History of Native America

Maeve Kane

mkane2@albany.edu

maevekane.net/hill

revisionist history

  • history is an evolving field of study
  • history is an argument about how we know what we know
  • history is inherently political - what is emphasized and how
  • settler colonialism is the process of writing Indigenous perspectives out of their own histories

The Civilizing Mission

First half

  • Indian education
  • Playing Indian
  • Anthropology and Indian history

where are we?

  • Entanglement era: 1650-1770
  • Removal era: 1770-1840
  • Extermination era: 1840-1887
  • Allotment & Assimilation era: 1887-1940
  • Termination era: 1940-1975
  • Self-Determination era: 1975-present

Ursuline Convent, Quebec 1620-1830

Eleazar Wheelock and alumni, 1750-1780

Thomas Indian Orphan Asylum, 1840-1970

Thomas Indian Orphan Asylum, 1840-1970

Thomas Indian Orphan Asylum, 1840-1970

Thomas Indian Orphan Asylum, 1840-1970

Tom Torlino

Albany State Normal School, 1844-present

Ely Parker

Caroline Parker

Lewis Henry Morgan

  • upstate NY, 1830s-1860s
  • Ely Parker's bro
  • "Tammany Indians": secret fraternal organizations
  • Indians are disappearing and their virtues must be saved
  • virtuous whites can embody the best characteristics of the "original Americans"

Scouting and Playing Indian

Scouting and Playing Indian

  • cities are dangerous to health
  • nature & health of white workers
  • anti-child labor activism
  • need for boys trained with skills for colonial wars
  • military uniforms for discipline (Carlisle)
  • constructs universal “Americanness” for immigrant whites, Hispanic and African Americans

HOW DOES THIS MAKE SENSE?

  • Americans play Indian to become "truly American"
  • playing Indian gives symbolic claim to land, stewardship, positive stereotypes
  • allows Americans to make a distinction between "good Indians" and "bad Indians"
  • good Indians disappear; bad Indians are violently removed
  • land is therefore free for settlement
  • justifies and erases colonial violence

legacies

  • language and cultural loss
  • family disruption
  • religious & institutional sexual abuse
  • paths out of poverty for some
  • Pan-Indian political organizing: Society of American Indians & National Congress of American Indians
  • legal, medical and academic skills to benefit reservations

INDIAN CHILD WELFARE ACT: 1978

  • 25-35% of children removed between 1886-1976
  • UN Declaration of Rights of Indigenous People
  • states have jurisdiction over child welfare
  • guarantees tribal jurisdiction over cases on reservations or with enrolled member parents
  • 2013 SCOTUS Adoptive Couple v Baby Girl

Second half

  • Cherokee Removal: big picture
  • Cherokee Removal: legal
  • Cherokee Removal: legacies
  • Iroquois non-removal

Cherokee background

  • Proclamation of 1763: British Indian policy
  • Treaty of Paris 1783: end of American Revolution
  • Commerce clause of Constitution
  • doctrine of conquest: basis of all US land ownership
  • Missouri Compromise 1820: westward spread of slavery

Constitutional COMMERCE CLAUSE

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes

1823: Johnson v M'Intosh

  • discovery doctrine & doctrine of conquest
  • Native American right of occupancy

1830: Cherokee Nation v Georgia

  • Cherokee Nation does not have standing
  • not a foreign nation, domestic dependent nations

1832: Worcester v Georgia

  • states may not make treaties or enforce laws
  • only federal government may make treaties

THE TREATY PARTY

  • John Ridge, Elias Boudinot & Stand Watie
  • "full blood," traditional govt
  • protect sovereignty by getting away from Georgia

THE NATIONAL PARTY

  • John Ross, Major Ross, William Hicks
  • intermarried, slave-owning, elected govt
  • protect sovereignty by working within US system

TREATY OF NEW ECHOTA 1835

  • Oct 1835: John Ross + Elias Boudinot attempt to negotiate in DC
  • Dec 1835: treaty council convened in Georgia
  • signed by 21 with no legal authority
  • citizenship clause removed after signing
  • Ross petitions Congress: 16k signatures

TRAIL OF TEARS

  • hot dry fall, cold wet winter
  • 7k militia to remove 13k Cherokees
  • 3 months, 1000mi, 1/4 mortality rate
  • Ridge, Boudinot & Watie murdered in Oklahoma
  • was there an alternative?

CIVIL WAR LEGACY

  • 1860 Indian Territory opened to white settlement
  • Confederacy promises to recognize Indian nations as independent nations
  • security of land and property: slaves

CHEROKEE FREEDMEN

  • Treaty of 1866: former slaves to be made citizens and given land
  • Dawes Rolls problems
  • Indian Self Determination Act vs. 13th Amendment?
  • 2017 reinstatement
  • is Cherokee citizenship biological or political?

SEMINOLE (NON) REMOVAL

  • First Seminole War: harboring slaves
  • Second: enforcement of Indian Act
  • Third: white squatting on reserved lands
  • Confederate recognition
  • Florida Everglades Natl Park

IROQUOIS (NON) REMOVAL

  • who has right of discovery to 1776?
  • who has the power to negotiate 1776-1783?
  • Mass. sold purchase rights to private companies
  • Iroquois rented land to whites who refused to move