The Pass System Essay

In 1885, the Canadian Government under the leadership by Sir John A Macdonald brought on a new way to achieve their goal in society of assimilating the First Nations people. They introduced the Pass System, which created numerous problem for the First Nations people. Thus, the Pass System was introduced it constituted numerous problems for the First Nations people, including visiting their children at residential schools and even leaving the reserve.

The Pass System created numerous problems for the First Nations people and the paramount problem would be that they were unable to gain permission to leave the reserve to visit their children in residential schools. Not being able to see their children was a distressing and burdensome time for

the parents since their children were a monumental part of their life. The children are an intricate part of the First Nation’s society as they are the ones who will pass on the oral traditions and stories to future generations. As I read online, the Indian Agents were only authorized to let the parents see their child at most four times a year unless the child was severely ill. Four times a year is partisan and nowhere near enough time to see your child and establish a relationship with them. Thus, the children would grow up with severed ties with their immediate family and their sense of family and culture would be non-existent. This is an abhorrent situation for the children and families had to go through this.

Moreover, the next aspect of life that was impacted by the Pass System was that the First Nations people were not obliged to leave the reserve unless granted permission from an Indian Agent. This meant that the First Nations people had to walk to the Indian Agent’s house which was typically a few days walk to ask for permission to leave. Most of the time, the Indian Agent was not home so they would have two options: First, to walk all the way back to their home and secondly, to camp over until the Indian Agent returned. The needed to get permission to leave the reserve and thus, diminished the independence of the First Nations people and must have made them feel like they are young children asking a parent. Equally, they also must have felt like second-grade citizens. This, in my opinion, must have been a profoundly degrading predicament for them. Similarly, the Pass System must have made the First Nations people feel particularly helpless being that they could not control their lives or be with their children when they were needed.

Ultimately, in my opinion the Pass System was extremely detrimental to the First Nation’s society and their ways of life.

It took the children away from their families by force and scarcely authorized them to visit their children unless the child was exceedingly close to death. I personally feel that no one should be able to control all aspect of a person’s life such as when they leave, when they return, and what they can do. Conversely, the Pass System had a goal of assimilating the First Nation’s culture and in my opinion they achieved this goal. The Canadian Government achieved this goal due to the children who went to residential schools lost the knowledge and spiritual aspect of their culture. On multiple accounts, the children came back for the summer from the residential schools and were disengaged in the ways of life of their culture.

In ending, the Pass System was an atrocious, but successful attempt to assimilate the First Nations people in Canada. In my opinion, the Pass System was not honorable and only concluded with negative contributions in the Canadian society and the First Nation’s society. I conclude that there could have been vastly different ways to work through these problems. Considering if the Canadian Government had implemented different ideas other than the Pass System I presume that there would be less confrontation and hostility between the two societies which would have resulted with living in

harmony.