AFTER MEECH

How Elijah Harper’s ‘No’ inspired a generation of Indigenous leaders,

It is evidence, surely, of some great cosmic sense of humour that of all the torrents of words spoken during one of Canada’s epic constitutional moments, a person who said so little ended up having the greatest impact.

The “No” spoken by Elijah Harper in June 1990, as he held an eagle feather in his seat in the Manitoba legislature, was soft, certain — and historic.

His recurring “No” effectively scuttled the Meech Lake constitutional accord negotiated under such charged, occasionally bizarre circumstances by prime minister Brian Mulroney and the country’s 10 provincial premiers.

And that “No” helped inspire a new generation of Indigenous leadership that, as Canada marks the 150th anniversary of Confederation, does not intend to let it be forgotten that justice for Indigenous peoples remains the country’s great outstanding issue.

For many, the newly confident, assertive Indigenous voice in Canada was helped into being in those moments when the late Oji-Cree leader, who died in 2013 at age 64, said “No.”

Harper was born in 1949 at Red Sucker Lake, Man., the second of 13 children in his family. He would be raised by his grandparents, and it was his grandfather who taught him to hunt, trap and fish.

When he was 8, government officials arrived on the trapline and Harper was taken to a residential school, where he spent the better part of a decade at institutions in Norway House and Birtle, Man.

The story there — one that has only recently come to broader Canadian consciousness — was familiar.

His hair was cut. He was punished for speaking his language. He was abused. He was told the things taught him by his elders were the ways of heathens.

“You feel like you don’t have any say, no rights, nothing,” he would later tell biographer Pauline Comeau.

Harper knew, when he returned home, that he wanted to help make change. He attended the University of Manitoba and became active there in seeking Indigenous rights.

At 29, he was elected chief of the Red Sucker Lake First Nation. Soon, he would be elected as the first treaty member of the Manitoba legislature. There, he would become a cabinet minister in the NDP government.

For all Harper’s accomplishments, his life was not easy. He had financial trials, marriage difficulties. He lost a cabinet post over an accident after which he failed to take a breathalyzer test.

But Elijah Harper had a date with history. He quit drinking and renewed his focus on the cause of his life when, in June 1987, Canada’s first ministers signed the Meech Lake constitutional accord, a set of decentralizing reforms intended to persuade Quebec to consent to the repatriated Constitution of 1982.

Harper was opposed to Meech Lake, he said, “because we weren’t included in the Constitution.

“We were to recognize Quebec as a distinct society, whereas we as Aboriginal people were completely left out.”

Over the three-year period allowed for ratification of the accord by provincial legislatures, objections built from federalists, Indigenous groups, women’s advocates.

As reservations grew, Mulroney convened a first ministers meeting in Ottawa in June 1990 that dragged on for a week.

As it happened, CBC’s all-news channel Newsworld had launched the year before and, for the first time, Canadians were privy to almost real-time accounts of the closed-door negotiations.

People were becoming famous. Some of them formerly obscure provincial premiers who, at breaks in proceedings, gave regular accounts of what was happening and what they wanted; some — like Wendy Mesley and Don Newman — the journalists to whose cameras the premiers dutifully trooped.

Over the course of the week, legends were born. At one point, Alberta’s Don Getty tackled Newfoundland’s Clyde Wells, it was said, to keep him from walking out. In the end, Ontario’s David Peterson played Captain Canada by ceding some Senate seats to get the deal cut and left the hall hailed as a great Canadian.

It was obvious to all, however, that Wells had deep reservations about the deal and that getting ratification from Newfoundland might be less than a sure thing.

It was evident, as well, to Manitoba Premier Gary Filmon, who had also signed on to Meech Lake somewhat reluctantly, that the man from Red Sucker Lake might pose a problem.

“Filmon had frequently warned me of Elijah Harper of the NDP,” Mulroney would later write in his memoirs. “That he would oppose Meech” with procedural tactics.

In Winnipeg, Harper told the legislature that “our relationship with Canada is a national disgrace” and that “we are fighting for our rightful place in Canadian society.”

At every step in the process, when unanimous consent was sought in the Manitoba legislature to proceed with ratifying Meech Lake, Harper quietly said, “No.”

It was one of the rare occasions in Canadian political history that an Indigenous man or woman was able to thwart the ambitions of those in power.

In short order, Elijah Harper became famous across the country. Coming from the ranks of the marginalized, he was the perfect symbol of dissent

“Today, because (Elijah Harper) inspired an entire generation of First Nations youth, there are thousands of us . . . One person can change the world.” FRANK BUSCH FIRST NATIONS AUTHOR AND ENTREPRENEUR

and defiance of an agreement cobbled together in private by 11 well-off white men.

He exuded humility. He spoke slowly, as if after long thought. He was, as biographer Comeau wrote, “so authentic,” an overnight icon.

Moreover, Harper was using the very levers of the democratic process against the will of an impatient elite, and was doing so far from the corridors of power in Central Canada.

For his stand, Harper was named The Canadian Press Newsmaker of the Year in 1990. Red Sucker Lake First Nation made him an honorary chief for life. He received honorary doctorates and awards from Indigenous and human rights organizations.

“We came to the realization very quickly that our voice mattered,” said Phil Fontaine, who would become chief of the Assembly of First Nations. “We could make history, we could change the course of history. We knew and understood what was possible.”

First Nations author and entrepreneur Frank Busch wrote when Harper died four years ago, that in his childhood “there was only one Elijah Harper.”

“Today, because he inspired an entire generation of First Nations youth, there are thousands of us . . . One person can change the world.”