ABORIGINAL HISTORY

DOCUMENTS - Acts & Bills - 1924 Act to amend the Indian Act

 

CHAP. 47.

 

An Act to amend the Indian Act.

 

[Assented to 19^th July, 1924]

HIS Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows:-

 

1. Section four of the Indian Act, chapter eighty-one of the Revised Statutes of Canada, 1906, is amended by adding thereto the following subsection:-

“(2)        The Superintendent General of Indian Affairs shall have charge of Eskimo

 affairs.”

 

1. Section twenty-seven of the said Act, as enacted by section five of chapter thirty-five of the statutes of 1914, is repealed, and the following is substituted therefor:-

“27A.  The Superintendent General may appoint a person or persons to administer

the estate of any deceased or insane Indian, and may make such general regulations and

 such orders in particular cases as he deems necessary to secure the satisfactory administration of such estates.”

 

1. Section twenty-eight of the said Act is repealed, and the following is substituted therefor:-

“28. In case any Indian dies intestate without issue, leaving a widow, all his

property of whatever kind shall devolve upon her, and if he leaves no widow the same shall devolve upon the nearest of kin to the deceased: Provided that any interest which he may have had in land in a reserve shall be vested in His Majesty for the benefit of the band owning such reserve is his nearest of kin is more remote than a brother or sister.”

 

1. Section sixty-one of the said Act is amended by adding thereto the following subsections:-

“(2) (a) In any case where the Superintendent or the Deputy Superintendent

General gives or has given notice to a purchaser or lessee of Indian lands or to his assignee, agent, executor, administrator or representative, of his intention to cancel a sale or lease under the provisions of this section, and in pursuance of such notice enters or has entered in the records of the Department the formal cancellation of such sale or lease, such entry of cancellation shall be and be deemed to have been effective from the date thereof to cancel and annul the said sale or lease, and any payments made on account of such sale or lease shall be and be deemed to have been forfeited,

(b)     In any such case as described in the preceding subsection the notice of cancellation shall be deemed to be and to have been sufficient if signed by the Superintendent General, the Deputy Superintendent General, or by any officer of the Department of Indian Affairs by the direction and with the authority of the Superintendent General or the Deputy Superintendent General; and more over the notice shall be deemed to be and to have been duly given and served upon or delivered to the purchaser or lessee, or to his assignee, agent, executor, administrator or representative as aforesaid if posted prepaid or franked to his last know address.

1. No action, suit or other proceeding, either at law or in equity, shall lie or be instituted, prosecuted or maintained against His Majesty or against the Superintendent General, or the Attorney General, or any officer of the Government of Canada, claiming any relief or declaration against or in respect of the cancellation or forfeiture of any such

 

sale or lease, or payments on account thereof by means of any such notice as aforesaid, unless the same was or shall have been instituted within one year from the date of the giving of the said notice.

1. Within the first fifteen days of each session of Parliament, the Superintendent General shall cause to be laid before both Houses of Parliament a list of all such sales or leases, cancelled during the twelve months next preceding that session, or since the date of the beginning of the then last session.
2. This Act shall not affect any rights under any judgment rendered before the date of the passing of this Act, or under any action, suit or other proceeding instituted before the first day of May, nineteen hundred and twenty-four.”

 

1. Subsection one of section ninety of the said Act is repealed and the following is substituted therefor:-

“90. (1)                 The Governor in Council may, with the consent of a band, authorize

and direct the expenditure of any capital moneys standing at the credit of such band, in the

  purchase of land as a reserve for the band or as an addition to its reserve, or in the purchase of cattle, implements or machinery for the band, or in the construction of permanent improvements upon the reserve of the band, or such works thereon or in connection therewith as, in his opinion, will be of permanent value to the band, or will, when completed, properly represent capital or in the making of loans to members of the

 band to promote progress, no such loan, however, to exceed in amount one-half of the appraised value of the interest of the borrower in the lands held by him.”

 

1. Subsection two of section one hundred and seven of the said Act as enacted by section three of chapter fifty of the statutes of 1920 is amended by adding at the end thereof the following:-

“Provided that where a wife is living apart from her husband, the enfranchisement

of the husband shall not carry with it the enfranchisement of his wife except on her own written request to be so enfranchised.”

 

1. Section one hundred and seven of the said Act as enacted by section three of chapter fifty of the statutes of 1920, and as amended by section one of chapter twenty- six of the statutes of 1922, is further amended by adding thereto the following subsection:-

“(8) Section one hundred and twenty-two A as enacted by section six, chapter

twenty-six of the statutes of 1918, was not intended to and shall be deemed not to have been repealed by section three of chapter fifty of the statutes of 1920, and any act or thing done under the provisions of said section one hundred and twenty-two A shall be and is hereby declared to be valid and effective.”