Turtle Island Affairs reports on Indigenous Nations and issues across Turtle Island, beyond colonial borders.
Written By Troy Littledeer
(MI’KMA’KI) When Nova Scotia’s Attorney General announced on Dec. 4 that the province would intensify enforcement against “illegal cannabis” regardless of location, Mi’kmaq advocates heard something else entirely: the province asserting control over an economy that they say their nations have the inherent and treaty-protected right to govern.
The directive followed months of raids, criminal charges and court rulings that have turned cannabis into a legal battleground over the reach of 18th-century Peace and Friendship treaties in a modern, regulated market.
This is not a debate about marijuana policy. It is a dispute over who decides.
Enforcement Escalation
Nova Scotia’s enforcement posture sharpened through Project Highfield, a coordinated police operation that began in October 2024 and culminated in search warrants and raids in February 2025 targeting unlicensed cannabis storefronts. Police announced Feb. 25 that 21 people had been charged with more than 50 offences connected to 13 storefronts.
Coverage of the operation and community response confirmed raids involved Mi’kmaw communities, with advocates describing the targets as Mi’kmaq-run businesses operating under treaty rights.
That posture became visible again on July 30, when Colchester County District RCMP and the Millbrook RCMP detachment executed a search warrant at a storefront on Willow Street, widely identified by advocates as the “Top Shelf Treaty Truckhouse.”
RCMP said one man was arrested at the scene and later released. Police stated he would not be charged. Investigators seized cannabis and unstamped tobacco, noting that other charges could follow as evidence is analyzed.
Mi’kmaq advocates immediately challenged both the authority and the manner of the raid, describing it as enforcement on Mi’kmaq territory without Mi’kmaq consent.
The Micmac Rights Association said the operation was carried out without permission from Millbrook’s Chief and Council and asserted the store’s operators held documentation recognizing Aboriginal and treaty rights to operate a truckhouse, a reference to treaty-era trade language and practice.
Millbrook First Nation Chief Bob Gloade publicly distanced his government from the operation. In a letter reported by Mi’kmaq-focused outlets after the raid, Gloade said Chief and Council were not involved in authorizing the store and urged police to prioritize enforcement against hard drugs rather than cannabis.
The exchange exposed a central tension in the dispute: unresolved questions of governance within Mi’kmaq communities are being effectively answered, day to day, by provincial enforcement.
Legal Context
Provincial authorities are relying in part on a Nova Scotia Provincial Court decision released June 7, 2024, in a case styled R. v. Marshall et al., involving cannabis dispensaries operating on Millbrook First Nation.
In that ruling, the court rejected an Aboriginal and treaty rights defence, finding the evidentiary record and expert reports before the court did not establish a treaty or Aboriginal right to trade in cannabis or to operate outside federal and provincial cannabis laws.
For provincial officials, the decision provided legal footing for enforcement. For Mi’kmaq advocates, its significance lies in what it did not do.
The court’s ruling was based on the insufficiency of the evidence and legal record in that case, not a categorical Supreme Court declaration that a Mi’kmaq right could never apply to cannabis. The court’s approach left open what Indigenous advocates describe as the core fight: whether a stronger historical and legal record could support a different outcome.
That nuance now defines the standoff. Enforcement is proceeding not because treaty rights have been definitively rejected at the highest level, but because courts have not been persuaded by the specific cases presented so far.
Attorney General and Justice Minister Scott Armstrong has stated he is “not aware of an even remotely credible basis for suggesting that use of or trade in cannabis is a Mi’kmaq Aboriginal or treaty right.”
A separate sentencing decision in 2025 underscored the immediate consequences. In that case, a man convicted of operating an unlicensed cannabis store within the territory of Millbrook First Nation received a six-month conditional sentence order. The judge cited deterrence, signaling that continued operation outside the provincial framework could result in escalating penalties.
Treaty Claims
Mi’kmaq vendors and leaders ground their claims in the Peace and Friendship Treaties, signed with the British Crown in the 18th century, including the Treaty of 1752. Unlike later agreements, those treaties did not involve land cessions. They governed peace and trade.
In modern Canadian law, treaty rights have already been recognized as protecting certain economic activity. In R. v. Marshall (1999), the Supreme Court of Canada recognized a treaty-protected right tied to a “moderate livelihood” in the context of Mi’kmaq fishing and trade.
Mi’kmaq advocates argue that treaty-era trade principles, often described through the language of “truckhouses,” support a continuing right to trade that should not be confined to 18th-century goods.
Provincial authorities counter that even if a general treaty right to trade exists, it does not automatically extend to cannabis, a product regulated under both federal and provincial law. Under Nova Scotia’s regulatory regime, the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation is designated as the exclusive legal retailer of recreational cannabis.
That unresolved tension between historical treaty language and contemporary regulation is now being tested in court.
Active Litigation
One of the clearest signs the dispute is far from settled is active litigation involving Thomas Durfee, a Mi’kmaw vendor who operates multiple “treaty truckhouses” and has said his right to sell cannabis flows from the Peace and Friendship Treaty of 1752.
Durfee has challenged provincial enforcement following raids connected to his operations. Coverage of the Attorney General’s directive identified his case as part of a broader wave of litigation moving through Nova Scotia courts that could eventually force higher courts to address the issue directly.
Many expect the matter to reach the Supreme Court of Canada, where justices could be asked to clarify how historic treaty rights apply to modern economies, and how Indigenous jurisdiction claims should be evaluated when governments regulate tightly controlled markets.
For Mi’kmaq advocates, litigation is not a defensive fallback. It is a deliberate effort to define sovereignty through law rather than allowing enforcement to define it by default.
The Oklahoma Parallel
The structure of the conflict is familiar to Indigenous nations beyond Nova Scotia.
In Oklahoma, Native Nations have repeatedly confronted state efforts to assert exclusive regulatory authority over activities connected to tribal jurisdiction. As in Nova Scotia, uncertainty is often resolved through enforcement before courts weigh in, placing the burden on tribes to defend their authority after the fact.
The parallel is not about cannabis. It is about process.
In both places, governments acknowledge Indigenous sovereignty in principle while constraining it in practice through regulation and policing. Courts become arbiters only after enforcement has already reshaped the terrain.
The differences are real. Canada’s constitutional framework and treaty system differ from those in the United States. But the pattern — recognition paired with restriction — is familiar across borders.
Conclusion
Mi’kmaq leaders have emphasized that their objective is not regulatory chaos, but self-regulation: systems designed and enforced by Mi’kmaq governments and accountable to Mi’kmaq communities.
What they are resisting is the assumption that provincial authority is the default and Indigenous authority an exception that must be proven under pressure.
As cases like Durfee’s move through the courts, the dispute is narrowing. It is no longer about whether cannabis should be sold, but about whether governments will recognize Indigenous jurisdiction without first sending police to define its limits.
The Supreme Court of Canada may ultimately decide how 18th-century treaty rights apply to a 21st-century economy. Until then, Mi’kmaq advocates are insisting on a simpler point: sovereignty is not theoretical, and it should not begin at the end of a search warrant.
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