Hunger, Horses, and Government Men

An enormously interesting and comprehensive read that does a great deal to provide the legal treatise with the respect that it should be afforded. It is an important book for anybody interested not only in legal history but also its “kissing cousins” such as social and political history. Legal history of this sort is something that has, unfortunately, received short shrift, so it is heartening to find such a well-written and well-edited riposte to those who might feel that the legal treatise is not worthy of the scrutiny of some of the best legal minds out there.

Sarah Carter is a professor of history and classics at the University of Alberta and the author of Aboriginal People and Colonizers of Western Canada:
This highly original and compelling study of the complex relationship between Plains First Nations and Canadian criminal law draws on and carefully evaluates a rich but overlooked source, the “low law” of the lower courts where Aboriginal men and women appeared before magistrates not just as the accused, but as informants, witnesses, claimants, and interpreters. These records reveal not only how criminal law was used to punish and discipline, but how Aboriginal people used the courts to redress injuries and wrong. Gavigan revisits, interrogates, and contextualizes the “criminalization” of First Nations. Drawing on new evidence and innovative applications of theory, and advancing fresh interpretations, this book challenges conventional wisdom and assumptions. It is a captivating study that provides a unique window on this era of dramatic transformation in the Canadian West, and it is also a significant and sophisticated contribution to our understanding of law and colonialism.

Jonathan Swainger is a professor of history at UNBC and co-editor of Laws and Societies in the Prairie West, 1670-1940:
Based on a compelling familiarity with the literature and offering a subtle reading of the interplay between First Nations, Métis, and “low law” on the Canadian Prairies, Shelley Gavigan offers a thoughtful and energetic argument challenging the criminalization theme found in recent scholarship. Dispensing with simple polarities, Gavigan raises the interpretative stakes for scholars examining the legal histories of the prairie west and its varied peoples. Her evidence and interpretations simply cannot be ignored.

Sidney L. Harring is a professor emeritus at the CUNY School of Law and the author of White Man's Law: Native People in Nineteenth-Century Canadian Jurisprudence:
One of the measures of Canada’s tortured relations with its First Nations peoples is the over-criminalization of Aboriginal peoples. This book is a long time coming, the first detailed analysis of the historical roots of the application of criminal law to the prairie peoples at the time of Canada’s formation. Gavigan writes this story with clarity, a compelling analytical framework, and great attention to historical detail. It is not the expected history, but a highly nuanced narrative that gives full respect to the difficulties that Aboriginal peoples faced as Canada made them subject to the Queen’s law.