American Indian Wars
The 2010 United States Census found 2,932,248 Americans who identified themselves as being American Indian or Alaskan Native, about 0.9% of the US population. The Canada 2011 Census found 1,836,035 Canadians who identified themselves as being First Nations (or Inuit or Métis), about 4.3% of the Canadian population. No consensus exists on how many people lived in the Americas before the arrival of Europeans, but extensive research continues to be conducted. Contemporary estimates range from 2.1 million to 18 million people living on the North American continent prior to European colonization, but the US Census Bureau stated in 1894 that North America was an almost empty continent in 1492 and that Indian populations "could not have exceeded much over 500,000."
Numbered Treaties
In 2010, Canada signed the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. In 2011 and again in 2012 the United Nations criticized the federal government over Attawapiskat. In 2012 in "Daniels v. Canada" the Federal Court of Canada ruled that 200,000 off-reserve First Nations people and 400,000 Métis were also "Indians" under S. 91(24) of the "Constitution Act, 1867". These however had no formal representation at the Assembly of First Nations, which had hitherto been assumed by the federal government to speak authoritatively on all matters involving "Indians".