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> It is high time for non-Native Americans to come to terms with the fact that the United States is built on someone else's land.

Land has been changing hands more or less continuously, forever. Before North America was "seized" by the people who came to be called Americans, parts of it were being seized and re-seized and re-re-seized by various groups of people who lived there at that time.

What is the author's reason for saying that it was at such-and-such a particular time that things were exactly as they should be, that everyone was occupying their proper piece of land?

I mean, it was violent bloodshed before the invaders arrived, and then it was ... more violent bloodshed after they arrived. People were being mean to each other long before the invaders arrived, and also after -- and ever since, everywhere in the world. Does the author think it's particularly bad to be mean to people who are of different ethnicity?

If a party owns land the US, by what moral authority can they block others access to it? By what moral authority can they demand rent on threat of eviction? Why wouldn't any democratic agency simply have the right to take it from them without compensation?

The reason this is a deeply interesting topic is because there are exceptionally strong claims to property rights made in the US and that same property was almost entirely all stolen in the recent past.

And because one gets such inconsistencies as claiming the theft occurred in the "mists of time" when, by definition, the constitution itself is further back in those same mists of time.

And the logically absurd (and patently false claims) that one can't locate a parcel's original possessor therefore some arbitrary purchaser down an illicit chain can make nearly unlimited exclusive claim to owning it.

And of course endless use of tu quoque.

So the authors intention is an utterly uninteresting red herring. It is a remarkable opportunity for thoughtful people to examine their own inconsistent views. The rest will simply shut their ears and convince themselves their is no reason for contemplation.

>that same property was almost entirely all stolen in the recent past.

Was there some sort of native American title office that the European settlers missed? Was every square mile of what would become the United States occupied, used, and accounted for?

The English were brutal, no doubt about it, but the French, for one, lived for a couple of centuries side by side with many native peoples in frontier areas without forcefully taking land and treating the natives as a population of people to be dealt with on an equal footing. There was plenty of room for everyone and huge areas of unclaimed, un-worked, un-owned land in every meaningful sense of the word.

And it wasn't just low intensity use by French trappers alongside natives but even higher intensity use such as the US southern states along side Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole agricultural societies that was working perfectly well [1] (until it was annihilated by Andrew Jackson et al contrary to a supreme court decision prohibiting it)

And indeed those tribes very much had land title offices, legal system and even constitutions echoing the US document.[2]

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Civilized_Tribes

[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherokee#Treaties_and_governmen...

"by what moral authority can they block others access to it"

Actually, here in Scotland there is a fairly widespread recognition (apart, perhaps, from some large landowners) that a lot of land was acquired by rather dubious means. I think this provides a fairly decent justification for the "right to roam" we have over most land.

Replace "America" with "Germany" and "Eastern Europe" and consider whether you would like to uphold your position.

The author's point was that the common narrative of European settlers colonizing an empty continent, alternatively European colonists bringing civilization to wild, barren lands has to be extended with European settlers bringing mass extermination to the indigenous population, through many different means.

I don't think I'm strongly pushing any particular position -- I think the author is, and I'm asking why.

Basically, what makes this particular story of human savagery, out of all of them, crucial right now? If it's high time for Americans to acknowledge that the US is built on someone else's land, is it also time for everyone else in every other country to do the same thing? Is there any country whose borders don't include territory that used to belong to people of some other ethnicity or culture?

Are we even sure we understand how to determine who really owns what piece of land? I'm genuinely asking. It seems very basic, but I don't know how to answer it.

Please note, I'm not trying to claim that any particular instance of violence was alright because everybody else was being violent too. Without a doubt, it was appalling, atrocious savagery, and will hopefully never be repeated. It's just that, in the field of appalling, atrocious savagery, there's a lot of competition.

But isn't "same old, same old" a dangerous position? I understand what you are saying, there have constantly been wars in every possible inhabitable area, everywhere in the world and especially at the end of the 19th century. So the US is not special in that respect. But the outside view of the US is that they deem themselves special - the shining beacon on the hill - a narrative that cannot be accommodated with its history. Germany had to come to terms with its past, acknowledge its past, is it too much to ask American citizens to do that as well, and continue onwards with a little more humbleness? The history of the US is not particularly nasty in comparison to other countries' histories, but it is not particularly exemplary as well.
>Replace "America" with "Germany" and "Eastern Europe" and consider whether you would like to uphold your position.

That would strengthen the OP's position by anyone who has even a basic understand of European history.

America has long held itself up as "better" than other countries - more virtuous, more wise, more free, more advanced, etc. etc.

When you actually look into it you see: a) the utterly brutal dispossession and extermination of a weak and technologically primitive existing population b) the callous and self-serving enslavation of vast numbers of people c) vicious and destructive interference in weak countries across the 20th and 21st century to facilitate the wholesale theft of natural resources.

I'm not saying that the rest of the world doesn't have its own sins, or that any other country would have been particularly better if they had the opportunities that America has had, but please, get down off your high horse. The ignorance and self-infatuation of American people is why they are so widely hated.

I don't think I'm on a high horse. I'm actually extremely critical of the US. Rereading my comment, is it possible you attributed viewpoints to me that I didn't actually express?
Everything you are saying here is oversimplified to the point of being grossly inaccurate (for example, 600,000 Americans died in a war to END slavery---why do you ignore that?). Basically, this is an apologia for hating Americans.

It is selectively historicizing something to justify your final sentence, which is an apologia for hating Americans.

If you hate Americans, maybe you shouldn't post on a website full of Americans.

And don't say you don't hate Americans. There is no reason to present a bunch of completely slanted history and just be like, "oh yeah, this is why other people hate Americans, but they are ignorant because they are selectively historicizing it." That is clearly not your attitude or your point.

By the way,

- Natural resources do not belong to whoever happens to live near them but simply ignores them. They belong to the person who extracts them. Property rights are acquired by use, not by where you were born or by your nationality.

- There were many cases of peaceful co-habitation with Native Americans and many cases of Native Americans initiating force against the settlers. Probably these categories account for a lot more than the category of outright brutality against natives, though that did happen some, particularly under Andrew Jackson (which is relatively late in our history!).

- It is worth recognizing that Americas founders were adamant about maintaining neutrality, so foreign interference is in many ways un-American. Moreover, it is worth recognizing that America has a moral right to interfere in foreign countries that threaten force against its citizens or their property, as does any country.

Natural resources... belong to the person who extracts them.

Wow, you must be a legal scholar. So let's say one day you come home to find that I've demolished your house and started drilling for oil. You're cool with that, I'm sure.

There were many cases of peaceful co-habitation with Native Americans and many cases of Native Americans initiating force against the settlers.

Good job at whitewashing. Let's say one day you come home and I'm camped on your front lawn. You tell me to get off so I beat you and take your living room as punishment for your "bad behaviour." A few weeks later you get angry and try and force me out again. This time I kill your wife and kids and give you the basement as a "reservation." Shouldn't have initiated force against me, right?

America has a moral right to interfere in foreign countries that threaten force against its citizens

This is just so laughable. If you think that the history of American 20th and 21st century foreign policy is about self-protection then... well, I guess you could say all those democratically elected leaders of third world countries were sort of threatening American citizens right? Threatening them with fair prices for natural resources maybe? Maybe if you consider all resources everywhere property of America, then anyone who refuses to sell you them for next to nothing and suppress their own citizenry for kickbacks is an aggressor...

I've been to America and the majority of the people I met - and this is in the nicer cities - were like big, stupid puppies, who thought America was the greatest country, and were completely confused when you said, well, no, actually... As I've said elsewhere there's no excuse for doing the wrong thing. Americans love to play the moral high card but they brutally annexed their country from a weak and vulnerable pre-existing population with much deeper historical and spiritual ties to the land. Then they've proceeded to do some of the nastiest things of the last few hundred years. Heaven forbid they be forced to admit any of that. The onus is on them though. The moral corruption of never acknowledging one's foundational guilt is inexorable.

They are widely hated by Europeans who do not even realize they are a vassal state. Most of the rest of the world would do anything to get to America.
"Most of the rest of the world would do anything to get to America."

I find this to be just a self-enforcing attitude (which one may get a chance to feel when entering a USA consulate).

Some decades ago, when there was a big difference in the quality of life between USA and "the rest of the world" (thanks to WW2 outcome), it made sense to claim such a thing. But things change, you know?

Spoken like a true American (with all that implies).

Most of the world would want America to fucking live them alone.

So presumably, if some foreign power invaded the US next week, violently exterminated most of the population, and herded the survivors into a few tracts of land, you would be fine with that? After all, land changes hands continuously.
Not at all. Nor am I "fine with" what happened to the natives.

All I'm asking is, would it be any major abberration, considering human history? Or would it just be: after atrocious violence and savagery, land briefly under the control of vague human entity X now seems to be under the control of vague human entity Y, episode #37,093,840?

>So presumably, if some foreign power invaded the US next week, violently exterminated most of the population, and herded the survivors into a few tracts of land, you would be fine with that?

I can tell you that I wouldn't expect to stand on my doorstep, facing the men with guns, saying, "ah, ah, ah, I own this land!" and have them turn away.

We do horrible things to other people, no doubt about it. Even worse, this specific moment in history isn't unique. So it goes.

>Land has been changing hands more or less continuously, forever. Before North America was "seized" by the people who came to be called Americans, parts of it were being seized and re-seized and re-re-seized by various groups of people who lived there at that time.

The scale and the speed were different. When a group of people moves in occupying part of the land, gradually over a long period is very different to one just moves in, kills all and takes everything.

I think what the author is saying is that the history taught in schools and colleges should not omit the part about the how the lands were acquired from the native americans.
And the OPs point is that we should not stop there either, because it is an arbitrary point in history. Also, as the number of immigrants increase in US schools, White guilt and other forms of self flagellation lessens. If you are not European, and your parent immigrated you have less of a complex about where the land came from, and are less likely to want to carry some burden foisted on you by some one with a funny political agenda.

It's interesting to me how we finally got rid of Original Sin, but now have replaced this with other, atheistic forms of this, like trying to make our children feel guilty about Native Americans and Slavery. I personally think this is the best way to increase tensions.

> It's interesting to me how we finally got rid of Original Sin, but now have replaced this with other, atheistic forms of this, like trying to make our children feel guilty about Native Americans and Slavery. I personally think this is the best way to increase tensions.

Time and time again people like to derail important discussions about the nature of Native American genocide and slavery by claiming this. Acknowledging this history is not about making people feel guilty, it is about understanding how those people are treated today and how their treatment is an extension of this history. The nature of racism and its history and legacy should not be trumped because it makes someone somewhere feel bad.

The best way to increase tensions is to ignore the past and continue to let that past influence how people are treated in the present, both socially and politically.

Yes. Ideally history taught in schools should present all sides in an unbiased manner without leaving parts out and go all the way to the present. But it happens all too often that parts of history are left out because of political agendas, ignorance, or lack of data. My understanding of the article is that the auther is pointing out one part of history that is consistently not taught (but should be).
Well, one possible perspective is that during a lot of the 20th century the US held itself to be morally superior to the "colonial" powers as they didn't have an empire.

However, the US - like Russia, didn't colonize other "nations" it appears to have mostly completely supplanted them in the areas it grew into.

Of course, this is only of historical interest, but as a wise man once wrote: "Who controls the past controls the future".

Mentioning President Lincoln in a positive light doesn't jive with his treatment of the Dakota https://www.facebook.com/dakota38movie (movie link).
"Of this self-identified population, only a fraction are visible minorities, subject to the discrimination that shapes identity and forges political movements."

Yeah, right. I think the author did very little research into the modern problems. Also, self-identified might cut it for the news media, but each tribe has a list of enrolled members. If you are not on someones list, you are not Native American for a vast majority of purposes.

Was "El Norte" (the Spanish settlement of California) only along the coast, or did they never lay full claim to the land? Curious as to why it doesn't really show on this visualization.

There's an excellent book about settlement patterns in the US called American Nations, by Colin Woodward. His theory is essentially that we don't pay nearly enough attention to the different influences of the competing original colonies, and that if you examine the history in this light there are all kinds of interesting narratives that you can draw. E.g., tidewater slavery != deep south slavery in fairly significant ways, because of the origin of each of those colonies (british gentry vs progeny of barbados slave owners) - and yet we generally make no distinction at all.

This is another case of 'I Can Tolerate Anything Except The Outgroup'

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-tolerate-anything...

It hits a lot of Americans at one point in their life, "We're not always the good guys." It's taken me a lifetime to understand that.
Very interesting visualization. It complements the recent release of An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, an excellent introduction to a consistently ignored aspect of US History.

http://www.beacon.org/An-Indigenous-Peoples-History-of-the-U...

Consistently ignored? Not at all. We are constantly reminded of this topic these days. It's very popular.

For instance, all you hear about on Columbus Day is about how (supposedly) horrible Colombus was, and how people are insulted that we still celebrate him.

Can you elaborate? Perhaps things have changed since I lived in the US (two years ago) but most people I knew were more or less completely ignorant of pre-colonial American history, and had only a passing familiarity with Columbus' misdeeds. I hope indeed it has changed.
Columbus was awful and we should be ashamed for celebrating him. We also learn way too much about native Americans, in some weird cultural guilt trip for past misdeeds. That isn't new--much of my childhood was wasted on learning native American history in the early 1990's.
History should be more than being "reminded". Few American could name the three largest Native nations today, much less 100 years ago, or what their systems of government, leaders, or social structures were.

I learned a lot in school about the Puritans, and Ancient Europe and even Egypt and Asian history, but little to nothing about the people who lived in California less than 200 years ago.

Vaguely reminiscent of maps of Israel and Palestine. Of course in the case of Native Americans, they are primarily to blame for obstinately refusing to accept the very generous division of 1807, in which they had the majority of the land. Instead they attacked the European settlers, leaving them with no choice but to expand for the purpose of self protection.
>Of course in the case of Native Americans, they are primarily to blame for obstinately refusing to accept the very generous division of 1807

Why should they accept the "generous division" of invaders?

Would you accept the "generous division" of your house or property, to some guy that just arrived and wants it?

because obviously the division terms would actually be upheld and followed, hah!
> It is high time for non-Native Americans to come to terms with the fact that the United States is built on someone else's land.

As usual, the concepts of "native United States citizen" and "native North American aborigine" are being conflated.

The United States is a "nation of colonists". The Republic did not precede the North-Western European colonists who founded it. Demands for non-Aborigionies to acknowledge "someone else's land" stem from a failure to distinguish between United States citizenship and chance birth on the North American continent. The North American Aborigine peoples may have historically been born on the North American landmass, but they were not the founders of the United States nor the people whose interests said nation was designed to further. The disorganized aboriginals variously aided or hindered the expansion of the Republic depending on the particular tribe's short term ends.

The European pioneers did not "steal" a pre-existing democratic republic, rather, they struggled, triumphed, and created their own for their progeny. North American Aborigines lived outside the republic until reservations were allotted to them, reservations which they largely continue to live apart in today.

Frankly, the tone of the parent article smacks of 1960s-era Baby Boomer coming-of-age politics. Its high time to question this line of thinking.

I agree that "someone else's land" is a bit much.

Saying that "North American Aborigines lived outside the republic" is a bit misleading, because it insinuates that they weren't interested in assimilating, and becoming a part of that struggling, triumphing mass of people that identified as Americans at that time.

More truthfully, leading up to the times when they were forcibly relocated to reservations, they were never allowed in, for the same reasons that black residents of the US had a tough time in those years: the world around them was quite racist and (especially in the case of indians) kleptomaniac.

In fact, many Native Americans tried to assimilate; I remember reading about one enterprising native gent in the early 1800s who had made himself quite rich from trade, had a mansion, the whole nine yards ... until the day came when his town wanted his stuff. So they took it, because America was in large part founded on the notion of repeatedly taking stuff that the natives considered their property.

Acknowledging the massive wrongs committed by this country against those peoples isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I agree with you that we need to be realistic about what conclusions we draw from it. Yes, the United States stole stuff from the indians. No, we're not going to now consider dispossessing the current owners of that stuff; that's akin to, say, questioning the rightness of the origins of modern-day Israel. There's a state there now, so it's moot.

This is a bad analogy because Israel continues in the modern day to usurp land from Palestinians, forcing them to self-dispossess. So if you're going to say exportation and colonization is wrong and should be illegal, you're right, this was learned during WWII and codified in the Geneva Conventions after it and why all Jewish settler land acquired on Arab villages is considered illegal by the international community minus Israel. And yet this land transfer continues as settlements are expanded, today. So it is not moot to question the rightness of modern day Israel or any other state that forces an indigenous population to self-dispossess.
This argument could be extended to literally any people, at any time in history who explored, conquered, annexed or founded a colony/country on a parcel of land that had been explored or lived on before. Franks, Gauls, Nordic vikings, Indo-Europeans, Phoenecians, Romans. They're all in the same club of explorers, navigators, warriors, tradesman, etc. It's also a major logical fallacy to assign current moral/ethical mores to a totally different time and place in history. "But it was bad that the Aztecs ripped hearts out of innocent virgins." Yeah, it was insanely horrible, but at the time that act kept the earth spinning and the gods happy (in their belief system). Want to go back in time and make the argument against that?
So generally, if you buy something from a burglar which belonged to someone else until some act of violence, the law does not recognize your ownership over the property but instead would demand you return it to its original owner.

For practical purposes, it doesn't make sense to give that land back wholesale. But it is relevant to, for example, a Libertarian reading Robert Nozick and claiming that he has a moral right to his property because it was originally claimed legally and then transferred through a chain of non-coersive transactions.

The European pioneers did not "steal" a pre-existing democratic republic,

Correct. They didn't steal a pre-existing political entity analogous to their own. What they stole was land and resources. Through force, manipulation, guile, rape, and genocide.

I don't see how either this quote or the article from which it is drawn conflates those those two categories of people. Indeed, it says that we "conquered" the native lands, a word that usually refers to one polity expanding from lands of its own into lands outside of it. It presupposes that native american lands were outside of the United States.

Yes, the European pioneers struggled. Both a military campaign and an agricultural enterprise are very difficult.