Unknown and Unstated Paternity and the Indian Act

Abstract:

Most people are not aware that when the Indian Act was amended in 1985 Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) removed provisions that protected children born out-of-wedlock, and thus children of unknown and unstated paternity.  Presently, when a mother applies for status registration for her child and the child is of unknown or unstated paternity due to issues such as rape, abuse, an affair, or death the Registrar of Indian Affairs applies a negative assumption of paternity – meaning that the father is a determined to be non-Indian.

It is well known that some fathers go through a period of insecurity and jealously when their partner becomes pregnant.  This state of being is somewhat analogous to the postpartum depression – psychosis continuum that some mothers experience after child birth.  While this state of pathology has yet to be identified, named, and defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, and thus effectively addressed, many people know that it is during a woman’s pregnancy when a father is more likely to become neglectful, abusive, and consequently likely to refuse to sign a child’s birth certificate.

In situations where the mother is registered under section 6(2) of the Indian Act and the mother does not acknowledge or know who the father is, or in situations where the father does not sign the birth certificate, the child is denied status registration and consequently their treaty benefits which include health care and education.  Young mothers and their babies should not bare the brunt of the government of Canada’s desire to eliminate status Indians.