11–20 of 80 posts
It may take some time for the Supreme Court eventually to rule on the matter, but the current property "owners" are criminal trespassers in my view.
It seems clear to me that the treaty violates the U.S. Constitution and as such, the property in question still belongs to the Cherokee People. It may take some time for the Supreme Court eventually to rule on the matter, but the current property "owners" are criminal trespassers in my view.
I am not a constitutional law expert, but I believe that under article 6 section 2 (the supremacy clause) treaties are held to be equal to the constitution. Thus, there is a very high bar for a treaty to by nullified based on contradicting the constitution. There is very little case law on this, and I believe the only instance in which an international executive agreement (not a treaty) was thrown out by the Supreme Court was Reid vs Covert. In that case, it was throw out on the grounds that it violated 5th and 6th amendment protections of Americans in foreign countries.
Has anything changed? The man who signed and implemented this lopsided "agreement" was president and is still celebrated by many. His nickname was "the Indian killer". His portrait hangs in the Oval Office.
...but the reaction to the current backlash will likely end with Andrew Jackson removed from our currency and the Oval Office.
The fact that most people acknowledge that what was done to Native Americans was bad is at least some small progress.
I wonder what things would be like if the European settlers hadn't displaced the indigenous Americans. (If the American Indian way of life evolved and was still predominant today.) It's an interesting mental exercise.
A good model would probably be one of the central or South American countries. Mexico would probably be a good model for the northern states and Brazil would probably be a good model for the southern states (due to the large degree of African ancestry in its population). In Mexico there was a high degree of mixture between Europeans and indigenous and current day Mexico has a socio-economic gradient that roughy follo…
White landowners pretty much did what they liked: murder, rape, theft, kidnapping, forced labor, mass-murder, destruction of whole villages, forced relocation, ...
Within living memory, indigenous people would have their property stolen or destroyed by Spanish-speaking thugs with no legal recourse, would be forced into labor, would be murdered or raped on a whim by wealthy landowners. Until recently, indigenous people were not allowed in some Mexican cities after dark and had essentially no political representation. Etc.
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By contrast, in the USA we just killed all of the indigenous people and took their land.
The difference is that in Mexico & Central America the whole economic system was based on a colonial overseer class who used indigenous labor to produce goods for export, whereas in the USA the economic system was originally based on European immigrant settlers farming their own plots of land (or in the US South, based on plantations worked by African slaves), and indigenous people were economically extraneous.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would require the Columbian Exchange of diseases to have been a non-event. That massive population loss opened up the continent. Also, American Indian tribes are not a monolith so the contrast would be interesting. Given the migration of some tribes, I would expect a lot more tribal wars.
Do you know why disease seemed to almost eradicate indigenous populations in North America vs leave a large portion the indigenous population intact in central and South America? Asking because there is an obvious, massive difference in degree of indigenous genetic representation in, for example, the US vs. Mexico.
The big difference between the USA and regions further south is that in the USA white settlers just mass-slaughtered most of those who remained post-disease so they could steal their land, whereas further south they were instead pressed into forced labor in service of a relatively small group of white colonial overseers.
It’s kind of like the difference between bison and cows. The former are economically extraneous so mostly got wiped out, whereas the latter are economically important domesticated slaves and therefore survive. (If this metaphor seems racist, note that throughout the Americas the ideology of ruling whites held that indigenous people were subhuman and undeserving of basic rights.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That would require the Columbian Exchange of diseases to have been a non-event. That massive population loss opened up the continent. Also, American Indian tribes are not a monolith so the contrast would be interesting. Given the migration of some tribes, I would expect a lot more tribal wars.
Do you know why disease seemed to almost eradicate indigenous populations in North America vs leave a large portion the indigenous population intact in central and South America? Asking because there is an obvious, massive difference in degree of indigenous genetic representation in, for example, the US vs. Mexico.
South America also had a lot less colonists (Portugal only had 2 million people and tried to restrict emigration) they also received a lot more slaves (North America got <10% of the slave trade) which mixed with with the native population.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you know why disease seemed to almost eradicate indigenous populations in North America vs leave a large portion the indigenous population intact in central and South America? Asking because there is an obvious, massive difference in degree of indigenous genetic representation in, for example, the US vs. Mexico.
Disease was pretty indiscriminate and wiped out the vast majority of the population throughout the Americas. Before European arrival there were a massive number of people living throughout Central America, the Amazon rainforest, etc. Populations didn’t recover until several centuries later (and in some places, still haven’t). The big difference between the USA and regions further south is that in the USA white settle…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you know why disease seemed to almost eradicate indigenous populations in North America vs leave a large portion the indigenous population intact in central and South America? Asking because there is an obvious, massive difference in degree of indigenous genetic representation in, for example, the US vs. Mexico.
Disease was pretty indiscriminate and wiped out the vast majority of the population throughout the Americas. Before European arrival there were a massive number of people living throughout Central America, the Amazon rainforest, etc. Populations didn’t recover until several centuries later (and in some places, still haven’t). The big difference between the USA and regions further south is that in the USA white settle…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
A good model would probably be one of the central or South American countries. Mexico would probably be a good model for the northern states and Brazil would probably be a good model for the southern states (due to the large degree of African ancestry in its population). In Mexico there was a high degree of mixture between Europeans and indigenous and current day Mexico has a socio-economic gradient that roughy follo…
In Mexico rural indigenous peasants were treated as subhuman garbage. White landowners pretty much did what they liked: murder, rape, theft, kidnapping, forced labor, mass-murder, destruction of whole villages, forced relocation, ... Within living memory, indigenous people would have their property stolen or destroyed by Spanish-speaking thugs with no legal recourse, would be forced into labor, would be murdered or r…