Treaty 7 is an agreement between the Crown and several, mainly Blackfoot, First Nation band governments in what is today the southern portion of Alberta.

[1] Negotiations concluded on September 22, 1877, at the Blackfoot Crossing of the Bow River, at the present-day Siksika Nation reserve, approximately 75 km (47 mi) east of Calgary, although a secondary signing occurred on December 4th of that same year, to accommodate Blackfoot leaders who were not present at the primary signing.

The British government, in an exchange of letters at the time of the transfer, sought assurances that Canada would provide the Crown's obligation to First Nations.

[3] Meanwhile, the Canadian government were pursuing the means to build a railway, which necessitated the acquisition of the land from the Indigenous people.

The leaders of the plains were interested in the treaty, due to their concerns about the direction in which the lives of their peoples were headed.

They had become aware that their resources were rapidly depleting as a result of overhunting and the commercialization of the usage of animals through the Hudson's Bay Company.

[3] They saw the numbered treaties as a way to associate themselves with the monarchy and gain the government's protection of their land and resources before American settlers could come to take over their territories.

The First Nations representatives were largely from the Blackfoot confederacy, due to their inhabiting the majority of the land that the Canadian government sought after.

[6] Laird suggested that the buffalo would soon be gone, and that it was important for the Indigenous peoples to move toward agricultural and ranching lifestyles, and that the government would support them in doing this.

Crowfoot waited for the arrival of Red Crow, the leader of the Kainai Nation and a trusted friend of Macleod, before making any decisions about the treaty.

[4] The treaty involved 130,000 km2 of land stretching from the Rocky Mountains to the Cypress Hills, the Red Deer River and the US border.

The terms of the treaty stated that all nations still maintained the right to hunt on the land, and that, in exchange for giving up ownership of the land, each nation was to receive reserves of 1 square mile (2.6 km2) per family of five, with proportional adjustments made for families of a larger or smaller number than that.

[8] Due to their rapidly depleting population of buffalo, the Indigenous people were interested in learning more about agriculture and how to cultivate their own produce, to help them navigate a more sedentary life.

[citation needed] The government brought money, cattle, and the promise of education with the intention of teaching Indigenous people the Western ways of living, so that they would be able to sustain their populations without the buffalo.

Their interpretation of the treaties was guided by their need for support from the crown and protection to ensure the survival of their people and culture.

$12 from the Queen was designated to each person who was part of any other of the above-mentioned tribes and other amounts of money to people of higher power such as chiefs.

[9] All these implications of the treaties have contributed to the level of poverty and grievances experienced on the reserves and by Indigenous peoples today.

When comparing the difference in cultures during the treaty signing, it is possible the Indigenous population could have been misinformed or misguided, whether unwittingly or intentionally.

The settlers at the time strongly advocated for the treaty to be a written document but the tradition of the Indigenous people was, and still is, an oral one.

[4] However, all the nations involved in the eleven treaties throughout Canada have since been in communications with the government about issues with their land surrenders, improperly performed surveys and fraudulent deals.