In May, 2016, at Qonasqamkuk, representatives of the Governments of Canada and New Brunswick met with the Peskotomuhkati Council. Though this was before any formal mandate to negotiate, the three governments agreed that the principles of the existing treaties between the Peskotomuhkati Nation and the Crown would continue to guide and govern their relationship.
The principles are those of the Covenant Chain: respect, trust and friendship.
At the same meeting, the three governments agreed that it would be proper, before any new negotiations began, and to begin to accomplish what Prime Minister Trudeau set out in his mandate letters to the Ministers of Indigenous Affairs and Justice – “restoring respectful nation to nation relations” – that the existing treaty relationship should be formally reaffirmed.
It is the 250th anniversary of Joseph Goreham’s Instructions to reaffirm the treaties of the 18th century, and to extend the Covenant Chain to the Wabanaki Nations. To commemorate the reaffirmation of the treaties in 2016, the Peskotomuhkati Council commissioned the making of a new wampum belt.
The wampum was made by Haohyoh Ken Maracle of the Deer Clan (Cayuga Nation of the Haudenosaunee) at the Grand River Territory. It is made of glass beads of a kind that have been in use as a substitute for shell wampum since the 18th century.