I strongly recommend the book The Rediscovery of America by Yale University scholar, Ned Blackhawk. It tells the little-known story of how tens of millions of acres of land where Native American tribes had lived for thousands of years were stolen by force by white settlers, appropriated by government fiat, and claimed through a steady stream of broken treaties.
In my book, Let the Oppressed Go Free, I refer at length to Article 1 of the United States Constitution that states “Indians not to be taxed.” With that language, Native Americans were essentially written out of the future of this country. George Washington may be known as “the father of our country”, but as Blackhawk points out, Washington never considered that Native Americans or African Americans would ever become full and equal citizens of this country. Remember that enslaved Africans were considered to be 3/5ths of a person, and Native Americans were not meant to be counted at all. He points out that the United States would be a tri-level society based upon land taken from dispossessed Native Americans, laws adopted by a white male democracy, and free labor provided by enslaved African Americans.
The exclusion of Native Americans from any semblance of citizenship in this country was finalized with the 1830 Indian Removal Act that forced Native Americans to relocate to regions west of the Mississippi River. Thousands of Cherokee Indians died during that forced march that came to be known as “The Trail of Tears.” Those Native Americans were uprooted so that more cotton could be planted and slavery could be expanded.
This intersection of Indian removal and the further enslavement of African Americans caused Blackhawk to refer to our nation’s founding document as “a constitution of colonialism.” The truth is, many African Americans have some Native American ancestry in their family tree. That story is well documented in the book Black Indians by William Loren Katz.
African Americans who want to have the history of our enslavement and subsequent sufferings remembered in books and classrooms across this country should want the same thing for Native Americans and their more than 500 years of suffering and extermination since European settlers began arriving in the Americas and the Caribbean. Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida graduated from Yale. I imagine that once he and Moms for Liberty learn about this book by a Yale scholar, they will undoubtedly seek to have it banned in schools and libraries.
Books like The Rediscovery of America by Ned Blackhawk are a great reason why history books on uncomfortable topics should be read and not banned. It is the only way the whole truth of American history can finally be learned. Think about this on Columbus Day. Better yet, think about joining with those who want to change Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day!
R E C E N T:
A silence that speaks volumes
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The Rev. Dr. Marvin A. McMickle, pastor emeritus of Antioch Baptist Church in Cleveland, Ohio, is interim executive minister, Cleveland Baptist Association, American Baptist Churches, USA. He served as president of Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, Rochester, New York, from 2011 to 2019.
