Missing in the media coverage of the blockades and protests is recognition of the fact B.C. is in “a completely different legal realm” than the rest of Canada, due to the lack of signed treaties, says Callison, who is a member of northwestern B.C.’s Tahltan Nation.

“The big issue in British Columbia is the continued denial of aboriginal title by the provincial governments and also by Canada,” says Darwin Hanna, also a founding partner of Callison & Hanna and a lawyer whose practice focuses on land claims, self-government and business law. Hanna, who also practises in the Northwest Territories, contrasts his own province with the dynamic in its northern neighbour, where he says the system operates more equitably.

“In the Northwest Territories, they have a true government-to-government relationship, in that you have the government of Canada you have the government of Northwest Territories and you have Indigenous governments,” he says. “In respect to any decisions that affecting the land, water and resources, nothing moves forward without each governing body providing their consent to any development.”

In response to calls for the Hereditary Chiefs and other protestors to respect the rule of law, Hanna notes it was the rule of law which mandated residential schools, mandated forced movement and was used “as a vehicle to allow settlers to pre-empt lands,” including with the conferring of major forestry licenses to companies not controlled by Indigenous people.

“You have this whole history of colonization that has benefited from the so-called ‘rule of law’ to favour the settlers and governments to the detriment of indigenous peoples,” Hanna says. “Now we have a situation in B.C., where you have the continued denial [of Aboriginal title] which has given rise to this conflict. The government has known for quite a few years now that they never received consent of the Wet'suwet'en and now they're trying to advance this project, and it sort of begs the question regarding the intentions of the crown to act honourably with respect to the implementation of Aboriginal title.”