, says the band council system never fully took root in Kahnawake.
“Our system of beliefs always clashed with the European way of doing things,” Deer said. “To us, the chiefs ... the king or the queen are not the sovereign, the people are the sovereign.”
Under the Longhouse system, women from Kahnawake’s three clans — the Bear, Turtle and Wolf clans — have the power to nominate and impeach chiefs. Membership in these clans is passed down through the mother.
“It’s like a semi-matriarchy,” Deer said. “There’s an emphasis on using rational thinking to solve conflicts and on community decision-making.”
The longhouse is where children are given their Mohawk names and where seasonal festivals like the Thunder Dance and Feast for the Dead take place. In this sense, it’s less a form of government than a living, breathing link to a culture that existed long before contact with Europeans.
The elected band council system, for its part, is a creation of the federal government.
Even so, the reality in places like Kahnawake is that the band council is the only seat of power recognized by Ottawa. And Delisle says it is a vehicle for real-world progress.
Take Kahnawake’s 268-year-old land claim, for instance. Twenty years ago, the Canadian government wouldn’t even recognize Kahnawke’s claim, which extends into neighbouring suburbs like St-Constant, Châteauguay and La Prairie.
Now there’s a process in place to strike a deal that could both return land to the Mohawks and pay them for years of lost revenue.
Last year, the provincial government began the process of handing more than 700 acres to Kahnawake as compensation for the land it expropriated to build Highway 30. The land runs along the territory’s southwest side and Kahnawake had to win a lawsuit filed by neighbouring cities last year to secure it. Still, it marked the first time in the province’s history that land was actually returned to the Mohawk territory.
When Krueger Electrical Services launched a project to build 44 wind turbines in neighbouring St-Rémi, they met with the band council first to discuss awarding royalties to Kahnawake.
“They didn’t have to meet with us but they chose to because those turbines are right in the middle of our land claim,” Delisle said. “Now we’re being compensated for that. It shows a growing recognition that this land was taken from us.”
If Delisle gets one of 11 spots on council, he says he wants to take the lead on land claim negotiations. He says despite past progress, negotiations have stalled during the last three years.
As it stands, the 8,000 Kahnawake residents have all but exhausted their ability to live on the small tract wedged between the St. Lawrence Seaway and Highway 30.
“We’re not looking to displace our neighbours. We just think there’s a solution that gives us greater land mass and some compensation for our losses,” Delisle said. “I think there’s a way to work this out.”
Though the tensions between members of the Longhouse and the band chiefs are real, Delisle points to areas where Mohawk traditions have been kept alive by council.
Local laws are passed through the community decision-making process — a nod to the traditional way of doing things — and Kahnawake has its own court system.
“You can look at history and at how the government of Canada has tried to terminate our rights, and we’re still here,” Delisle said. “I honestly believe there are better days ahead of us. And that’s why I’m running for office.”
Joseph Norton did not respond to the Montreal Gazette’s request for an interview.
Boring? Politics in Kahnawake can be exciting, immensely frustrating, but never boring. Some of the issues we deal with are about our survival as a people.