LAUSR

regimes reminiscent of those in residential schools. Some punishments were largely psychological, such as relocating patients to wards where language barriers prevented socialization. Others affected the body more directly, such as tying children to their beds or applying casts to the lower body that prevented movement. These hospitals served as propaganda to demonstrate that the emerging welfare state provided care even to those who fit awkwardly into modernity by “medicalizing inequality and pathologizing Aboriginality” (129). Lux approaches resistance with nuance by considering actions ranging from flight to First Nations workers who comforted patients in their own language. Chapter 5 centres on IHS efforts in the 1960s to “get out of the hospital business.” Lux argues that assimilation remained at the core of the IHS’s efforts. Without an Indian hospital system First Nations would have to seek care elsewhere. Most bands wanted their hospitals to stay, albeit in a better form. Bands feared that their funds would be channelled into community institutions that primarily served non-Aboriginal patients. Lux also stresses the surge in political organization following the 1969 “White Paper” on Indian policy that offered a pathway to provincial taxation. Medicare had left First Nations behind since the IHS only reimbursed costs for patients it deemed indigent. Faced with a choice between means-tested care or out-of-pocket expenses, bands pressed the federal government for care based on treaty rights. Chapter 6 provides a case study on the protracted, and still ongoing, legal battle pertaining to health care and treaty rights in North Battleford, Saskatchewan. Ottawa preferred to view health care as a policy rather than a legal obligation. The debate hung on how to interpret the “medicine chest” clause in Treaty Six (1867). The Canada Health Act of 1984 helped to somewhat ameliorate the tension between provincial and federal governments since it allowed for reimbursement regardless of means. This chapter adds texture to Lux’s argument about agency by revealing community organization and legal action by First Nations that sought recognition of treaty rights. Much more could be said about this important contribution. Chapters 5 and 6 could be organized chronologically to make the legal context clearer. Still, Lux has written a must-read book for scholars of history, political science, and public policy.