In the 1970s, Drew Ann Wake was given an opportunity to work for someone that would lead to not only doing years of work she enjoyed but also give her a chance to author a book about the person from whom she learned so much.
That person was Justice Thomas R. Berger, a non-Indigenous man whose lifelong contributions to Indigenous rights still resonate with many people in Canada and beyond.
SA国际影视传媒淥ne of the great shocks of my life was when I first went to work for Tom and I sat down in his office, and he asked me a number of very serious questions that were thoughtful,SA国际影视传媒� Wake recalled. SA国际影视传媒淗e listened very carefully to my answers and he hired me at a time when there must have been 40 young men who would have given anything to have gone to work for him.
SA国际影视传媒淎nd he, you know, he hired a young woman.SA国际影视传媒�
That rare opportunity had a major impact on Wake, a former CBC North reporter, who came to admire the qualities and scruples that defined BergerSA国际影视传媒檚 personality, moral character, and his ground-breaking work for justice.
SA国际影视传媒淪o the fairness in a time when the workplace was not necessarily fair, still astonishes me, and it was an opportunity of a lifetime for me, and I cannot thank him enough for having given me the experience of researching and writing on issues that I cared very deeply about,SA国际影视传媒� she said.
Near the end of his life, Wake said Berger called on her to revisit his many notes on cases that he had stored away and was planning to write about.
SA国际影视传媒淲e went through a lot of his research work, and he handed me some chapters and said, SA国际影视传媒楾his is a book I'm working on, but I know I won't have time to finish it.SA国际影视传媒橲A国际影视传媒�
SA国际影视传媒淎nd he said SA国际影视传媒� his line that I always remember SA国际影视传媒� SA国际影视传媒楧o with it what you will,SA国际影视传媒橲A国际影视传媒� she said.
The result is now the newly-released book Against the Odds: The Indigenous Rights Cases of Thomas R. Berger.
A compilation of his lifelong work and fight for justice for Indigenous Peoples, Wake said the book is filled with examples of how Berger exemplified fairness and how he fought for those he felt were treated unfairly.
SA国际影视传媒淚 feel that's who Tom Berger was. He felt that people had to act fairly and honestly and within the law, and so Indigenous rights mattered to him, because he felt that really in Canada, things have been routinely unfair in the interpretation of Indigenous rights,SA国际影视传媒� Wake said.
BergerSA国际影视传媒檚 name is associated not only with Indigenous hunting rights but also public hearings on the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, the Peel Watershed case, and the Manitoba M茅tis case, to name a few.
To build or not to build
In the Northwest Territories, the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry, or the 'Berger Inquiry,' began in 1974 led by Berger as the royal commissioner.
During the extensive inquiry, the effects of having a pipeline built through the Mackenzie Valley and the northern Yukon were explored and examined for the impact it would have on the people, the environment and the economy, with Indigenous perspectives and knowledge at the forefront.
Norman Yakeleya, a Sahtu Dene and former MLA for the Sahtu region, said he recalled first hearing about the Berger Inquiry when he was a teenager just out of residential school. At that time, he said nothing was taught about Indigenous rights or protecting their culture.
SA国际影视传媒淎nd I was wondering, why are we standing up for our rights? Why are we talking the way we're talking? And I was curious if we were stopping economic progress in our small communities, and why were we talking so strongly about our land and our way of life,SA国际影视传媒� Yakeleya said.
SA国际影视传媒淭he residential school did a very good job in terms of assimilating our minds and our thinking that our way of life was no longer valid, and we should turn to the modern day economic realities of the North, and that we need not to go back to what they call SA国际影视传媒榖ack to the old way of living,SA国际影视传媒橲A国际影视传媒� he said.
Insight into challenges
Yakeleya said the impact Berger had on the North and during the inquiry was profound.
SA国际影视传媒淛ustice Berger saw the clear crystal ball of what Indigenous people were up against. I think he had that intelligent, intellectual law interpretation of what was right and what was not so right, and how the odds were stacked against the Indigenous people,SA国际影视传媒� he said.
SA国际影视传媒淚 think people were taken aback by his kindness. He was willing to sit and listen to the Indigenous people ask questions, you know, and go to communities SA国际影视传媒� someone that really got a lot of attention and respect from our people, because for the first time really, a white man, a judge at that, took the time to listen to the average people in regards to their way of life.SA国际影视传媒�
Yakeleya said Berger worked from his heart as well as his strong legal mind.
SA国际影视传媒淚 think his legacy would be his kindness, especially around the elderly, the old people, and his patience to let the people speak in their language. He wasn't insistent on just English.
SA国际影视传媒淗e really wanted to hear what the people said and the only way they could understand the people was to let them speak their language, and allow the interpreters to do their best job to interpret what they were saying.SA国际影视传媒�
Wake said the title of the book was inspired by the many cases Berger brought to court that SA国际影视传媒渂roke new ground.SA国际影视传媒�
SA国际影视传媒淭om would always say, SA国际影视传媒榃eSA国际影视传媒檙e in the right, and so I think we can persuade the judges,SA国际影视传媒橲A国际影视传媒� she recalled.
SA国际影视传媒淏ecause they broke new ground, it was against the odds that he would win. And yet, again and again and again, he won.
SA国际影视传媒淚 think he had a way of being a self-effacing man, you know, not pushing or putting himself forward. So there was real warmth when he returned as a lawyer to a case in the North.SA国际影视传媒�
Wake said BergerSA国际影视传媒檚 very final case, the Peter Ballantyne Cree Nations case from Manitoba, was settled after he passed away. Berger prevailed in that case, too.
SA国际影视传媒淪o even after he passed away, his cases were successful,SA国际影视传媒� she added.
