A lot of inexperienced young students and a dumpy old common room
Entering [law school], I was expecting much more. I had expected to meet a whole pile of very, very talented people, and what I met was a lot of young students that were just inexperienced. Of course, I was the only Indian in 16 years. So I had higher expectations of the quality of the students, because I had seen what was required in order to get in. When I became the Law Students’ Association president, I sat on the admissions committee, and I saw all of the 800 or 900 applications. We only accepted I think it was 150 or something like that. I had high marks coming in and had more than qualified. I had a big LSAT mark. But we rejected a Rhodes Scholar—a Rhodes Scholar!—because of his low LSAT. He had less than 600 on the LSAT. I was quite surprised at it.
But generally the first impression I had of law school was it was in a rundown shack of a building. You know, six or seven or eight old army huts. Then there was the main reading room, and it had two ends, a special collection and then a periodical collection. There was a dumpy old common room. But it had all the library books and everything like that.
And I enjoyed it. I was really keen on becoming a real good student so I sat at the front of the class all the time. I was a good student to start.
All the students just held their heads down
Anyway, the incident that really changed things, I suppose, was [my property professor]. He would come in late very often. He did anything he wanted. If he was there early, he’d start early. If he was there late, he wouldn’t apologize. And I didn’t like that.
Anyway, we were reviewing a case one day and he says, “Give me the facts of this case.” So I gave them to him: An old man who had been abandoned by his own family took in a young fellow who looked after him for the rest of his life. The young fellow, who the old man called his nephew, even though there was no blood relationship, was included in the will. One of the nearest living relatives, who had abandoned the old man, succeeded in having the will overturned and inherited the substantial property.
“And what do you think of that, Mr. Wilson?” the prof asked me.
“Well, it’s bullshit.” I said. “It’s clear that the old man wanted to deed his property to the young fellow.”
I said, “What the hell? I mean, where’s the justice in this system?”
And I’ll never forget his response. The professor put his hands on the lectern and looked down at me and he said, “Bill Wilson, you have one of the most brilliant legal minds I’ve ever encountered. But as soon as you are able to disabuse yourself of the assumption that the law has anything to do with human rights or equity, you will become a great lawyer.”
I asked him, “What are you talking about?”
He pontificated, “Law is about perpetuating propertied and moneyed interests in the hands of very few, and protecting it forever. That’s what the law is about. Remember that.”
I was in a bit of shock, but then said: “Well, if that’s what the law’s about, you can stick it up your ass.”
And I left, never to return to that class.
I was furious as I walked away from the building. I wasn’t just angry at the professor because I had come to expect that kind of conduct from him. What pissed me off was the reaction of the students. All the students had been complaining about him. And when I confronted him, he said, “You just get the hell out of here.” And I said, “Why don’t you get out of here?” I said, “You’re the one that’s causing a problem.” Anyways, he goes, “Well, I’ll get out of here if the students say I should.” All the students just held their heads down. They were all intimidated. They made me sick.
As I walked to my car my contracts prof asked me where I was going when I should be in class. “What are you doing?” he asked. “I’m going to down to fuckin’ Fraser Arms. I’m going to get nuts drunk.” And he goes, “Come with me. Come to my office.” It was an old army hut and you had to walk up these stairs, and it was shitty old tarpaper, literally a tarpaper shack. He had a tiny cluttered with books, periodicals and overflowing ashtrays. “Open that desk drawer,” he said. I opened the drawer and found a bottle of scotch with and two dirty little glasses that had never been cleaned.
“Pour us a shot,” he said.
“Slam yours,” he demanded. I am partial to beer, but scotch seemed appropriate at the time.
We poured another shot then we sat there sipping. Finally, he said, “What’s your problem kid?”
So I told him what had happened. “Oh,” he says. “Don’t worry about it, the guy’s an asshole.”
That’s what a prof said to me. And that seemed to be the general consensus. After I had calmed down a bit, he asked me if I had any money. I actually had lots of money. I was working full-time in first year. And I said, “Sure, I have money. What are we going to do now?”
He said, “You are going to go over to the Student Union Building and get [a person there] to sell you the CANNED notes.” I didn’t know what he was talking about but I went over as directed. [The person] had a little office space from which he greeted me warmly. I asked told him that [the prof] had directed me to get CANNED notes. He gave me a big book containing all the best notes from all my classes, notes taken by good students over the years. I tried to hand him the $25 they would normally cost.
“Well, no, they’re free to you.”
I said, “No, no, that’s …”
“No, no, no,” he said. “You take them.”
I said, “No, here. Here’s 25 bucks.”
He says, “Okay, I’ll take it, but I’ll buy you Heinekens at Cecil Green Hall.”
I said, “Okay.” So I took the notes anyway, and I took them downtown. I was living off-campus.
I went back to [my contract prof’s] office with the CANS. He said, “Do me a favour, I want you to stay to write the Christmas exams.”
I said, “I’m never going back into [my property professor’s] class.”
He says, “You don’t have to. That’s why I sent you to get the CANNED notes.”
So I got all the notes, and that’s basically what I studied. And I didn’t come back to school until just before Christmas exams. I was in Ottawa and all over the province. I was helping the Union of BC Indian Chiefs get established. And then I came back just in time for Christmas exams. Anyway, I ended up getting I think it was 78% on the Christmas exam. I thought, “Shit, if they’re going to give me a law degree, I might as well just stay here.” So I stayed, but I still kept my jobs and traveled the country.
So thanks to [my contracts professor] I stayed, and I’m glad I did. I could have been easily distracted. I was offered a job in Ottawa, I was offered a job downtown. I already had a full-time job, and then I really wanted to go fishing. And he said, “No, you have to stay here.” So I did and became only the second Indian to graduate from law school, my cousin Alfie Scow being the first.
Birth of the Great Trike Race
I was never a student. I’d just come in and do some stuff. So I stayed for three years. I was student president the second year. I was an ex-officio member of the Canadian Bar Association, a member of the BC Council. Got appointed to a whole lot of other boards including the Canada Council on Social Development. So it opened up a lot of things for me.
In my first year I noticed that it was a very unhappy place. People were stealing each other’s notes, starting to compete even in the quality of their dress. I thought it was a stupid place socially. In fact it had no social life that I was aware of. That’s when I decided to run at the end of first year. My slogan was simply, “I am going to turn this place into a more fun place for people.” I ran against a guy who promised to reform the economy and change the world. I had no such aspirations. I just wanted to make law school more enjoyable. I am proud to say that I was successful in doing so, with the help of a number of people. Within the first two weeks of my term we held the first ever Beer Bust in the Common Room on Fridays. We created the great trike race. We started the fundraising for the new Law School. I am indebted to a number of people who helped to make the changes. I must mention the president of the university, whose approval was needed for the first Beer Bust. I needed his signature on the liquor permit. He said he would sign it on one condition, that he be allowed to buy me the first beer. So the place became a little more friendly, even though I was very seldom there.
A short stint in articles
I made a lot of connections and a lot of friends thanks to my position as the Law School Association President. Every month I attended the Provincial Council of the Canadian Bar Association. They had the meetings at the Terminal City Club, Vancouver Club or one of the other nice clubs down town. I got to ‘hobnob’ with a lot of people. [Two professors] got me articles with a prominent labour management firm downtown. It wasn’t my intention to practice law but I did want to learn negotiation skills and this firm specialized in such a practice. I wanted to be an Indian politician. I flirted with the possibility of being an MP or an MLA but I rejected that thankfully. I started the articles and was treated extremely well. I am sure being the first Indian to graduate from Law School in 16 years had something to do with it. I liked to think actually that it was my talent and good looks—but whatever! My short stint in articles ended when the BC Association of Non-Status Indians offered me a signing bonus and $24,000/year tax free. I was making $800 a month taxable at the law firm. It did not take me long to clean out my desk.
The people at the firm were really pissed off at me because they’d made a special place for me in their firm. I just said, “Listen, I’m leaving.” I didn’t believe and I still don’t believe that the white man’s law is superior to my law. I know it isn’t. So I never bit the bullet. Anyway, I’m glad I did what I did, but I often wonder: I’d be a multimillionaire now, because I would have been good at it and I knew what it took to be good at it. Anyway, I ended up becoming a politician, and that’s pretty much the end of the story about law school.
Native Courtworker and Counselling Association
In first year, I was working for the Union of BC Indian Chiefs for the summer. We obtained a grant for Opportunities for Youth funded by the Secretary of State. We hired six students from the law school. In those days there was no computer networking for court statistics. You literally had to go into the court house in order to obtain detailed information. We were trying to find out how many Indians were appearing before court and how many pled guilty. So we divided the Province up and sent our students out to the court registries.
The basic idea was to use the John Howard Society and amalgamate it with our association so that it would be a universal service open to all. The John Howard Society had an Indian component but it wasn’t 100% devoted to Indians, Métis and non-status. So we formed the Native Courtworker and Counselling Association, and devoted it exclusively to Indians, Métis, and non status Indian people.
The students gathered up all this information and the findings were horrendous. Over 80% of all Indians charged with an offence would plead guilty and get six to two less a day for minor offences. Multiple minor offences would become a major offence and the recidivism was just atrocious.
We compiled all this data and produced a report with suggestions about how this situation could be resolved. [My friend] and I who worked on the project took our proposal to Ottawa seeking start up money for the Native Courtworker Association. There was no awareness or any interest here from in provincial government in regard to Indians. So it was off to Ottawa for a week. [My friend] and I and stayed in the Skyline Hotel and walked up the hill every day to try to meet with Ministers. We saw a lot of ministers, but not the one we wanted to, the Justice Minister John Turner. We saw a lot of MPs, we probably talked to a hundred MPs who sadly seemed to have no influence unless they are in Cabinet.
Every day we went to see the Justice Minister first thing in the morning. We’d sit there and the receptionist would say, “Well, the Minister is in the House right now,” or “The Minister is busy right now,” or so on and so on. We were young and naïve and certainly did not know how Ottawa worked. We would soon learn a basic political lesson.
As an undergrad, I joined the Beta Theta Pi fraternity at UBC. At the time I thought it was a good idea but I had no idea really of what benefit it might be. [My friend] and I were sitting outside the Minister’s office. We had been there since 10 o’clock, like we were every day. We were just about to give up and go to lunch when [Minister Turner’s assistant] walked in the door. I knew him from my old fraternity days. He came over, gave me the secret handshake and we talked a little Latin to each other.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“We are here to see the Minister,” I said.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
“Since 10 o’clock every morning this week,” I answered.
“Why didn’t call you me? I would have got you in the first time you were here,” he said.
“Well, I didn’t know the connection.”
He went into the Minister’s office and returned immediately. “Come in, Billy,” he says. We went in to find Justice Minister Turner lying on a comfortable couch with his shoes off and his tie undone. He unfolded himself from the couch, stood up, gave me the secret handshake and we mumbled a few words in Latin. My friend, not being a Beta, seemed somewhat excluded but Turner made him feel at home immediately by offering us a drink and a cigar. Turner was an impressive man, handsome and athletic. He made us feel comfortable. We had entered another world.
The bells were ringing calling the MPs to the House but they were not the urgent bells that would demand they be there. “Muffle the bells a little bit so we can have a talk,” Turner said. We sat there having an informal conversation with the highest ranking legal officer in the country. We literally made small talk for over half an hour. Turner even asked me about my soccer career because he knew that I had played for the UBC Thunderbirds. Then he said, “Oh, shit. I guess I have to get going because the bells have changed their tone.” He said, “You guys are welcome to stay here if you like but before I go let me ask you what you came to see me about.” We had been there an hour and hadn’t yet talked about anything to do with business.
I gave him our proposal and stated that we needed $86,500 to found a Native Courtworker program in the province of British Columbia. He scanned it briefly, turned to his assistant, and said, “Have you seen this?” His assistant said, “Yes, I have read it through.”
“Look good to you?”
He said, “Yeah.”
Turner said, “How much do you need, Bill?”
I said, “We need $86,400.” And he goes, “I think it’d probably be better off with $186,000, don’t you think?”
“That’s fine with me.” Shook hands, double handshake, secret handshake, a few words in Latin, and we left. Two weeks later, we got a cheque for $186,410. That’s how the Courtworkers Association was founded. It was a major lesson in life for me. “Who you know, not what you know.”
The story’s neat. But we did the work. We were the first ones, believe it or not, in the legal system to actually discern the accused by race. We didn’t know about the rest of them because they weren’t listed, but they were all listed by Indian race, so that’s something. That wouldn’t be tolerated now—what your race would be if you were being charged. You don’t have to tell anybody. But the Indians were identified, and that made it easier for us to get the number.
So we got it going and it became the Native Courtworkers Association for about five years, and then it became alcohol and drug, too, so it became the Native Courtworker and Counselling Association. I was the vice-president of it for many years and my friend was a president.
The original slogan was “A Helping Hand to Justice.” We were doing things like revamping laws in the way you can deal with the accused, getting to the reality of why people are coming forward in such numbers. “Well, it’s obvious. Poverty.” You go, “No, it’s alcohol.” “Well, fuck, they’re drinking because they’re poor. So let’s start to deal with the reality.” So we were just starting to get into that kind of restorative justice, new approaches at the community level to justice.
Then we got our funding cut off. But what really happened was internal internecine warfare. Some Indians on the board didn’t like the other Indians on the board, and the Department of Indian Affairs manipulated that. Then, anyway, we got the funding back right away. But then there was a cooperative venture between the Union of BC Indian chiefs and the United Native Nations that I was the president of. So the United Native Nations were pretty much the people that [followed up] from the Union of BC Indian Chiefs. It was the Union that founded it, eh? And it continued to exist. And in ’76, I became the president of the new organization called the United Native Nations. Then we agreed there would be six board members from the Union, six board members appointed by the United Native Nations, one appointed by the province, and one appointed by the feds, and one appointed by the RCMP.
And it worked out really well. We had some great, great meetings, and we were actually doing initiatives, changing things. But then the internecine warfare just fucked it all up. And now the guys on the streets say, “Instead of ‘A Helping Hand to Justice,’ ‘A Helping Hand to Jail’ is the slogan now,” among the guys that are in the joint now, eh?
You could hear the screaming and crying
Still I did a bunch of work in the jails when I was a student. My sister, she was a court worker, and she got me going to the Kent Institute and all those other places, including [the] one near Abbotsford, it’s a maximum security place. Oh, I hated going there. But we went there. They were wanting to have things like sweats and cleansing and healing, that kind of stuff. So we were just advocating on their behalf. Then any kind of appeals or stuff like that, we would simply turn over to a court worker. So on a regular basis, the court workers would go in and take the details down if there was something that we could do. And you know as well as I do, there’s not much you can do. But we would do it. But we were representing them to the world, I suppose.
I spent 24 hours in BC Pen, too, when I was in law school. They don’t do that kind of stuff anymore. Well, the BC Pen is gone. They took us out there at four o’clock in the afternoon and they locked us up until four o’clock the next day. There was about 12 of us. We were segregated. We were in a segregated wing. But you could hear the screaming and crying—a horrible place. We didn’t mingle with the prisoners, but we were there for 24 hours. It’s gone now.
Oh, we had some great profs. The curriculum was standard. You took the same stuff in first year. Everybody in school took the same in first year. And pretty much everybody took the same in second year. And then the third year, you might have a couple options. There was no open curriculum. Everybody came out with a law degree that was exactly the same. People say, “What did you study in law school?” Well, same thing everybody else did. There was no electives, no nothing.
All over the place and still going to school
I went to work for the Union of BC Indian Chiefs in the summer of about a month before I was supposed to go back to school. The administrator of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs had resigned. So they appointed me [as] the administrator. Well, I don’t know shit from wild honey about administration. I mean I really had never—it had never crossed my mind. So I had to become the administrator of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs. Then I finally came [to law school], my wife and I, moved from North Vancouver out to UBC. They didn’t have an administrator. So I used to go down there probably two or three days a week. The office was at Musqueam, eh? And I was the administrator. Then finally they got somebody to help me in about I guess it would be March. They got a new guy they broke in.
Then I got approached by the BC Association of Non-Status Indians, because my mother was non-status because she married a white guy after my dad passed away, so she lost her status. Anyway, so they approached me because they were excluded from land claims and the constitutional stuff and everything like that. So I went to work for them and it was wonderful. A new opportunity and the Union had turned into just a Department of Indian Affairs rump group, which it still is. Worthless, a waste of time and money. But BCANSI had some initiatives. You know, they had local initiatives where people would be doing things on their own—economic development, housing. We built a lot of houses in this province for non-status Indian people. And they were more of a political innovative group than the Union. Union was DIA-oriented.
I got elected to the Union executive or board of directors. I was one of 15 chief council members. So I stayed. But the Union had really turned back in. They hired a former executive assistant to [a] politician, and he turned it back into just a DIA flunky organization. But as a result of that, I got to travel, and in third year I ended up working for [the] the president of the National Indian Brotherhood. And I worked very briefly for [him].
Then I worked for BCANSI, and then I got a job. Because of the non-status thing, I got employed by groups around the province, or around the country. I worked for the James Bay Crees. I worked for Federation of Saskatchewan Indians. I worked for Council of Yukon Indian Brotherhood and the Council of Yukon Indian–Métis–Non-Status. I worked for places all over the place, so I got to travel quite a bit. That was kind of neat. But all the time, I was still going to school.