Federal Governance

In 1883 the Department of Indian Affairs decided to reduce funding for Indian Affairs as part of an overall reduction in government spending. Furthermore, a large portion of the reduced DIA funding was used to experiment with the creation of residential schools.

Farm instructors from Ontario were sent to western reserves to instruct on European farming skills to First Naitons people on agency farms. Fifteen sites were established in the Northwest, six in the Treaty 4 district, and nine in the Treaty 6 district. There were five farm instructors assigned to Treaty 4 and eight instructors assigned to Treaty 6. Additional ‘non-instructional’ farms were created to provide supplies for people working on agency farms. The program was officially retired in 1884. The Home Farm Program included providing rations to feed those who were working on the farms, an alternative iteration of the Work for Welfare Policy. Wadsworth considered six to nine pounds of flour to be the appropriate pay for a day's work on the farm. This program was widely considered to be a failure. The government recruited farm instructors who were poorly trained and ill-prepared for the requirements of the work. Overall, the scheme was incapable of dealing with the widespread famine that was affecting Indigenous people in the prairies.

To facilitate the Home Farm Program, the position of Indian Commissioner of the Northwest Territories was created. Sir Edgar Dewdney was appointed as the first commissioner in May, 1879. Dewdney’s duties as commissioner included overseeing the Home Farm program, the distribution of relief, encouraging Aboriginal people to settle on reserves, and convincing Sitting Bull’s Lakota to return to the United States.

Aboriginal signatories of Treaty 4 took the opportunity presented by the visit of Governor General Lorne to Western Canada to outline their grievances with treaty implementation. They continued to assert their right under the treaty to have their livelihoods ensured. Lorne was asked if the treaty terms could be improved in order to ensure that this could happen.

Officials sent wild and unbroken Montana cattle to many reserves in the Fort Carlton area, who were not accustomed to people and were ill-suited to agricultural work. Ploughing was impossible with these animals, and many died during that winter. M.G. Dickieson contracted with S.C. Baker and Co. to provide cattle to the Fort Cartlon bands, and sought Mr. Comfort to choose the cattle, having chosen appropriate animals for other Saskatchewan-area bands the previous year. When Comfort was not able to undertake the contract, Dickieson pushed the contract through with S.C. Baker and Co. anyway, and the animals that they selected to give to the Carlton bands were largely of poor quality. There were many complaints from these bands concerning their cattle.

Macdonald’s National Policy focused on expanding transport and reach across the country; linking it sea to sea using a transcontinental railroad, encouraging Western settlement (by Europeans, Americans, and Eastern Canadians), and encouraging domestic production with protective tariffs. In order to accomplish this, Indigenous lands in the west were sought for railroad construction and land settlement. For instance, the occupation of these lands was undertaken through treaty and reserve policies. In 1878, Macdonald made himself head of the Department of the Interior, giving himself ultimate control over settlement policy and Indigenous policy in the North-West.

In 1884 Inspector T.P. Wadsworth reported that the classroom "was a large cheerless room." In addition, he recommended that the school should be supplied with iron desks and assorted teaching materials (maps, lesson cards, library books, and library equipment). He also suggested that white servants should be employed at the school to prevent the passing of messages between the students and the aboriginal community. Following Inspector Wadsworth's report, Rev. Clarke wrote a letter to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Edgar Dewdney, which laid out a number of improvements to the facilities and services that he felt should be made. Commissioner Dewdney forwarded these recommendations to Ottawa for approval but received no immediate reply to authorize the improvements.

Interior Minister Laird abolished the Board of Indian Commissioners and replaced it with two superintendent positions which would cover the entirety of the prairie region. The Manitoba superintendent position, based in Winnipeg, included territory covered in treaties 1, 2, 5, and a small section of treaty 3. The Northwest Superintendency was originally supposed to include only Treaty 4 territory, but as more western treaties were signed, they came under this superintendency as well. Its headquarters was planned for the capital of the Northwest Territories, once it had been chosen. Each superintendency was to be governed by up to five Indian Agents chosen by the Governor General.

The Department of the Interior was created with the goal of overseeing the growth and evolution of the Northwest Territories, including dealing with land surveys, mining, and Indian affairs.

In 1860, control of Indian Affairs was transferred to Canada from the British Government, becoming a branch of the Crown Lands Department. This was one of the last services to be transferred from imperial to colonial government. This meant that the Canadian Government was now in control of Treaty making, land sequestering, economic, social, and legal policy in regards to Indigenous peoples, and officials were largely unchecked in their assertion of power (which was aimed on securing the settlement of European immigrants on Indigenous lands and procurement of resources).