Politics

Between the mid-1970’s and mid-1980s Duke was at the forefront of the political struggle for the rights and land claims of Non-Status Indians and Metis People. During this timeframe he filled the role of Vice-President of the Native Council of Canada (1974-1976), the Director of Land Claims Research for the Metis and Non-Status Indian Association (1978-1980), and President of the Metis and Non-Status Indian Association (1980-1983).

As a result of his political and academic work, he published We Are Metis: A Metis View of the Development of A Native Canadian People. And, in 1985, after a decade of research and significant political struggle by the entire Metis community, amendments were finally made to the Indian Act (Bill C31) to remove a number of discriminatory provisions from the Act, including restoring status and membership rights to native families whose matriarch married a Non-Status Indian or Settler.

An Article from the Toronto Star in1981explains the Metis Struggle for Rights and Freedoms under the Indian Act

During this time, Duke also worked closely with Smokey Bruyere to fight for Aboriginal Rights. Aboriginal Rights had been, until that point, associated with Land Claims and Treaty negotiations along with certain cultural entities. However, the true definition of Aboriginal Rights encompassed the complete complement of Indigenous aspirations including the right to self-determination in education, economic development, health and welfare, housing and communications. As Director of Research for Aboriginal Title at OMNSIA, and through his landmark work presented in We Are Metis, Duke was able to prove beyond a doubt that the Metis presence in Ontario played a vital, indeed a crucial role, in the development of the province and his work continues to advocate for the recognition of Indigenous peoples as a founding people of Canada in the Constitution, alongside the French and English. This idea has been consistently rejected by Prime Ministers, beginning with Chretien as read in the articles below.

Duke and Smokey Bruyere at OMNSIA 1982

Duke and Smokey Bruyere at OMNSIA 1982

“We cannot accept that the federal government would like to is piecemeal us off and buy us off with economic development programs, housing programs, and so on. And what we’re saying is that we want to be full-fledge citizens and founding peoples in this country and we want to participate in Canada’s Constitution with all the rights that that entails, and Chretien is telling us that we can’t have it.”

In the News

 
 

“There’s an incredible bureaucracy called The Department of Northern and Indian Affairs.  They make their livings off the fact that native people are poor.  All their programs are directed toward us, but we don’t get the jobs in running these programs.   The people who have the jobs and earn their living from us are in the business of keeping us poor.  We are a renewable resource to all the people in all the branches of the federal and provincial governments who are earning their living by trying to solve a problem that they don’t actually want to solve because if they did, the native people would be better off and they’d be out of a job.”