These are
great evils; and it must be added that they appear to me to be irremediable. I
believe that the Indian nations of North America are doomed to perish; and that
whenever the Europeans shall be established on the shores of the Pacific Ocean,
that race of men will be no more. *i The Indians had only the two alternatives
of war or civilization; in other words, they must either have destroyed the
Europeans or become their equals.
i [ This seems, indeed, to be the opinion of almost all American statesmen.
"Judging of the future by the past," says Mr. Cass, "we cannot
err in anticipating a progressive diminution of their numbers, and their
eventual extinction, unless our border should become stationary, and they be
removed beyond it, or unless some radical change should take place in the
principles of our intercourse with them, which it is easier to hope for than to
expect."]
At the first
settlement of the colonies they might have found it possible, by uniting their
forces, to deliver themselves from the small bodies of strangers who landed on
their continent. *j They several times attempted to do it, and were on the
point of succeeding; but the disproportion of their resources, at the present
day, when compared with those of the whites, is too great to allow such an
enterprise to be thought of. Nevertheless, there do arise from time to time
among the Indians men of penetration, who foresee the final destiny which
awaits the native population, and who exert themselves to unite all the tribes
in common hostility to the Europeans; but their efforts are unavailing. Those
tribes which are in the neighborhood of the whites, are too much weakened to
offer an effectual resistance; whilst the others, giving way to that childish
carelessness of the morrow which characterizes savage life, wait for the near
approach of danger before they prepare to meet it; some are unable, the others
are unwilling, to exert themselves.
j [ Amongst other warlike enterprises, there was one of the Wampanaogs, and
other confederate tribes, under Metacom in 1675, against the colonists of New
England; the English were also engaged in war in Virginia in 1622.]
It is easy to
foresee that the Indians will never conform to civilization; or that it will be
too late, whenever they may be inclined to make the experiment.
Civilization
is the result of a long social process which takes place in the same spot, and
is handed down from one generation to another, each one profiting by the
experience of the last. Of all nations, those submit to civilization with the
most difficulty which habitually live by the chase. Pastoral tribes, indeed,
often change their place of abode; but they follow a regular order in their
migrations, and often return again to their old stations, whilst the dwelling
of the hunter varies with that of the animals he pursues.
Several
attempts have been made to diffuse knowledge amongst the Indians, without
controlling their wandering propensities; by the Jesuits in Canada, and by the
Puritans in New England; *k but none of these endeavors were crowned by any
lasting success. Civilization began in the cabin, but it soon retired to expire
in the woods. The great error of these legislators of the Indians was their not
understanding that, in order to succeed in civilizing a people, it is first
necessary to fix it; which cannot be done without inducing it to cultivate the
soil; the Indians ought in the first place to have been accustomed to
agriculture. But not only are they destitute of this indispensable preliminary
to civilization, they would even have great difficulty in acquiring it. Men who
have once abandoned themselves to the restless and adventurous life of the
hunter, feel an insurmountable disgust for the constant and regular labor which
tillage requires. We see this proved in the bosom of our own society; but it is
far more visible among peoples whose partiality for the chase is a part of
their national character.
k [ See the "Histoire de la Nouvelle France," by Charlevoix, and
the work entitled "Lettres edifiantes."]
Independently
of this general difficulty, there is another, which applies peculiarly to the
Indians; they consider labor not merely as an evil, but as a disgrace; so that
their pride prevents them from becoming civilized, as much as their indolence.
*l
l [ "In all the tribes," says Volney, in his "Tableau des
Etats-Unis," p. 423, "there still exists a generation of old
warriors, who cannot forbear, when they see their countrymen using the hoe,
from exclaiming against the degradation of ancient manners, and asserting that
the savages owe their decline to these innovations; adding, that they have only
to return to their primitive habits in order to recover their power and their
glory."]
There is no
Indian so wretched as not to retain under his hut of bark a lofty idea of his
personal worth; he considers the cares of industry and labor as degrading
occupations; he compares the husbandman to the ox which traces the furrow; and
even in our most ingenious handicraft, he can see nothing but the labor of
slaves. Not that he is devoid of admiration for the power and intellectual
greatness of the whites; but although the result of our efforts surprises him,
he contemns the means by which we obtain it; and while he acknowledges our
ascendancy, he still believes in his superiority. War and hunting are the only
pursuits which appear to him worthy to be the occupations of a man. *m The
Indian, in the dreary solitude of his woods, cherishes the same ideas, the same
opinions as the noble of the Middle ages in his castle, and he only requires to
become a conqueror to complete the resemblance; thus, however strange it may seem,
it is in the forests of the New World, and not amongst the Europeans who people
its coasts, that the ancient prejudices of Europe are still in existence.
m [ The
following description occurs in an official document: "Until a young man
has been engaged with an enemy, and has performed some acts of valor, he gains
no consideration, but is regarded nearly as a woman. In their great war-dances
all the warriors in succession strike the post, as it is called, and recount
their exploits. On these occasions their auditory consists of the kinsmen,
friends, and comrades of the narrator. The profound impression which his
discourse produces on them is manifested by the silent attention it receives,
and by the loud shouts which hail its termination. The young man who finds
himself at such a meeting without anything to recount is very unhappy; and
instances have sometimes occurred of young warriors, whose passions had been
thus inflamed, quitting the war-dance suddenly, and going off alone to seek for
trophies which they might exhibit, and adventures which they might be allowed
to relate."]
More than
once, in the course of this work, I have endeavored to explain the prodigious
influence which the social condition appears to exercise upon the laws and the
manners of men; and I beg to add a few words on the same subject.
When I
perceive the resemblance which exists between the political institutions of our
ancestors, the Germans, and of the wandering tribes of North America; between
the customs described by Tacitus, and those of which I have sometimes been a
witness, I cannot help thinking that the same cause has brought about the same
results in both hemispheres; and that in the midst of the apparent diversity of
human affairs, a certain number of primary facts may be discovered, from which
all the others are derived. In what we usually call the German institutions,
then, I am inclined only to perceive barbarian habits; and the opinions of
savages in what we style feudal principles.
However strongly
the vices and prejudices of the North American Indians may be opposed to their
becoming agricultural and civilized, necessity sometimes obliges them to it.
Several of the Southern nations, and amongst others the Cherokees and the
Creeks, *n were surrounded by Europeans, who had landed on the shores of the
Atlantic; and who, either descending the Ohio or proceeding up the Mississippi,
arrived simultaneously upon their borders. These tribes have not been driven
from place to place, like their Northern brethren; but they have been gradually
enclosed within narrow limits, like the game within the thicket, before the
huntsmen plunge into the interior. The Indians who were thus placed between
civilization and death, found themselves obliged to live by ignominious labor
like the whites. They took to agriculture, and without entirely forsaking their
old habits or manners, sacrificed only as much as was necessary to their
existence.
n [ These nations are now swallowed up in the States of Georgia, Tennessee,
Alabama, and Mississippi. There were formerly in the South four great nations
(remnants of which still exist), the Choctaws, the Chickasaws, the Creeks, and
the Cherokees. The remnants of these four nations amounted, in 1830, to about
75,000 individuals. It is computed that there are now remaining in the
territory occupied or claimed by the Anglo-American Union about 300,000
Indians. (See Proceedings of the Indian Board in the City of New York.) The
official documents supplied to Congress make the number amount to 313,130. The
reader who is curious to know the names and numerical strength of all the
tribes which inhabit the Anglo-American territory should consult the documents
I refer to. (Legislative Documents, 20th Congress, No. 117, pp. 90-105.) [In
the Census of 1870 it is stated that the Indian population of the United States
is only 25,731, of whom 7,241 are in California.]]
The Cherokees
went further; they created a written language; established a permanent form of
government; and as everything proceeds rapidly in the New World, before they
had all of them clothes, they set up a newspaper. *o
o [ I brought back with me to France one or two copies of this singular
publication.]
The growth of
European habits has been remarkably accelerated among these Indians by the
mixed race which has sprung up. *p Deriving intelligence from their father's
side, without entirely losing the savage customs of the mother, the half-blood
forms the natural link between civilization and barbarism. Wherever this race
has multiplied the savage state has become modified, and a great change has
taken place in the manners of the people. *q
p [ See in the Report of the Committee on Indian Affairs, 21st Congress,
No. 227, p. 23, the reasons for the multiplication of Indians of mixed blood
among the Cherokees. The principal cause dates from the War of Independence.
Many Anglo-Americans of Georgia, having taken the side of England, were obliged
to retreat among the Indians, where they married.]
q [ Unhappily the mixed race has been less numerous and less influential in
North America than in any other country. The American continent was peopled by
two great nations of Europe, the French and the English. The former were not
slow in connecting themselves with the daughters of the natives, but there was
an unfortunate affinity between the Indian character and their own: instead of
giving the tastes and habits of civilized life to the savages, the French too
often grew passionately fond of the state of wild freedom they found them in. They
became the most dangerous of the inhabitants of the desert, and won the
friendship of the Indian by exaggerating his vices and his virtues. M. de
Senonville, the governor of Canada, wrote thus to Louis XIV in 1685: "It
has long been believed that in order to civilize the savages we ought to draw
them nearer to us. But there is every reason to suppose we have been mistaken.
Those which have been brought into contact with us have not become French, and
the French who have lived among them are changed into savages, affecting to
dress and live like them." ("History of New France," by
Charlevoix, vol. ii., p. 345.) The Englishman, on the contrary, continuing
obstinately attached to the customs and the most insignificant habits of his
forefathers, has remained in the midst of the American solitudes just what he
was in the bosom of European cities; he would not allow of any communication
with savages whom he despised, and avoided with care the union of his race with
theirs. Thus while the French exercised no salutary influence over the Indians,
the English have always remained alien from them.]
The success of
the Cherokees proves that the Indians are capable of civilization, but it does
not prove that they will succeed in it. This difficulty which the Indians find
in submitting to civilization proceeds from the influence of a general cause,
which it is almost impossible for them to escape. An attentive survey of
history demonstrates that, in general, barbarous nations have raised themselves
to civilization by degrees, and by their own efforts. Whenever they derive
knowledge from a foreign people, they stood towards it in the relation of
conquerors, and not of a conquered nation. When the conquered nation is
enlightened, and the conquerors are half savage, as in the case of the invasion
of Rome by the Northern nations or that of China by the Mongols, the power
which victory bestows upon the barbarian is sufficient to keep up his
importance among civilized men, and permit him to rank as their equal, until he
becomes their rival: the one has might on his side, the other has intelligence;
the former admires the knowledge and the arts of the conquered, the latter
envies the power of the conquerors. The barbarians at length admit civilized
man into their palaces, and he in turn opens his schools to the barbarians. But
when the side on which the physical force lies, also possesses an intellectual
preponderance, the conquered party seldom become civilized; it retreats, or is
destroyed. It may therefore be said, in a general way, that savages go forth in
arms to seek knowledge, but that they do not receive it when it comes to them.
If the Indian
tribes which now inhabit the heart of the continent could summon up energy
enough to attempt to civilize themselves, they might possibly succeed. Superior
already to the barbarous nations which surround them, they would gradually gain
strength and experience, and when the Europeans should appear upon their
borders, they would be in a state, if not to maintain their independence, at least
to assert their right to the soil, and to incorporate themselves with the
conquerors. But it is the misfortune of Indians to be brought into contact with
a civilized people, which is also (it must be owned) the most avaricious nation
on the globe, whilst they are still semi-barbarian: to find despots in their
instructors, and to receive knowledge from the hand of oppression. Living in
the freedom of the woods, the North American Indian was destitute, but he had
no feeling of inferiority towards anyone; as soon, however, as he desires to
penetrate into the social scale of the whites, he takes the lowest rank in
society, for he enters, ignorant and poor, within the pale of science and
wealth. After having led a life of agitation, beset with evils and dangers, but
at the same time filled with proud emotions, *r he is obliged to submit to a
wearisome, obscure, and degraded state; and to gain the bread which nourishes
him by hard and ignoble labor; such are in his eyes the only results of which
civilization can boast: and even this much he is not sure to obtain.
r [ There is in the adventurous life of the hunter a certain irresistible
charm, which seizes the heart of man and carries him away in spite of reason
and experience. This is plainly shown by the memoirs of Tanner. Tanner is a
European who was carried away at the age of six by the Indians, and has
remained thirty years with them in the woods. Nothing can be conceived more
appalling that the miseries which he describes. He tells us of tribes without a
chief, families without a nation to call their own, men in a state of
isolation, wrecks of powerful tribes wandering at random amid the ice and snow
and desolate solitudes of Canada. Hunger and cold pursue them; every day their
life is in jeopardy. Amongst these men, manners have lost their empire,
traditions are without power. They become more and more savage. Tanner shared
in all these miseries; he was aware of his European origin; he was not kept
away from the whites by force; on the contrary, he came every year to trade
with them, entered their dwellings, and witnessed their enjoyments; he knew
that whenever he chose to return to civilized life he was perfectly able to do
so—and he remained thirty years in the deserts. When he came into civilized
society he declared that the rude existence which he described, had a secret
charm for him which he was unable to define: he returned to it again and again:
at length he abandoned it with poignant regret; and when he was at length fixed
among the whites, several of his children refused to share his tranquil and
easy situation. I saw Tanner myself at the lower end of Lake Superior; he
seemed to me to be more like a savage than a civilized being. His book is
written without either taste or order; but he gives, even unconsciously, a
lively picture of the prejudices, the passions, the vices, and, above all, of
the destitution in which he lived.]
When the
Indians undertake to imitate their European neighbors, and to till the earth
like the settlers, they are immediately exposed to a very formidable
competition. The white man is skilled in the craft of agriculture; the Indian
is a rough beginner in an art with which he is unacquainted. The former reaps
abundant crops without difficulty, the latter meets with a thousand obstacles
in raising the fruits of the earth.
The European
is placed amongst a population whose wants he knows and partakes. The savage is
isolated in the midst of a hostile people, with whose manners, language, and
laws he is imperfectly acquainted, but without whose assistance he cannot live.
He can only procure the materials of comfort by bartering his commodities
against the goods of the European, for the assistance of his countrymen is
wholly insufficient to supply his wants. When the Indian wishes to sell the
produce of his labor, he cannot always meet with a purchaser, whilst the
European readily finds a market; and the former can only produce at a
considerable cost that which the latter vends at a very low rate. Thus the
Indian has no sooner escaped those evils to which barbarous nations are
exposed, than he is subjected to the still greater miseries of civilized
communities; and he finds is scarcely less difficult to live in the midst of
our abundance, than in the depth of his own wilderness.
He has not yet
lost the habits of his erratic life; the traditions of his fathers and his
passion for the chase are still alive within him. The wild enjoyments which
formerly animated him in the woods, painfully excite his troubled imagination;
and his former privations appear to be less keen, his former perils less
appalling. He contrasts the independence which he possessed amongst his equals
with the servile position which he occupies in civilized society. On the other
hand, the solitudes which were so long his free home are still at hand; a few
hours' march will bring him back to them once more. The whites offer him a sum,
which seems to him to be considerable, for the ground which he has begun to
clear. This money of the Europeans may possibly furnish him with the means of a
happy and peaceful subsistence in remoter regions; and he quits the plough,
resumes his native arms, and returns to the wilderness forever. *s The
condition of the Creeks and Cherokees, to which I have already alluded,
sufficiently corroborates the truth of this deplorable picture.
s [ The destructive influence of highly civilized nations upon others which
are less so, has been exemplified by the Europeans themselves. About a century
ago the French founded the town of Vincennes up on the Wabash, in the middle of
the desert; and they lived there in great plenty until the arrival of the
American settlers, who first ruined the previous inhabitants by their
competition, and afterwards purchased their lands at a very low rate. At the
time when M. de Volney, from whom I borrow these details, passed through
Vincennes, the number of the French was reduced to a hundred individuals, most
of whom were about to pass over to Louisiana or to Canada. These French
settlers were worthy people, but idle and uninstructed: they had contracted
many of the habits of savages. The Americans, who were perhaps their inferiors,
in a moral point of view, were immeasurably superior to them in intelligence:
they were industrious, well informed, rich, and accustomed to govern their own
community.
I myself saw in Canada, where the intellectual difference between the two
races is less striking, that the English are the masters of commerce and
manufacture in the Canadian country, that they spread on all sides, and confine
the French within limits which scarcely suffice to contain them. In like
manner, in Louisiana, almost all activity in commerce and manufacture centres
in the hands of the Anglo-Americans.
But the case of Texas is still more striking: the State of Texas is a part
of Mexico, and lies upon the frontier between that country and the United
States. In the course of the last few years the Anglo-Americans have penetrated
into this province, which is still thinly peopled; they purchase land, they
produce the commodities of the country, and supplant the original population.
It may easily be foreseen that if Mexico takes no steps to check this change,
the province of Texas will very shortly cease to belong to that government.
If the different degrees—comparatively so slight—which exist in European
civilization produce results of such magnitude, the consequences which must
ensue from the collision of the most perfect European civilization with Indian
savages may readily be conceived.]
The Indians,
in the little which they have done, have unquestionably displayed as much
natural genius as the peoples of Europe in their most important designs; but
nations as well as men require time to learn, whatever may be their
intelligence and their zeal. Whilst the savages were engaged in the work of
civilization, the Europeans continued to surround them on every side, and to
confine them within narrower limits; the two races gradually met, and they are
now in immediate juxtaposition to each other. The Indian is already superior to
his barbarous parent, but he is still very far below his white neighbor. With
their resources and acquired knowledge, the Europeans soon appropriated to
themselves most of the advantages which the natives might have derived from the
possession of the soil; they have settled in the country, they have purchased
land at a very low rate or have occupied it by force, and the Indians have been
ruined by a competition which they had not the means of resisting. They were
isolated in their own country, and their race only constituted a colony of
troublesome aliens in the midst of a numerous and domineering people. *t
t [ See in the Legislative Documents (21st Congress, No. 89) instances of
excesses of every kind committed by the whites upon the territory of the
Indians, either in taking possession of a part of their lands, until compelled
to retire by the troops of Congress, or carrying off their cattle, burning
their houses, cutting down their corn, and doing violence to their persons. It
appears, nevertheless, from all these documents that the claims of the natives
are constantly protected by the government from the abuse of force. The Union
has a representative agent continually employed to reside among the Indians;
and the report of the Cherokee agent, which is among the documents I have
referred to, is almost always favorable to the Indians. "The intrusion of
whites," he says, "upon the lands of the Cherokees would cause ruin
to the poor, helpless, and inoffensive inhabitants." And he further remarks
upon the attempt of the State of Georgia to establish a division line for the
purpose of limiting the boundaries of the Cherokees, that the line drawn having
been made by the whites, and entirely upon ex parte evidence of their several
rights, was of no validity whatever.]
Washington
said in one of his messages to Congress, "We are more enlightened and more
powerful than the Indian nations, we are therefore bound in honor to treat them
with kindness and even with generosity." But this virtuous and high-minded
policy has not been followed. The rapacity of the settlers is usually backed by
the tyranny of the government. Although the Cherokees and the Creeks are
established upon the territory which they inhabited before the settlement of
the Europeans, and although the Americans have frequently treated with them as
with foreign nations, the surrounding States have not consented to acknowledge
them as independent peoples, and attempts have been made to subject these
children of the woods to Anglo-American magistrates, laws, and customs. *u
Destitution had driven these unfortunate Indians to civilization, and
oppression now drives them back to their former condition: many of them abandon
the soil which they had begun to clear, and return to their savage course of
life.
u [ In 1829 the State of Alabama divided the Creek territory into counties,
and subjected the Indian population to the power of European magistrates.
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