Native Americans and 'We, the People': Expanding the Canon of American Political Thought

Among the Native American readings, I gave most weight to those that discuss the Iroquoian influence on the Founding Fathers around such concepts as constitutionalism, individual rights, democracy, confederation and bicameral government, checks and balances, and impeachment of officials. 4 Though still controversial among some historians, the compelling evidence is important for helping our students to understand that political ideas do not emerge full blown from the heads of a few seminal thinkers, but are the product of complex cultural interchanges. The Iroquois Great Law of Peace, dating back over 1,000 years, is still operative and represents the earliest documented example of democratic constitutional government in the Americas. Its origin may also be the first example of a successful effort at disarmament between nations. It is an oral tradition which takes two days to recite, so it is unavailable as a primary document. However, this gave me the opportunity to discuss oral and written traditions as differing kinds of epistemologies and the relationship to the world that emanates from each. There is a particularly good essay in the Iroquoian material by John Mohawk on the "Indian Way as a Thinking Tradition." Later, after the students read materials from the era of European conquest and settlement, we discussed the fact that the European settlers and their academic ancestors considered oral cultures "primitive," "unthinking," and "superstitious." If it wasn't written down, it couldn't be authoritative or accurate; it couldn't be a depiction of real life. Next I included several pieces from the era of European conquest, including excerpts from Columbus's log and from Las Casas's History of the Indies, as well as the "Privileges and Prerogatives Granted to Columbus" by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella and the papal bull "Inter Caetera" of Alexander VI, in which he divides up the entire imagined world between Portugal and Spain. 5 The materials from the Columbus era enabled students to deconstruct the Western world-view, to see it as just one of many different worldviews in existence at the beginning of the modern era. We can point out that when Columbus started out to find gold in the "Indies" (for the purpose, he admits, of financing the conquest of the Holy Land), the centers of European thought were peripheral backwaters on the edge of the Ottoman Empire 6 and we can ask why it is that these tiny backwaters were able to transform the world in a few