The Mi'kmaq ( , ; singular: Mi'kmaw, also L'nuk and formerly Micmac) are an Indigenous group of people of the Northeastern Woodlands, native to the areas of Canada's Atlantic Provinces, primarily Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland, and the Gaspé Peninsula of Quebec as well as Native Americans in the northeastern region of Maine. The traditional national territory of the Mi'kmaq is named Mi'kma'ki (or Mi'gma'gi); it is one of the five confederated Wabanaki (or Dawnland) countries.
As of 2023, there are 66,748 Mi'kmaq people in the region; this includes 25,182 members in the more recently formed Qalipu First Nation in Newfoundland. According to the Canadian 2021 census, 9,245 people claim to speak Mi'kmawi'simk, an Eastern Algonquian language. Once written in Mi'kmaw hieroglyphic writing, it is now written using most letters of the Latin alphabet.
The Mi'kmaq, Wolastoqiyik (Maliseet), and Pasamaquoddy nations signed a series of treaties known as the Peace and Friendship Treaties with the British Crown throughout the 18th century; the first was signed in 1725, and the last in 1779. The Mi'kmaq maintain that they did not cede or give up their land title to Mi'kma'ki or other rights through these Peace and Friendship Treaties. The landmark 1999 Supreme Court of Canada decision in R v Marshall upheld the 1752 Peace and Friendship Treaty "which promised Indigenous Peoples the right to hunt and fish their lands and establish trade."
Etymology
Mi'kmaq (singular: Mi'kmaw) comes from the word ni'kmaq meaning "my friends". There exist various spelling conventions resulting in forms like Mi'gmaq (sing.: Mi'gmaw) and Míkmaq (sing.: Mígmaw). The singular form (Mi'kmaw) is also used as the adjectival form, as seen in "Mi'kmaw Nation". Alternatively, Mi'kmaq use the terms L'nu (plural: L'nuk, meaning "the people") to describe themselves.
Grand Council Sante' Mawio'mi
On August 30, 2010, the Mi'kmaq Nation and the Nova Scotia provincial government reached a historic agreement, affirming that the Mi'kmaq Grand Council was the official consultative authority that engages with the Canadian federal government and the provincial government of Nova Scotia.
In 1927, Grand Chief Sylliboy was charged by Nova Scotia with hunting muskrat pelts out of season. He was the first to use the rights defined in the Treaty of 1752 in his court defence. He lost his case. In 1985, the Supreme Court of Canada finally recognized the 1752 treaty rights for Indigenous hunting and fishing in their ruling on R v Simon. Le Clerq noted that the Mi'kmaq children were memorizing prayers utilizing the counting of marks, but did not claim to have incorporated any of this system into the hieroglyphs he created. It is likely that this pre-Le Clerq writing system was part of a writing tradition by the Mi'kmaq similar to that observed in 1651 amongst the Eastern Abenaki of Maine. Today, it is written mainly using letters of the Latin alphabet.
At the Kejimkujik National Park and National Historic Site, petroglyphs of "life-ways of the Mi'kmaq", include written hieroglyphics, human figures, Mi'kmaq houses and lodges, decorations including crosses, sailing vessels, and animals, etched into slate rocks. These are attributed to the Mi'kmaq, who have continuously inhabited the area since prehistoric times. The petroglyphs date from the late prehistoric period through the nineteenth century.
In the late 1670s, French missionary Chrestien Le Clercq, who was working in the Gaspé Peninsula, was inspired by marks made by a young Mi'kmaq using charcoal on birchbark. Leclercq created what is now known as Mi'kmaq hieroglyphic writing to teach Catholic prayers and hymns to the people in their own unique form of language. After Le Clerq's returned to France in 1687, the script had to be taught to other groups of Mi'kmaq by other missionaries, indicating it was not a script that the Indigenous peoples already knew.
thumb|The [[Holy Mary Rosary prayer in Mi'kmaq hieroglyphics by the Luxembourg missionary Christian Kauder, 1866]]
Christian Kauder was a Luxembourg missionary in Mi'kma'ki from 1856 to 1871. He included samples of Mi'kmaq hieroglyphic writing, such as the Holy Mary Rosary prayer and the Lord's Prayer, in his German Christian catechism published in Vienna in 1866.
David L. Schmidt and Murdena Marshall published some of the prayers, narratives, and liturgies represented in hieroglyphs—pictographic symbols in a 1995 book. As noted, the pre-contact Mi'kmaq utilized some form of writing, but Le Clerq indicated that the hieroglyphs were "formed" by him. Schmidt and Marshall showed that these hieroglyphics served as a fully functional writing system. Although this older spelling is still in use, the Mi'kmaq consider the spelling "Micmac" to be "tainted" by colonialism.
The Mi'kmaq prefer to use one of the three current Mi'kmaq orthographies when writing the language. Spellings used by Mi'kmaq people include Mi'kmaq (singular Mi'kmaw) in Prince Edward Island (Epekw'itk), Nova Scotia (Mi'kma'ki-Unama'ki), and Newfoundland (K'taqamkuk); Miigmaq (Miigmao) in New Brunswick (Sipekni'katik); Mi'gmaq by the Listuguj Council in Quebec (Kespek); and Mìgmaq (Mìgmaw) in some Native literature.
Lnu (the adjectival and singular noun, previously spelled "L'nu"; the plural is Lnúk, Lnu'k, Lnu'g, or Lnùg) is the term the Mi'kmaq use for themselves, their autonym, meaning "human being" or "the people". Members of the Mi'kmaq historically referred to themselves as Lnu, but used the term níkmaq (my kin) as a greeting.
The French initially referred to the Mi'kmaq as Souriquois and later as Gaspesiens. Adopting a term from the English, they referred to them as Mickmakis. The British originally referred to the people as Tarrantines, which appears to have a French basis.
Various explanations exist for the rise of the term Mi'kmaq. The Mi'kmaw Resource Guide says that "Mi'kmaq" means "the family". The Anishinaabe refer to the Mi'kmaq as Miijimaa(g), meaning "The Brother(s)/Ally(ies)", with the use of the nX prefix m-, opposed to the use of n1 prefix n- (i.e. Niijimaa(g), "my brother(s)/comrade(s)") or the n3 prefix w- (i.e., Wiijimaa(g), "brother(s)/compatriot(s)/comrade(s)").
Charles Aubert de La Chesnaye was documented as the first European to record the term "Mi'kmaq" for the people, using it in his 1676 memoir. Marion Robertson stated this in the book Red Earth: Tales of the Mi'kmaq (1960s), published by the Nova Scotia Museum, Robertson cites Professor Ganong, who suggested that "Mi'kmaq" was derived from the Mi'kmaq word megamingo (earth). Marc Lescarbot had also suggested this. Taqamgug was historically part of Onamag before the 1800s.]]
Mi'kmaq Country, known as Mi'kma'ki, is traditionally divided into seven districts. Prior to the imposition of the Indian Act, each district had its own independent government and boundaries. The independent governments had a district chief and a council. The council members were band chiefs, elders, and other worthy community leaders. The district council was charged with performing all the duties of any independent and free government by enacting laws, justice, apportioning fishing and hunting grounds, making war and suing for peace.
Districts
The eight Mi'kmaq districts (including Ktaqmkuk which is often not counted) are Epekwitk aq Piktuk (Epegwitg aq Pigtug), Eskikewa'kik (Esge'gewa'gi), Kespek (Gespe'gewa'gi), Kespukwitk (Gespugwitg), Siknikt (Signigtewa'gi), Sipekni'katik (Sugapune'gati), Ktaqmkuk (Gtaqamg), and Unama'kik (Unama'gi). The orthography between parentheses is the Listuguj orthography used in the Gespe'gewa'gi area.
Current federal and provincial relations with Mi'kmaq
Tripartite Forum
In 1997, the Mi'kmaq–Nova Scotia–Canada Tripartite Forum was established. On August 31, 2010, the governments of Canada and Nova Scotia signed a historic agreement with the Mi'kmaq Nation, establishing a process whereby the federal government must consult with the Mi'kmaq Grand Council before engaging in any activities or projects that affect the Mi'kmaq in Nova Scotia. This covers most, if not all, actions these governments might take within that jurisdiction. This is the first such collaborative agreement in Canadian history including all the First Nations within an entire province.
Marshall decision
On September 17, 1999, the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the treaty rights of Mi'kmaq Donald Marshall Jr. its landmark R v Marshall ruling, which "affirmed a treaty right to hunt, fish and gather in pursuit of a 'moderate livelihood'." The Supreme Court also cited Section 35 of the 1982 Constitution Act in their 1999 ruling that resulted in Mi'kmaq, Maliseet, and Peskotomuhkati people the "right to hunt, fish and gather in pursuit of a 'moderate livelihood' from the resources of the land and waters." In the 2018 publication, Truth and conviction: Donald Marshall Jr. and the Mi'kmaq quest for justice, Marshall was quoted as saying, "I don't need a licence. I have the 1752 Treaty." The 1989 Royal Commission on the Donald Marshall Jr. Prosecution resulted in a compensation to Marshall of a lifetime pension of $1.5 million. When Marshall won, 34 Mi'kmaq and Maliseet First Nations bands were affected in the provinces of New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and the Gaspé region of Quebec.
Soon after the September 17 decision, Miramichi Bay—"one of Canada's most lucrative lobster fisheries"— became the site of a violent conflict between Mi'kmaq fishers and non-Mi'kmaq commercial fishers. Immediately after the ruling, Mi'kmaq fishers began to lay lobster traps out of season. Incidents such as the Burnt Church Crisis were widely covered by the media from 1999 and 2002. This was captured and documented in the 2002 National Film Board feature-length documentary Is the Crown at war with us? by Alanis Obomsawin. The documentary also described how Ocean and Fisheries department officials seemed to "wage a war" on the Mi'kmaq fishermen of Burnt Church, New Brunswick with "helicopters, patrol boats, guns, with observation by airplanes and dozens of RCMP officers". The documentary asks why the fishers were being harassed for "exercising rights that had been affirmed by the highest court in the land." In May 2003, the House of Commons' Standing Committee On Fisheries And Oceans chaired by MP Tom Wappel, submitted its report on fisheries issues, which "recommended that all charges stemming from the [confrontation over the lobster fisheries]" be dropped and that the fishers should be compensated by federal government for "their lost traps and boats." The report said that Mi'kmaq fishers have the "same season as non-native fishermen" and could not therefore, fish in the fall. It recommended that "native bands be issued licences, which they would distribute to native fishermen." These regulations do not mention the Mi'kmaq or the Marshall decision. These regulations prevent Mi'kmaq lobster fishers from selling their lobster to non-Mi'kmaq. Mi'kmaq fishers say that this does not align with the Marshall decision.
On November 9, 2020, a group of Mi'kmaq First Nations and Premium Brands Holdings Corporation announced their $1 billion purchase of Clearwater Seafoods, which was finalised on January 25, 2021. The group of First Nations includes Sipekne'katik, We'koqma'q, Potlotek, Pictou Landing, and Paqtnkek First Nations, and is led by Membertou and Miapukek First Nations. The purchase represents the "largest investment in the seafood industry by a Canadian Indigenous group". The harvest of non-Indigenous fishermen in the region will now be purchased by Clearwater Seafoods' Mi'kmaq part owners.
Dispute over rights-based inshore lobster fishery (2020–present)
Since September 2020, there has been an ongoing lobster fishing dispute between Sipekne'katik First Nation members of the Mi'kmaq and non-Indigenous lobster fishers mainly in Digby County and Yarmouth County, Nova Scotia.
Background
After Mi'kmaq chiefs declared a state of emergency in October 2020, the federal government appointed Allister Surette as Federal Special Representative to investigate.
In the March 2021 report's backgrounder, Surette cited Macdonald-Laurier Institute's Ken Coates who said that Mik'maq communities had benefitted from improvements resulting from the Marshall decision, as the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) granted access to Mi'kmaq fishers to the "commercial fishery through communal licences operated by the bands". Macdonald-Laurier Institute's Ken Coates said that the commercial fishing industry had not suffered because of this. Others disagreed, saying that Canada had never fully implemented the Marshall decision, and that, over the decades, various levels of government and authorities mishandled and neglected local concerns related to the implementation of the Marshall decision. St. Marys Bay is part of Lobster Fishing Area (LFA) 34, making it the "largest lobster fishing area in Canada with more than 900 licensed commercial fishermen harvesting from the southern tip of Nova Scotia up to Digby in the Bay of Fundy." It is also "one of the most lucrative fishing areas in Canada". DFO reported that as of December 2019, there were 979 commercial lobster licenses in LFA 34. One such protest took place on September 15 at Saulnierville and Weymouth wharves.
On September 17, Sipekne'katik launched a "moderate livelihood fishery" with a ceremony at the Saulnierville wharf, the first lobster fishery regulated by Mi'kmaq in Nova Scotia. On September 18, the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaw Chiefs declared a province-wide state of emergency in response to threats by commercial and non-Indigenous fishers, including some that had cut the Mi'kmaq lobster traps.
On October 1, Potlotek First Nation and Eskasoni First Nation launched their own moderate livelihood fishery in a celebration at Battery Provincial Park that coincided with Mi'kmaq Treaty Day. The management plan behind this fishery had been in development for three months, prompted by the seizure of lobster traps by DFO officials. Community licenses issued through this fishery will entitle fishers to 70 tags, and boats will be allowed to carry up to 200 lobster traps each. At the time of the launch of the Potlotek fishery, Membertou was also planning on launching their own fishery, following a similar plan. On the evening of October 13, several hundred non-Indigenous fishers and their supporters raided two storage facilities in New Edinburgh and Middle West Pubnico that were being used by Mi'kmaq fishers to store lobsters. During the raids, a van was set aflame, another vehicle was defaced and damaged, lobsters being stored in the facilities were destroyed, and the New Edinburgh facility was damaged, while a Mi'kmaw fisher was forced to barricade himself inside the facility in Middle West Pubnico. Indigenous leaders called the raids racist hate crimes and called on the RCMP to intervene, citing their slow response on the evening and lack of arrests even a day after the police claimed they "witnessed criminal activity". Social media posts from the commercial fishers and their supporters claimed that the lobsters taken in the raids were removed as they represented "bad fishing practices" on the part of the Mi'kmaq, but Sipekne'katik Chief Mike Sack and a worker at the Middle West Pubnico facility claimed the lobsters that were stored there were caught by the commercial fishers, not Mi'kmaw. Assembly of First Nations national chief Perry Bellegarde, federal Fisheries minister Bernadette Jordan, and Colin Sproul, president of the Bay of Fundy Inshore Fishermen's Association, all condemned the violence. Nova Scotia Premier Stephen McNeil maintained his position that this issue must be solved federally when asked about it at a press conference. Several months later, in January 2021, the manager of the Middle West Pubnico facility, James Muise, made a public post in a Facebook group for commercial fishers, claiming that he gave the people involved in the raids permission to enter the facility and take the lobsters. Muise offered to work with people charged with offenses connected to the raids and try to get those charges dropped.
Chief Mike Sack was sucker punched while trying to give a press conference on October 14. Also during the violence, an elder had sage knocked out of her hand while smudging, and a woman was grabbed by the neck.
On October 15, the Mi'kmaq Warrior Peacekeepers arrived at the Saulnierville wharf with the intention of providing protection to Mi'kmaq who were continuing to fish amid the violence. The fishers said they were putting pressure on Premier McNeil to act.
On October 21, Sipekne'katik managed to secure an interim injunction against the restriction of band members' access to the Saulnierville and Weymouth wharves, as well as the New Edinburgh lobster pound. The motion for the injunction was filed ex parte due to the urgency of the situation, as the band was struggling to sell any of their catch in the midst of the violence and protests. The injunction will remain in place until December 15, 2020.
In January 2021, 23 people were charged in connection to the violence at the lobster storage facilities on October 13, 2020: 15 for break-and-enter and 8 for break-and-enter and mischief.
Intimidation over the fishery dispute has continued into 2021. In mid-January, lobster harvester and Sipekne'katik citizen Jolene Marr, whose brother was surrounded in the West Pubnico lobster pound on October 13, was sent a seven second-long close-up video of a man's face that included what "sounds like a racial slur and six gunshots in the background."
Talks with DFO
On October 23, 2020, the Mi'kmaq Rights Initiative (known as the KMKNO for "Kwilmu'kw Maw-klusuaqn Negotiation Office") announced that talks with the DFO over defining "moderate livelihood" had broken down. The following Wednesday (October 28), Terry Paul, chief of Membertou First Nation, stepped down from his position with KMKNO and the Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi'kmaq Chiefs, saying "[his] confidence in the operations of the organization [sic] have weakened over time," citing issues of transparency, and preferring to pursue treaty rights negotiations outside of the Assembly.
Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan sent a letter to Chief Mike Sack on March 3, 2021, outlining the terms under which a moderate livelihood fishery could be negotiated, and what the federal government would be "prepared" to allow; the letter proposed balancing "additional First Nations access through already available licences" and stated that "these fisheries will operate within established seasons." These terms were rejected by Chief Sack, who stated that "we have a management plan that is better for conservation than theirs is, so we're going to follow our own plan."
Truth and Reconciliation Commission
In 2005, Nova Scotian Mi'kmaw Nora Bernard led the largest class-action lawsuit in Canadian history, representing an estimated 79,000 survivors of the Canadian Indian residential school system. The Government of Canada settled the lawsuit for upwards of .
In autumn 2011, there was an Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission that travelled to various communities in Atlantic Canada, who were all served by the Shubenacadie Indian Residential School, the sole residential school for the region. In his 2004 book entitled Legacies of the Shubenacadie Residential School, journalist Chris Benjamin wrote about the "raw wounds" of Mi'kmaw children who attended the Shubenacadie institution in the period spanning over three decades, from 1930 to 1967.
History
Pre-contact period
thumb|left|Miꞌkmaq Women Selling Baskets, Halifax, Nova Scotia, by Mary R. McKie c. 1845
In southwestern Nova Scotia, there is archaeological evidence that traces traditional land use and resources to at least 4,000 years. In Kejimkujik National Park and National Historic Site, there are canoe routes that have been used for thousands of years by Indigenous people travelling from the Bay of Fundy to the Atlantic ocean. Research published in 1871 showed that some Mi'kmaq believed they had emigrated from the west, and then lived alongside the Kwēdĕchk. According to Mi'kmaq traditions recorded by S. T. Rand, the Kwēdĕchk were the original inhabitants of the land. The two tribes engaged in a war that lasted "many years", and involved the "slaughter of men, women, and children, and torture of captives", and the eventual displacement of the Kwēdĕchk by the victorious Mi'kmaq. focused his MA research specifically on pre-contact fish weirs in southwestern Nova Scotia. In the chapter "Early Indian-European Contact" in the 1978 Handbook, ethnologist T. J. Brasser, described how pre-contact small semi-nomadic bands of a few patrilineally related families who lived in a climate unfavorable for agriculture, had subsisted on fishing and hunting. Developed leadership did not extend beyond hunting parties. In the same 1978 Handbook, anthropologist Philip Bock described the annual cycle of seasonal movement of pre-contact Mi'kmaq. Bock wrote that the Mi'kmaq had lived in dispersed interior winter camps and larger coastal communities during the summer. The spawning runs of March began their movement to converge on smelt spawning streams. They next harvested spawning herring, gathered waterfowl eggs, and hunted geese. By May, the seashore offered abundant cod and shellfish, and coastal breezes brought relief from the biting black flies, deer flies, midges, and mosquitoes of the interior. Autumn frost killed the biting insects during the September harvest of spawning American eels. Smaller groups would disperse into the interior where they hunted moose and caribou. The most important animal hunted by the Mi'kmaq was the moose, which was used in every part: the meat for food, the skin for clothing, tendons and sinew for cordage, and bones for carving and tools. Other animals hunted/trapped included deer, bears, rabbits, beavers, and porcupines.
Mi'kmaq territory was the first portion of North America that Europeans exploited at length for resource extraction. Reports by John Cabot, Jacques Cartier, and Portuguese explorers about conditions there encouraged visits by Portuguese, Spanish, Basque, French, and English fishermen and whalers, beginning in the 16th century.
European fishing camps traded with Mi'kmaq fishermen, and trading rapidly expanded to include furs, according to Thomas B. Costain, (1885–1965), a journalist who wrote historical novels. By 1578, some 350 European ships were operating around the Saint Lawrence estuary. Most were independent fishermen, but increasing numbers were exploring the fur trade.
17th and 18th centuries
Colonial wars
In the wake of King Philip's War between English colonists and Native Americans in southern New England (which included the first military conflict between the Mi'kmaq and New England), the Mi'kmaq became members of the Wapnáki (Wabanaki Confederacy), an alliance with four other Algonquian-language nations: the Abenaki, Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, and Maliseet. The Wabanaki Confederacy was allied with the Acadian people.
Over a period of seventy-five years, during six wars in Mi'kma'ki, the Mi'kmaq and Acadians fought to keep the British from taking over the region (See the four French and Indian Wars as well as Father Rale's War and Father Le Loutre's War). France lost military control of Acadia in 1710 and political claim (apart from Cape Breton) by the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht with England.
But the Mi'kmaq were not included in the treaty, and never conceded any land to the British. In 1715, the Mi'kmaq were told that the British now claimed their ancient territory by the Treaty of Utrecht. They formally complained to the French commander at Louisbourg about the French king transferring the sovereignty of their nation when he did not possess it. They were informed that the French had claimed legal possession of their country for a century, on account of laws decreed by kings in Europe, that no land could be legally owned by any non-Christian, and that such land was therefore freely available to any Christian prince who claimed it. Mi'kmaq historian Daniel Paul observes that, "If this warped law were ever to be accorded recognition by modern legalists they would have to take into consideration that, after Grand Chief Membertou and his family converted to Christianity in 1610, the land of the Mi'kmaq had become exempt from being seized because the people were Christians. However, it's hard to imagine that a modern government would fall back and try to use such uncivilized garbage as justification for non-recognition of aboriginal title."
Along with Acadians, the Mi'kmaq used military force to resist the founding of British (Protestant) settlements by making numerous raids on Halifax, Dartmouth, Lawrencetown, and Lunenburg. During the French and Indian War, the North American front of the Seven Years' War between France and Britain in Europe, the Mi'kmaq assisted the Acadians in resisting the British during the expulsion. The military resistance was reduced significantly with the French defeat at the Siege of Louisbourg in Cape Breton. In 1763, Great Britain formalized its colonial possession of all of Mi'kma'ki in the Treaty of Paris.
Covenant Chain of Peace and Friendship Treaties
thumb|left|upright=1.35|Mi'kmaw Encampment by [[Hibbert Newton Binney, c. 1791]]
Between 1725 and 1779, the Mi'kmaq, Wolastoqey (Maliseet), and Peskotomuhkati (Passamaquoddy) signed numerous treaties, commonly referred to as the Covenant Chain of Peace and Friendship Treaties, through which they entered into a "peaceful relationship with the British Crown." The Mi'kmaq assert that through these treaties—which were referenced as legal precedent by the Supreme Court of Canada in R v Marshall—the Mi'kmaq "did not cede or give up their land title and other rights."<!-- Preceding sentence non-sequitur and oversimplification of the source. --> The Halifax Treaties (1760–1761), marked the end of warfare between the Mi'kmaq and the British.
The 1752 Peace and Friendship Treaty Between His Majesty the King and Jean-Baptiste Cope, on behalf of the Shubenacadie Mi'kmaq has been cited in the Supreme Court of Canada's 1985 decision in R v Simon. With the signing of various treaties, the 75 years of regular warfare ended in 1761 with the Halifax Treaties.
Although the treaties of 1760–1761 contain statements of Mi'kmaq submission to the British crown, later statements made by Mi'kmaq reveal that they intended a friendly and reciprocal relationship, according to the 2009 book, Nova Scotia: a pocket history, by Saint Mary's University history professor, John G. Reid and Brenda Conroy. In the early 1760s, there were approximately 300 Mi'kmaq fighters in the region and thousands of British soldiers. The goals of the Mi'kmaq treaty negotiators engaged in the 1760 Halifax treaty negotiations, were to make peace, establish secure and well-regulated trade in commodities such as furs, and begin an ongoing friendship with the British crown. In return, the Mi'kmaq offered friendship and tolerance of limited British settlement, although without any formal land surrender, according to Reid and Connor.
The arrival of the New England Planters and United Empire Loyalists in greater number put pressure on land use and the treaties. This migration into the region created significant economic, environmental and cultural pressures on the Mi'kmaq. The Mi'kmaq tried to enforce the treaties through threat of force. At the beginning of the American Revolution, many Mi'kmaq and Maliseet tribes supported the Americans against the British. They participated in the Maugerville Rebellion and the Battle of Fort Cumberland in 1776. Mi'kmaq delegates concluded the first international treaty, the Treaty of Watertown, with the United States soon after it declared its independence in July 1776. These delegates did not officially represent the Mi'kmaw government, although many individual Mi'kmaq did privately join the Continental Army as a result. In June 1779, Mi'kmaq in the Miramichi valley of New Brunswick attacked and plundered some of the British in the area. The following month, British Captain Augustus Harvey, in command of HMS Viper, arrived and battled with the Mi'kmaq. One Mi'kmaq was killed and 16 were taken prisoner to Quebec. The prisoners were eventually taken to Halifax. They were released on 28 July 1779 after signing the Oath of Allegiance to the British Crown.
As their military power waned in the beginning of the 19th century, the Mi'kmaq people made explicit appeals to the British to honor the treaties and reminded them of their duty to give "presents" to the Mi'kmaq in order to occupy Mi'kma'ki. In response, the British offered charity or, the word most often used by government officials, "relief". The British said the Mi'kmaq must give up their way of life and begin to settle on farms. They were also told they had to send their children to British schools for education.
thumb|Monument to the [[Treaty of 1752, Shubenacadie First Nation, Nova Scotia]]
Gabriel Sylliboy was the first Mi'kmaq elected as grand chief in 1919 and the first to fight for treaty recognition—specifically, the Treaty of 1752—in the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia.
In 1986, the first Treaty Day was celebrated by Nova Scotians on October 1, 1986 in recognition of the treaties signed between the British Empire and the Mi'kmaq people.
The treaties were only formally recognized by the Supreme Court of Canada once they were enshrined in Section 35 of the Constitution Act of 1982. The first Treaty Day occurred the year after the Supreme Court upheld the Peace Treaty of 1752 signed by Jean-Baptiste Cope and Governor Peregrine Hopson.
19th century
Royal Acadian School
Walter Bromley was a British officer and reformer who established the Royal Acadian School and supported the Mi'kmaq over the thirteen years he lived in Halifax (1813–1825). Bromley devoted himself to the service of the Mi'kmaq people. The Mi'kmaq were among the poor of Halifax and in the rural communities. According to historian Judith Finguard, his contribution to give public exposure to the plight of the Mi'kmaq "particularly contributes to his historical significance". Finguard writes: