Review of Lha Yudit’ih: We Always Find a Way: Bringing the Tŝilhqot’in Title Case Home by Lorraine Weir with Chief Roger William

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The Tŝilhqot’in Nation is made up of six communities: Tl’etinqox, ʔEsdilagh, Yuneŝit’in, Tŝideldel, Tl’esqox, and Xeni Gwet’in. Xeni Gwet’in is located in the Nemiah Valley in the central interior of British Columbia. Because the people there have resisted logging in favour of their traditional trapping and hunting, this valley is at the centre of many of the events of Lha Yudit’ih. In order to begin the series of actions that led to the title case Tŝilhqot’in Nation v. British Columbia, a Declaration was issued in 1989, which stated that in the Nemiah Area Wilderness Preserve there would be no commercial logging, mining, roadbuilding, or damming. In 1992, without notice, a logging company began refitting a bridge to move heavy machinery across a river. This was quickly followed by a roadblock. And so it went until 2014, the year of the Supreme Court’s ruling. Chief Roger William (Xeni Gwet’in), named as plaintiff in the case, was integral as councillor, Chief, and witness. Here is the announcement of the court’s decision from the Nation’s website:

On June 26, 2014, for the first time in Canadian history, the Supreme Court of Canada recognized 1,900 square kilometres of land as Aboriginal Title Land. Aboriginal title includes the rights to control the land and decide how it will be used, to use the land for traditional and modern purposes, and the full benefit and ownership of the lands and resources. (“Declared Title Area”)

On the ground, however, during the long period when the case moved through the courts, business as usual continued in Xeni Gwet’in, with logging companies eager to clearcut and mining companies with big plans for the area. As one central witness, Elder Gilbert Solomon, puts it, “Anyways, we start callin’ in, how do you say, outsidehelp, help from the outside. We start singin’” (xxi). With that help and incredible persistence, they found a way.

Without Chief Roger, there would be no case, but without Professor Weir, there would be no book (xxv). The process required good communication between them and with the community: “What Chief Roger wanted was to have the story of the Title case brought back home by a midugh, a settler, as an act of restorative justice demonstrating that their stories had been heard and understood” (xxvi). The bulk of the book consists of transcribed voices from the community—old and young, Elders, leaders, and allies. They spoke voluntarily about their lives, their nation’s history, their teachings, their views of the case, and their connections to it. As a result, to read it is to learn about far more than the case: we are given its human context. Weir describes Chief Roger’s words as the spine of the book, but its other voices reflect his practice of taking everything to the community for their views and a vote.

The book begins with Chief Roger setting the scene and outlining his childhood, then moves to memories of the devastating smallpox epidemic of 1862 and then to the Chilcotin War. In 1864, some Tŝilhqo’tin men killed intruding road builders; several unsuccessful government attempts were made to retaliate. Finally, six Chiefs were invited to what they thought were peace talks. All were arrested and executed. They are still remembered. Subsequent sections deal with residential school, daily life before roads (but with horses, plenty of horses), logging and its response, roadblocking, and then legal casing.

A book focusing on the legal issues alone would have been both complex and boring. This one puts the plaintiff’s views at the forefront. What I did not expect was just how suspenseful the story remained, even though I knew the outcome. Time spent convening meetings, running votes, trying to raise funds to meet imposed deadlines, watching lumber going out of the territory without compensation, and dealing with constant negotiations that had to be conducted, according to the lawyers, so as to remain “in good faith” continued for years. Unsurprisingly, these processes were seen by some as caving in to a foreign and untrustworthy legal system. Every so often, the whole case seemed to be hanging by a thread. In the meantime, tax dollars were funding the government lawyers, with endless bureaucratic ways to consume the time of a group of people who were not rich in anything but the “last green part of BC” on which they could continue their way of life (xxi). The book has its lighthearted moments, as when the women coming to the court to witness the final decision were relieved at the metal detector of their everyday carry: big hunting knives. Chief Roger remarks that, “with the women’s knives gone, the men felt pretty brave” (354). From a literary perspective, the inclusion of oral stories used to make the case is of interest; this has only been possible since the 1997 Delgamuukw v. British Columbia ruling that oral tradition should be given the same weight as written evidence in Indigenous land title cases. Also included are the moving moments of song, drumming, smudging, and prayer that were as essential to the Tŝilhqot’in proceedings as were the legal formalities.

Scholars will be happy with the book’s admirable academic apparatus: an introduction to the book and its organization and methods by Weir, detailed footnotes, acknowledgements, maps, photographs, a chronology, lists of the twenty-nine witnesses and the thirty-four interviewees and the communities they are from, an index to each interviewee’s contributions, and an index to the book. Worth noting is that the interviews continue to 2017 with commentary on what might happen next. Great attention is paid to language, with a few sections of interlinear translation: the Tŝilhqot’in language is a Dene (Athabaskan) language with related languages spoken to the north, but also by the Navajo. Chief Roger describes a visit to the Navajo Nation, which holds the largest territory of any Indigenous nation in the United States; there, he realized that he could feel free in a way he did not feel in his own territory. I expect he feels freer now.

The book belongs to a burgeoning number that provide an overview of the worldview and histories of particular nations from their perspectives, often deriving from the extensive in-house research required by court cases. This one should find a home on the bookshelves of many non-specialist readers. And perhaps it should be found in the hands of law students, as well.

Works Cited

“Declared Title Area.” Tŝilhqot’in National Government, https://tsilhqotin.ca/governance/declared-title-area/. Accessed 21 Feb. 2025.

Supreme Court of Canada. Tŝilhqot’in Nation v. British Columbia. Supreme Court of Canada, 26 June 2014, https://decisions.scc-csc.ca/scc-csc/scc-csc/en/item/14246/index.do.