By Kaniehtonkie.

On Thursday, July 28, Kenneth Deer was interviewed by Global News (GN).

Deer told GN, “Its good the Pope came. He came here to address Indigenous peoples and that’s always significant… He still hasn’t taken responsibility for the whole church. He keeps blaming individuals or groups and really, it’s the institution of the church that contributed to residential school abuse and they haven’t acknowledged that. So, we were disappointed with that.

He continued, “We are certainly not stopping here.”

“Our delegation, Haudenosaunee External Relationship Committee did not to ask for an apology – for years we’ve been campaigning to get the Vatican to revoke the Papal Bulls that make up the Doctrine of Discovery. . . These Papal Bulls are the basis to how states claim sovereignty over Indigenous lands. We need the Pope to clarify and change history. States still today use the Doctrine of Discovery in court cases against Indigenous people.”

HERC is an official committee under the Grand Council in Onondaga. Originally each of the Six Nations appointed two people to the Committee. Another three were appointed ‘at large’ by the Confederacy.

HERC members include titleholders Todadaho, Deskaheh, among others.

Simply said, HERC deals with governments and has sent delegations to the UN in New York and Geneva, and to countries like Bolivia and Ecuador. HERC assists Haudenosaunee delegations and lacrosse teams apply for visas to other countries for travel on Confederacy passports. HERC also deals with Canada on passport issues.

When Grand Council is not in session, HERC has a continuous log of work activity.

Deer went on to say, to GN, “Complete revocation to the Papal Bulls is a good step – so much has been done to the damage to Indigenous people. States still use the Doctrine of Discovery in court cases.

The Papal Bull stated that any land not inhabited by Christians was available to be “discovered,” claimed, and exploited by Christian rulers and declared that “the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself.” This “Doctrine of Discovery” became the basis of all European claims in the Americas as well as the foundation for the United States’ western expansion.

In a prepared press release following the Pope’s apology, Desmond Bull, Treaty Six Chiefs expressed how First Nations people in Canada are not the only Indigenous peoples to results of genocide committed by the Catholic Church and the Vatican.

Bull stated, “Our brothers and sisters in the United States, Central America and South America have all been victims of the Church. They too need healing.”

According to the Bulls, in essence, Natives in the America’s had only a right of occupancy, which could be abolished. In the US Supreme Court in the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh, Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in the unanimous decision held “that the principle of discovery gave European nations an absolute right to New World lands.”

In contemporary history, the Doctrine of Discovery was what Ruth Bader Ginsburg relied on, in part, in the United States Supreme Court 2005 decision Sherrill v Oneida Indian Nation of New York, a decision that overturned the Circuit Court and denied the Oneida Nation tribal immunity over their ancestorial and territorial lands. The Oneida Nation ancestorial land that had been purchased by the State without treaty or congressional consent, was later repurchased by the Nation through straightforward ‘modern’ mechanisms, on the real-estate market.

Reiterating, Doug George Kanentiio, “Also, he (the Pope) did not openly retract the Doctrine of Discovery but did acknowledge it was a factor. The Doctrine remains intact and was cited as recently as 2005 when the so-called Oneida Nation of New York gambled with the collective rights of the Haudenosaunee in the US Supreme Court and lost. The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote the unanimous opinion which effectively undermined all Native land reclamation actions in the US. Bader ruled the Doctrine was the basis upon which the US could take Native lands and suppress Indigenous sovereignty.

Everything which happens on Native lands, in the US and Canada, is rooted in the Doctrine and its revocation would cause a revolution in Indigenous law as it would remove “trust” and “crown” land controls over our territories and the colonial institutions imposed upon us.

The Doctrine is how the police, the social workers, the Indian agents, the Church, and the band councils were able to kidnap us. That cover needs to be removed and the raw facts of what was done to us must be exposed.”

The AFN summarized cases in Canada, “Such as St. Catherine’s Milling and Lumber Company v. The Queen relied upon early U.S. Supreme Court cases such as Johnson v. McIntosh that are based on the discovery doctrine. It is worth noting that in these and other relevant legal cases, the Indigenous Peoples affected were not included as direct parties. Such breaches of natural justice serve to further discredit these rulings and the Doctrine on which they are based.

Discovery was used as a tool to attempt the “exclusive power to extinguish” Indigenous rights on an ongoing basis. The preexisting inherent sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples was not considered. Modern court rulings continue to interpret the law relying on the Doctrine of Discovery. As recently as 2012, the BC Court of Appeal not only validated such destructive acts, but also attempted to extinguish Indigenous rights through judicial ruling.”

Deer said, “In Rome last Spring, I think what you heard were the lawyers. I think what you heard again was more of the lawyers. Here, (Quebec) was more Pope Francis and less of the lawyers.”

Deer added, “Some people were ecstatic, with the Pope’s visit, and other people are on the opposite end – they show the depth of the anger and despair over 500 years.”

Across Turtle Island

St. Anne Residential School Survivor and Advocate, Evelyn Korkmaz is a community member of Nishnawbe Aski Nation. She was present when the Pope visited in Alberta last week.

Korkmaz said, “I’ve waited fifty years for this. I have classmates who will not hear this, they are no longer here because of suicide, and substance abuse - because they could not live with such abuse. I was at St. Anne’s, and they had an electric chair, and they used the electric chair for torture.”

“I’ve traveled and spoke at the United Nations in 2018, 2019 and 2020. The Pope needs to respect our rights in our own country. This is our country. He has made no mention of releasing documents held by the Vatican. We are asking them to release the documents. They belong here. They belong to us.”