A federal heritage board has redefined the legacy of the Northwest Mounted Police, once celebrated for asserting Canadian control over the West, now describing them as a colonial paramilitary force that disregarded Indigenous governance and culture.Blacklock's Reporter says minutes from the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada show a new draft statement recasting the Mounted Police — predecessor to the RCMP — as enforcers of federal policy who undermined First Nations societies. The force, established in 1873, had long been commemorated for stopping U.S. expansion and ending the illegal whiskey trade on the Prairies. It was officially recognized as a National Historic Event in 1972..“The laws the federal government created and the Mounted Police enforced as police officers, magistrates and justices of the peace did not take into consideration Indigenous laws, moral codes, culture, customs, ways of life or pre-existing social, economic and political structures,” read a revised Statement Of Commemorative Intent.Though initially seen as a stabilizing force in newly acquired territories, the new statement says the police's role evolved into one of enforcing policies with “long term and damaging consequences” for indigenous communities, leading to eroded trust. The force was disbanded in 1920 and replaced by the RCMP.The revision was approved by board members including Canada’s chief archivist Leslie Weir, a $243,000-a year appointee who has previously overseen the removal of historical web content deemed offensive..Access To Information records show Weir personally ordered a 2021 purge of thousands of Library and Archives Canada webpages after a single media complaint. “This is an enormous undertaking with over 7,000 web pages,” she wrote to staff, calling the content removal urgent. “Much of this outdated historical content no longer reflects today’s context and may be offensive to many.”Staff scrambled to interpret the order. “Do we have a definition?” one manager asked, while another noted, “This is not the way to do this.”Weir’s directive followed a Toronto Star inquiry but no public complaints were recorded.
