A RED PAPER
The Human Rights of
Indigenous Peoples and the Doctrine of Discovery: Medieval Christian theology
at the heart of modern international policy
- 09.10.15 -
This educational
project is funded and published by
P.O. Box 4569 Arcata,
CA 95518
Researched and Written by
Cynthia Boshell, J.D.
Human Rights
Consultant
Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples
Edited by
Joe Parker, Ph.D.
Pitzer College
About Cynthia Boshell, J.D.
Cynthia Boshell (Kusa-Kosati-Muscogee, Wind Clan) is a human
rights consultant who focuses primarily on empowering Indigenous Peoples'
exercise of self-determination. As a 2011 Seventh Generation Fund delegate to
the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, Cynthia wrote and
presented to both the Global Indigenous Women's and the Global Indigenous Peoples'
Caucuses regarding the influence of the Convention on the Elimination of
Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) on Indigenous women and communities [under
the direction of U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues Expert member and
Special Rapporteur on the Doctrine of Discovery, Tonya Gonnella Frichner,
Onondaga]. Cynthia holds a Juris Doctorate from the University of Tulsa College
of Law (2015), where she earned a certificate in Native American Law and a
certificate in Sustainable Energy and Resources Law. She lectures in Native
American Studies at Humboldt State University where she introduces learners to
the roots of colonization, the causes of environmental injustice, and the
impact of genocide on Indigenous Peoples.
Seventh Generation Fund's Red Papers emanate from the
Gourds of Wisdom
Keeping Indigenous Knowledge
an Indigenous Peoples' Think Tank.
Gourds of Wisdom
Keeping Indigenous Knowledge
an Indigenous Peoples' Think Tank.
"When we walk
upon Mother Earth, we always plant our feet carefully because we know the faces of our future generations are
looking up at us from beneath the
ground. We never forget them. In the absence
of the sacred, nothing is sacred. Everything is for sale." - Oren Lyons
(Onondaga Nation), Seventh Generation Fund Board of Directors.
This
paper continues the international discussion of how 500 years of genocide
impacts Indigenous Peoples.
1 The experiences of genocide cannot be told by outsiders; the survivors are the only ones who are qualified to speak the truth of how dehumanizing brutalities impact them. Denying victims the opportunity to be heard, dismissing the their concerns as "revisionist history," and urging them to overlook past atrocities ratifies the acts of the perpetrators and deprives victims, survivors, and their descendants of the deserved healing and recovery process. Many truths about how worldwide genocide impacts Indigenous Peoples have yet to be voiced by the survivors, recognized by the international community, and redressed by the States that are responsible. Although the forcible domination of Indigenous Peoples by Christian-European empires has been on-going in the "Western Hemisphere"1 for over five hundred years, it is only recently that the leaders of Indigenous nations have been able to gain access to the United Nations in Geneva to officially speak on their own behalf, and object to the religiously-based, international genocide that has been termed the "Doctrine of Discovery.2
2 Indigenous Peoples' international
dialogue focuses on reasserting their inherent human rights, on holding both
States and the Roman Catholic Church accountable for the systematic
extermination of Indigenous cultures, and on dismantling the framework of
domination forced on them by the past and continuing assaults of Christian
nations on their territories, cultures, and well-being. In 2010, the United
Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) appointed Special
Rapporteur Tonya Gonnella Frichner (Onondaga, Snipe Clan) to conduct a
preliminary study on how the Doctrine of Discovery has impacted Indigenous
Peoples. Ms. Frichner's study was ground-breaking–the first study of its kind
ever presented to a United Nations body. Entitled Impact on Indigenous
Peoples of the International Legal construct known as the Doctrine of
Discovery, which has served as the Foundation of the Violation of their Human
Rights, (E/C.19/2010/13; Feb. 3, 2010),3 Special
Rapporteur Fricher's study concluded that a wide range of human rights
violations against Indigenous Peoples is rooted in the intentional policy of
Christian domination that has been institutionalized and enforced through
national and international law.4 In 2012, the
Haudenosaunee, the American Indian Law Alliance, and the Indigenous Law
Institute of North America co-presented a conference room paper on the Doctrine
of Discovery,5 challenging the UNPFII to probe
into the deep roots and systematic biases that
continue to sanction violence
against Indigenous Peoples–particularly
against women–and the domination and dehumanization of Indigenous Peoples
everywhere the genocidal Doctrine of Discovery is applied. The 2012 paper also
called for the Roman Catholic Pope to formally revoke the religious documents
in which various Popes feigned the authority to give non-Christian nations and
peoples to Christian monarchs as property for exclusive exploitation.
Importantly, this paper recommended the UNPFII commission a more detailed
study, examining how these inhumane acts and political agendas effect
Indigenous Peoples.6 That study was completed in
2014 by Permanent Forum Chair Grand Chief Edward John (Akile Ch'oh) and
examined some of the deeper consequences of the framework of dominance,
recommended avenues of redress, and joined Ms. Frichner's 2010 study and the
2012 conference room paper in urging international bodies to continue examining
the impacts of the Doctrine of Discovery in private, public and international
forums.7
3 The purpose of this paper is to
provide background information for some of the key issues that the 2012
conference room paper addressed. In particular, this discussion will examine
some of the points that Ms. Frichner's noteworthy 2010 study introduced,
focusing on the deep religious roots of the Doctrine of Discovery and how it
came to be embedded in present day practices that continue the systematic
extermination of Indigenous Peoples.
4 The Doctrine of Discovery is an international policy of ethnic cleansing, originating in the Medieval Roman Catholic Church, that legalizes the destruction of non-Christian peoples. The "doctrine" is a collection of Christian beliefs, suppositions, and perceptions of the world that began to converge around 1095 AD with Pope Urban II's Speech at Clermont,8 which evolved into a fanatical “religio-political” ideology of empire. 9 The purpose of this dogma was to disguise the Church's insatiable hunger for power and wealth behind a screen of an allegedly charitable world-wide Christian mission to Christianize non-Christian peoples. However, the primary purpose of the doctrine was clear: To facilitate resource exploitation, State-and Church-sponsored acts of genocide10 were carried out globally, legitimized by integrating the ideology of empire, known as the "Doctrine of Discovery," into the existing laws of European Christian nations. The term "Doctrine of Discovery" is a term that has been used consistently by the Roman Catholic Church and nations of Christendom to disguise the truth: that they deliberately committed crimes against humanity for the purpose of profit.11
5 As a result of over five hundred years
of victimization by colonial States, the condition of Indigenous Peoples
worldwide is one of extreme marginalization.12
Statistically, the percentage of
Indigenous Peoples who populate many colonial states is in the extreme
minority. 13 Everywhere practices of domination
and dehumanization have been applied, destruction, demoralization and death
have followed. Indigenous women disproportionately suffer from violence and
sexual exploitation14 when compared to their non-Indigenous
counterparts, and experience greater impacts to their health and access to
social services. Indigenous youth are the future of Indigenous Peoples, yet
they are the most vulnerable and marginalized group in the world, according to
UNICEF.15 Indigenous families are deprived of
the most basic standards of health, well-being, and continuity. 16 Indigenous Peoples are denied autonomy when States
violate the right to exercise free, prior and informed consent regarding
decisions that affect their lands, resources, and economies.17 States continue to devalue Indigenous Peoples'
rights to, inter alia, identity, nationality, property, culture, traditions,
spiritual practices, education, self- governance, legal systems, wellness and
future posterity. 18 Yet, both domestically and
internationally, Indigenous Peoples have no effective mechanism to enforce
existing treaties, protect themselves from continuing atrocities, or prevent
further State-condoned violations of their fundamental human rights. Currently
there are very few international or domestic remedies to achieve justice;
State-sponsored genocidal assaults on Indigenous Peoples continue unabated and
invisible to the majority of society.19
6 One hundred percent of the resources
human beings rely on for survival, comfort, and prosperity are provided by our
Mother Earth. The global community of human beings faces a diminishing supply
of natural resources as world population and affluence of nations increases.
Greater demand for diminishing supply promises bigger profits to private
industry and is a strong, perverse incentive that accelerates resource
extraction. Consider that Indigenous Peoples occupy approximately 20% of the
world's land surface, which contains an estimated 80% of the world's cultural and
biological diversity. Corporations perceive Indigenous territories as an
untapped source of mineral, energy, and intellectual wealth,20 so as natural resources diminish elsewhere,
profit-driven entities are even more inclined to prey upon Indigenous Peoples'
territories, sacred sites, vital cultural properties and traditional knowledge.
21 To enable exploitation of resources, States
continue to violate human rights, relying on principles rooted in the Doctrine
of Discovery as an excuse to disregard the fundamental rights of the Indigenous
Peoples. 22 The long-standing practice of
profiting off of property stolen from Indigenous Peoples23 is a significant contributor to Indigenous population decline
and to global climate change, posing a threat to the national security of
States as diminishing resources and climate disruption foreshadows the
destabilization of society as a whole. 24 As
pressure increases on Indigenous Peoples' lands, identities, communities, and
existence, it is urgent to understand and discuss the policies that systematize
disrespect for the human rights of Indigenous Peoples and make possible the
systematic annihilation of Indigenous nations.
7 To forward the discussion of how
Christian domination impacts the world's Indigenous Peoples, this research will
introduce and examine the main principles that embody the international
"legal doctrine," euphemistically termed the "Doctrine of
Discovery," which sanctions the domination, exploitation and extermination
of Indigenous Peoples. This examination focuses on the origin, basis and
purpose of three main principles of the doctrine; explains why and how the
oppression of Indigenous Peoples became an intentional policy goal; and
describes how the United States accepted, evolved and continues to use the
doctrine in its domestic and foreign policy to disguise the genocidal nature of
its interference with Indigenous Peoples' human and collective rights. This
paper concludes by presenting several policy recommendations to liberate and
restore the rights and dignity of Indigenous Peoples.
"I do not wish to
delay, but to discover and go to many Islands to find gold." Christopher Columbus,
October 15, 1492.
8 The Medieval Roman Catholic Church is
the necessary starting point to begin understanding the religious nature of
modern policies and how these policies endorse the domination of non-Christian
people. Beginning with the First Crusade in 1095 AD, the Popes issued oral and
written edicts, calling for Christians to participate in religious warfare
against non-Christian nations,25 and soliciting
contracts with Christian monarchs to conduct "Just War." Some of the
major contracts were termed "Papal Bulls," which were a form of
documentation reserved for the most important Church pronouncements.26 Generally, these contracts promoted three goals: the
spread of Christian religion, spread
of Christian political empire, and
the conversion of non-Christian property and resources into commodities for
Christian European markets. The contracting Monarch gained the exclusive right
to exploit the resources and populations of non-Christian peoples who were
successfully dominated; the Church secured the permanent right to place
Christian clergy in the newly dominated territories for the purpose of civilizing
(Christianizing) non-Christian peoples. The contracts did not recognize that
non-Christian peoples have rights. In fact, the Pope clearly ordered his
monarchs to destroy non- Christians who refused to submit peacefully to
domination. In these contracts we can trace how Christianization, expansion of
Christian empire, and conversion of non-Christian property into commodities for
the economic markets of Christian nations were developed, refined, and used as
tools of Christian domination throughout the centuries of crusading. As the
crusades turned westward, the same tools and approaches were applied world-wide
with genocidal ferocity during what chroniclers have termed
the "Age of Discovery."
9 Because the Popes claimed to be the
Earthly voice of the Christian God, the Pope was assumed to possess a measure
of authority that was even greater than that of a monarch. When a Christian
monarch made a contract with the Pope, the contract was considered by other
Christian monarchs to be paramount to all other agreements. The Papal Bulls Dum Diversas and Romanus Pontifex are two such contracts that Portugal negotiated
with Pope Nicholas V. Significantly, these two Bulls illustrate how the
ideology of Christian domination is a common thread running through crusades
against peoples of Islam and the search for exploitable resources that were
previously outside of European Christian awareness. A third contract, the Inter-Caetera of 1493, was successfully
negotiated by Spain. Inter-Caetera
contained no warfare provision against Islamic nations, since Spain had already
concluded a war with Islamic nations over Granada; the Spanish contract was solely focused on
Spanish claims to territories previously unclaimed by Christendom.27 However, the Pope stated explicitly that all the
provisions contained in the Dum Diversas
and Romanus Pontifex should be
incorporated into the Spanish contract as well. This inclusion affirmed that
warfare against non-Christian Indigenous Peoples was not confined to the
crusades of Europe and Middle East. The Christian westward campaign of
"discovery" was an intentional continuation of Christian crusading.28
10 Eye-witness accounts record how the
Spanish under Christopher Columbus' supervision interacted with Indigenous
Peoples of the Americas. Dominican Bartolomé de Las Casas accompanied Columbus
on the search for previously unidentified territories and recorded the degenerate
behavior of the Spanish toward the Indigenous Peoples. De Las Casas refused to
use "conquest" to describe Spanish actions, instead describing what
he had witnessed as "assault", "massacre", "horrid
crimes", "tyranny and cruelty", "inexpressible outrages",
"inhumane and barbarous butcher" and "torments never before
known or heard."29 De Las Casas describes
what has come to be acknowledged as genocide: the systematic extermination of
entire populations through violence,
enslavement, and domination.
Claiming the divine right of the
Pope, Spain justified these atrocities with the flimsy pretext that it had the
responsibility to Christianize the world's non-Christian people. In truth,
Christianization meant destabilizing and dominating free and independent
peoples, and degrading their resources, property and persons into "commodities" to increase the
wealth of Christian monarchs and the Church. The tools of Christian domination
continue to be actively applied in the present and are relevant to contemporary
issues such as globalization, exploitation of Indigenous Peoples' resources,
and the continued denial of Indigenous Peoples' human rights.
Christian natural law relies on Biblical principles to justify the genocide of Indigenous Peoples.
11 Although the Inter-Caetera of 1493 purported to give the Spanish absolute ownership of non-Christian lands, Spain sought an authority independent of the Pope's divine right to add weight to its claimed absolute right in these lands. Spain found that authority in Christian natural law as formulated by Dominican legal scholar Franciscus de Victoria.30 This approach held that the moral laws of the Christian God, the creator, were also the laws of nature. Thus, there could be no discrepancy between Christian law and natural law. Because of this, Christian law was a universal natural law that applied to Christians and non-Christians equally.31 In reality Christian natural law became a mechanism for justifying the destruction of Indigenous cultures and forcing Indigenous Peoples to conform to Christian norms.32 Under Christian natural law, monarchs concluded that they possessed a divine right - sovereignty - by reason of their exalted status as "rulers of men." The divine right of the king rendered the monarch (or sovereign) infallible.33 Because Christian monarchs embraced "Christian natural law" as the basis for policy and as the standard for their nations' jurisprudence, the extent to which Christian dogma justified and energized colonial aspirations cannot be overstated. 34 Victoria proposed three "natural law" theories that were similar to many of the elements found in the Spanish and Portuguese contracts with the Church. Like the Church contracts with Spain, these theories were based on the spread of the Christian religion, the conversion of Indigenous property to commodities for transferring wealth to the Christian monarchy and the Church, and the usurpation of Indigenous self- governance.
12 The religious domination proposal
suggested that because Christians were commanded to preach the gospel, natural
law gave Christian nations the right
to enter non-Christian lands for the purpose of evangelizing and building
facilities to aid in conversion efforts. Resistance to Christianization would
be sufficient cause for the Christian discoverer to conduct "Just
War," forcibly seizing non-Christian lands and replacing the existing
non-Christian, Indigenous government with Christian rulers. This theory
incorporates the Inter Caetera
contract with Spain, which stated,
13 [Y]ou have
purposed with the favor of divine clemency to bring under your sway the said
mainlands and islands with their residents and inhabitants and to bring them to
the Catholic faith ... you purpose also, as is your duty, to lead the peoples
dwelling in those islands and countries to embrace the Christian religion ... you should appoint to the aforesaid
mainlands and islands worthy, God-fearing, learned, skilled, and experienced
men, in order to instruct the aforesaid
inhabitants and residents in the Catholic faith and train them in good
morals."35
14 When combined with Christian natural law,
the effect was that non-Christians had no
right to reject Christian teaching or to deny evangelists access to
their territories. To reject Christian proselytization was to choose warfare
and destruction. The Spanish Requiremento
of 1513 is an example of how the religious element of Christian natural law
was applied. Carried by Spain's agents throughout North and South American
continents to proclaim Spain's domination, the Requiremento stated:
15 Wherefore, as best we can, we ask and require
you that you consider what we have said to you, and that you take the time that
shall be necessary to understand and deliberate upon it, and that you acknowledge
the Church as the ruler and superior of the whole world. But if you do not do
this, and maliciously make delay in it, I certify to you that, with the help of
God, we shall powerfully enter into your country, and shall make war against
you in all ways and manners that we can, and shall subject you to the yoke and
obedience of the Church and of their highnesses; we shall take you, and your
wives, and your children, and shall make slaves of them, and as such shall sell
and dispose of them as their highnesses may command; and we shall take away
your goods, and shall do you all the mischief and damage that we can, as to
vassals who do not obey, and refuse to
receive their lord, and resist and contradict him: and we protest that the
deaths and losses which shall accrue from this are your fault, and not that
of their highnesses, or ours, nor of
these cavaliers who come with us.36
16 Victoria's second Christian natural law
proposal was a political justification for domination, suggesting that the
seizure of non-Christian governments by the Christian monarch would benefit the
non-Christian Indigenous Peoples, whom Victoria characterized as inherently
less intelligent than the Christian Spanish. Victoria alleged that, because
non-Christian Indigenous Peoples had no "proper law nor magistrates,"
and had community-oriented governmental structures that were unfamiliar to
hierarchical monarchies, Indigenous Peoples were incompetent to govern
themselves. 37 This argument supposes that since
the law of Christianity and the law of nature are one, Christian government is
inherently superior to the governments of non-Christian peoples and as such, is
justified in usurping the governments of non-Christian, Indigenous Peoples.38 Victoria's proposal incorporated and updated the
terms of Spain's agreement with Pope Alexander VI in which Spain ostensibly had
the right to extend its authority and jurisdiction over all the peoples and
lands it discovered.39 Victoria envisioned
Spanish paternalism would achieve a dual purpose, serving as a source for
protecting Spain's claim to non-Christian territories from interference by
other nations Christian monarchs, while becoming a source of power for Spain's
complete subjugation of the Indigenous Peoples that it claimed dominion over.
17 Victoria's third Christian natural law
proposition concluded that Spain was justified in exploiting non-Christian
peoples for economic purposes. This suggestion relied on the Good Samaritan
parable from the New Testament to conclude that Indigenous Peoples violated
Christian natural law if they prevented Christian nations from "engaging
in trade."40 Victoria reasoned that since
every man is the neighbor of every other man,41 and every man is obligated to love his neighbor,42
non-Christian Indigenous Peoples were legally required by Christian natural law
to love the Spanish and therefore obligated to cooperate with Spain's desire to
increase its wealth. In Victoria's logic, denying Spain the resources it
desired or interfering with Spain's profits violated Christian natural law, so
Spanish Christians would be justified in waging war against the violating
Indigenous Peoples and taking their property and persons.43 These ideas are an extension of those included in
the Romanus Pontifex in which Pope Alexander VI instructed the Portuguese to:
18 make purchases
and sales of any
things and goods
and victuals whatsoever, as it
shall seem fit, with any Saracens and infidels, in the said regions; and also ... enter into any
contracts, transact business, bargain, buy and negotiate, and carry any
commodities whatsoever to the places of those Saracens and infidels.44
19 In a long succession of reprehensible
acts of savagery the Christian Spanish evidenced very little of the Christian
principles of brotherly love, kindness, and humility they purported to embrace.
In reality, the violence that the Spanish visited upon Indigenous Peoples did
not arise from Indigenous nations refusing to allow Christian exploitation of
their resources. Instead, the inhumane practices of slavery and other
dehumanizing treatment were used to instill fear into the minds of the people
for the purpose of breaking down any idea of resistance and forcing them into
slavery so that the Christian Spanish dominators could exploit natural resources
and labor.45 As applied, Victoria's principle of
commerce came to mean that Christians could freely take
whatever
they wanted from non-Christian peoples.
20 Victoria's arguments were carefully
formulated to disentangle Spain from dependence on the Church's largesse;
however, Victoria relied on the same principles expressed in the Papal Bulls to
incorrectly conclude that Christians were superior to the Indigenous Peoples
that they chose to dominate.46 Soon other
Christian European monarchs adopted Christian natural law to justify their own
assaults on Indigenous Peoples.47
Institutionalizing Christian natural law into
the secular legal systems of Christendom established the foundation for
international law and continues to define the racist relationship between
modern political States and Indigenous Peoples.
This framework of dominion and pogrom of econogenics runs precisely along the same lines of the fanatical “religio-political” ideology of empire that invaded this hemisphere in 1492 with the Doctrine of Discovery, then during the War on Mexico in 1846 rode into the O’odham Territories now known as Maricopa County on the war horse of the Doctrine of Manifest Destiny.48 -Tupac Enrique Acosta, Seventh Generation Fund Vice-Chairman
21 By the time the nations of Christendom
began aggressively invading the Americas, the doctrine of Christian domination
had been evolving for at least 500 years. Colonists sent by the Christian
monarchs were given divine rights and privileges through corporate charters to
establish settlements and exploit resources for the British trade monopoly.49 The marriage of money, religion, and empire was not
accidental. At the core of colonization is the belief that wealth is
sacrosanct;50 this fosters the idea that, as a
political ideology, Christianity is a form of entitlement. To illustrate the
depth of callousness that this fiction encourages, consider the following
excerpts, written by wealthy English Puritan lawyer and Massachusetts Bay
Colony founder John Winthrop. Winthrop called upon the popular principles of
Christian natural law to justify the colonial policy of genocide in which
smallpox-infected blankets were gifted to Indigenous Peoples deliberately to
spread the deadly disease:51
22 God's hand hath so
pursued them, as for 300 miles space, the greatest part of them are swept away
by the smallpox which still continues among them: so God hath thereby cleared
our title to this place.52
23 If God were not pleased with our inheriting these parts,
why did he drive out the natives before us? And why does he still make room for
us, by diminishing them as we increase? ... If we had no right to this land,
yet our God has a right to it, and if he be pleased to give it us (taking it
from a people who had so long usurped upon him, and abused his Creatures) who
shall control him or his terms?53
24 Winthrop encouraged serious belief in the
fiction that the Christian colonists were the Chosen People - the Children of
Israel - engaged in a holy war against the non-Christian Indigenous Peoples in
the "new" Promised Land of Caanan to which they had a divine right.54 With the end of the Revolutionary War, the belief
in the divine right of the United States to dominate and consume non-Christian
Indigenous Peoples and their homelands
became the primary policy tool for nation-building, economic development
and expansion. This idea of domination continues to be a cornerstone of
national identity and the foundation upon which the United States asserts its
claim of sovereignty.
A. Religious
justification used to force Christianization of Indigenous Peoples.
25 In the 1823 Johnson v. M'Intosh case, the United States Supreme Court made a
formal declaration that Christian natural law was the basis for policies
carried out by the Church, by secularized Christianity, and by religious
sectarian colonial governments. 55 It is not a
coincidence that Johnson v. M'Intosh
repeats the three main themes of religious, political, and economic control
upon which Church contracts and secular Christian natural law had relied. To appreciate the sweeping implications of
the M'Intosh decision, it is important to
examine how the Court repurposed Medieval Christian domination to serve the expansionist
goals of Christian settler States while giving the appearance that domination
of Indigenous Peoples is a legitimate exercise of democratic government.
26 The M'Intosh
decision explained that when the Revolutionary War between the United States
and Great Britain ended, the treaty between these nations required the United
States to agree unequivocally to "that principle which as been received as
the foundation of all
[Christian] 56 title in America." 57 This means that the United States, as successor to
Great Britain's claims in North America accepted the Christian foundation of
it's land claims, including the genocidal principles of Christian domination
that made the title system possible.58
Marshall's opinion describes the historical acts of Christian domination and
the civilizing process (Christianization) as a legally binding transaction in
which the nations of Christendom received absolute freedom to exert power over
non-Christian nations in return for undertaking the mission of establishing the
Christian religion and Christian civilization. Marshall wrote, "The
potentates of the old world found no difficulty in convincing themselves that
they made ample compensation to the inhabitants of the new, by bestowing on
them civilization and Christianity, in exchange for unlimited
independence."59
27 Restated, the Court categorically refused
to overturn or even examine whether the United States' claim to ownership of
Indigenous land was legitimate. A thorough analysis of the underlying British
claim would have revealed that the policy of genocide, rooted in Christian
natural law was entirely irrational and a violation of the lofty principles of
democracy that the United States purported to hold inviolate. If the Court
found Great Britain's claim invalid, then the United States' claim could not be
valid. By refusing to do further analysis, the Court formally embraced the
religious bias and racial inequities against Indigenous Peoples that the practices
of Christian domination systematized.60 Manifested
within the laws and policies the United States are Church and secular Christian
natural law requirements to Christianize, or "civilize" Indigenous
Peoples. The civilizing process was an aggressive attempt to supplant
Indigenous Peoples' non-Christian religious beliefs with the beliefs of
Christianity. This was accomplished by confining Indigenous Peoples in prison
camps (reservations) and boarding schools that were operated by religious
institutions for the purpose of re-education and conversion.
B. Modern
political justifications to usurp Indigenous Peoples' self-governance.
"By ignoring the
cumulative impact of the intellectual rationalization, the cultural,
historical, and legal practices, patterns, and policies that have resulted in
the officializing of white supremacy across all of Arizona, the courts shield
the issue of patterns of systemic profiling within the entire U.S. justice
system."61
- Tupac Enrique Acosta,
Vice Chair, Seventh Generation Fund Vice Chairman
28 In Johnson
v. M'Intosh, the United States Supreme Court accepted Christian domination
with full knowledge of its oppressive nature and its religious bias against
Indigenous Peoples. Medieval theories of Christian domination evolved into the
subtle forms of inequality that permeate modern institutions and remain
ensconced, often invisible to casual observation. The M'Intosh decision repeated the 500-year-old justifications used to
excuse genocide. First, the Court placed the blame on the victims for the
forcible domination by Christian monarchs:
29 "Although we do not mean to engage in the defen[s]e of
those principles which Europeans have
applied to Indian title, they may, we think, find some excuse, if not
justification, in the character and habits of the people whose rights have been
wrested from them."62
30
Next, the Court exaggerated the differences between Christian and non-Christian
peoples, focusing on the "Indian savage" myth to persuade itself that
"Just War" was the only solution available to Christian government to
reduce the "dangers" Indigenous Peoples posed to society:
31 "But the tribes of
Indians inhabiting this country were fierce savages, whose occupation was war, and whose
subsistence was drawn chiefly from the forest. To leave them in possession of
their country, was to leave the country a wilderness; to govern them as a
distinct people, was impossible, because they were as brave and as high
spirited as they were fierce, and were ready to repel by arms every attempt on
their independence."63
32 Using a risk-reduction argument enabled
the Court to reach its desired conclusion: that Britain's policy of Christian
domination was reasonable. While it should seem obvious that genocide is not at all reasonable, the Court did not
address the reasonableness of genocide. It avoided this question by presuming
that because the genocide of Indigenous Peoples was a long- standing practice
embraced by Christendom, it was valid. The Court merely asked whether a Christian
dominator acts reasonably when it "wrests" rights away from
non-Christian peoples who resist Christian interference. What the M'Intosh opinion does not ask is whether
it is reasonable to force Christian values on those who do not embrace the
Christian religion; or whether religious bias is a legitimate basis for
law-making; or whether it is reasonable to usurp the deeply rooted rights and
governance systems of Indigenous Peoples merely because their systems of
self-governance are different than the hierarchical government structures used
by Christian nations. Had the Court addressed any of these other questions, it
would have had great difficulty justifying Christian domination. But by
severely limiting the scope of its analysis, the Court decided that it is
reasonable to deprive non-Christian Indigenous Peoples of their inherent human
rights. Following in the footsteps of the other nations of Christendom, the
U.S. Supreme Court legitimized the use of Christian natural law and Church law
as a basis for United States law and policy.
C. Modern
economic justification used to undermine Indigenous Peoples' property rights.
33 At issue in Johnson v. M'Intosh, was whether Indigenous nations retained the
power to dispose of their land once the Christian nations claimed domination
rights. Independent nations make their own decisions about the control and
exchange of their territories and about how natural resources will be managed.
However, the M'Intosh opinion
undermined the sovereignty of Indigenous
nations with respect to the control of their territories.64 The Court's insistence that the property
ownership rights of Indigenous Nations should be subject to the control of the
Christian sovereign found its source in notions espoused by both the Church and
Victoria.65 The M'Intosh opinion cites an example the Rhode Island charter which
was issued by Christian British monarch Charles II in an attempt to establish a
superior title to the area of Rhode Island. The Court viewed the charter as a
valid title simply because the document claimed to be valid. Charles' charter
clearly relied on the myth of Indigenous Peoples as inferior to justify his
actions in making the grant.66
34 To reward the immigration of British
Christians who left "their desirable stations and habitations, and with
excessive labor and travel, hazard and charge [transplanting] themselves into
the midst of the Indian natives" Charles encouraged the use of
"lands, islands, rivers, harbors and roads, as are very convenient, both
for plantations, and also for building of ships, supply of pipe-staves, and
other merchandize and which
lies very commodious, in
many respects, for commerce,"67
including the constituent elements of the land along with the territory itself.68 Charles II viewed the profit gained from Indigenous
Peoples' lands as reimbursement for the expense of Christianizing the
Indigenous Peoples of North America; the M'Intosh
opinion agreed that the United States' claim to the territories of Indigenous
Peoples was justified since the United
States had assumed Britain's responsibility to Christianize the Indigenous
Peoples of North America.
35 Indigenous Peoples are inherently
sovereign. Yet, the Johnson v. M'Intosh
justifications and excuses for Christian domination have been used worldwide to
dispossess Indigenous Peoples, destroy their independence and sovereignty, and
convert their territories into commodities to bring wealth to Christian
dominators. Genocidal practices continue because a majority of the world's
nations have never been held responsible for the institutions and practices
that continue to rest on the claim that the irrational principles of Christian
natural law and Medieval Church doctrine are legitimate. This research
concludes that a genocide of epic proportions has been perpetrated upon the
world's Indigenous Peoples for at least 500 years by those States which have
applied and continue to apply the arbitrary, illogical, and dehumanizing
Medieval principles of Christian domination.
36 Christian domination is defined by an insatiable drive for wealth disguised as a global mission to Christianize peoples who are considered "inferior" because their lifeways do not follow the Christian concept of "civilization." Civilization is defined as Christianization. By that definition, any peoples who are non-Christian are uncivilized. The act of defining non-Christian Indigenous Peoples as uncivilized is an exercise of power, rooted in the assumed divine right of the Pope, the king, the State, and the corporation, which is statutorily created by political entity alleging a divine right.
A. The United States claims a divine right
to meddle in the affairs of independent States of Abya Yala
37 In 1823, U.S. President James Monroe
warned the other members of the Family of Nations to end their efforts to
dominate the Western Hemisphere.69 This U.S.
foreign policy, known as the Monroe Doctrine, stated that further colonization
efforts would be viewed as acts of aggression by the United States, and would
require U.S. intervention. Monroe was aware that the purpose of colonization
was domination, and although his stated purpose was to defend the newly
independent, former Spanish and Portuguese colonies in the Americas, this was
not purely an act of altruism. The political purpose of the Monroe Doctrine was
to assert the United States' claim that it was fully equal with the other
Christian nations of Europe. By stating its willingness to back up the Monroe
Doctrine with military force, the United States claimed that it, too held a
divine right: the Divine Right of the State and that this right was equal to
the divine right claimed by other sovereigns. The Monroe Doctrine was announced
approximately thirteen years after the period when Spanish and Portuguese
colonies in Latin America began claiming independence. The United States feared another round of
colonial conquest to the south, which could potentially jeopardize U.S.
territorial claims west of the Mississippi, making them vulnerable to
invasion and colonization by European
States. Further, the potential for recolonization of independent nations to the
south could interfere with the U.S. goal to dominate resources and trade in the
Western Hemisphere. Within thirty years of the Monroe Doctrine's announcement,
the meddling of the United States in South America was overt. Prior to 1900 the
United States was responsible for building a railroad in Panama (1855),
supplying arms to the Mexican government in its war against France (1863),
supplying troops to Nicaragua (1894) which eventually became a de facto U.S.
colony (1899), and claiming Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Eastern Hemisphere
nation of the Philippines after defeating Spain in a war (1898).
38 In 1905 United States President Theodore
Roosevelt announced what has become known as the "Roosevelt
Corollary."70 In this speech Roosevelt used
the "just war" argument to defend his position that the United States
had a patriarchal responsibility as a "civilized" and
"enlightened" state to ensure that its neighbors would "progress
in stable and just civilization," prosper from their "natural riches,"
and be responsible for making good use of their freedom. As long as the Latin
American countries followed Roosevelt's definition of "stable, orderly,
and prosperous" the United States would not be forced to use military
intervention to influence their affairs.71 The
Roosevelt Corollary employed the same justifications upon which both the Roman
Catholic Popes and Victoria had relied as grounds for human rights violations.
In 1934, President Franklin D. Roosevelt replaced the Theodore Roosevelt policy
toward Central and South American States with his own version: the Good
Neighbor Policy. This policy stated that the United States would no longer use
military intervention to influence the affairs of Latin America.72 However, United States military intervention in
Latin American continued, as did the exploitation of resources and the
political dominating process. Starting in 1900 at least 65 major U.S.
interferences became public knowledge over the course of 115 years, for an
average of one event occurring every 21 months between 1900 and 2015. 73 It is not an exaggeration to characterize the U.S.
involvement in Latin America as a continuous effort to exercise domination.
When categorized using the legal theories embraced by the Papacy and Victoria,
it becomes obvious that the foreign policy of the United States is rooted in
the same divine right ideology asserted by the Pope and by the monarchs.
B. The
Divine Right of Corporations: Hunger for Profit Fuels Ongoing Genocide
39 Recall that the first British colonies in
North America were corporations. Corporations are a very old form of conducting
trade with roots in the Roman empire. Corporations,
called publicani, were awarded
contracts and eventually publicani
evolved into permanent forms of conducting business and investing for the purpose
of making profit. Because publicani
were politically connected and very influential, they were lucrative. The publicani system was filled with scandal
and operated as an agency of the government, extending credit, collecting taxes
and enslaving those who were unable to make the payments demanded. These early
Roman corporations operated with little or no legal boundaries under the
blessing of the Roman State, in spite of their abuse and oppression of the
Roman population. 74 The Roman concept of corporations
became part of Christian Church law and also part of the secular law of
Christian monarchies. 75 Starting as early as
1492 with Columbus, Christian monarchs began issuing charters, which delegated
rights and powers based on the sovereign's alleged divine right, to
enterprising businessmen for the
purpose of conducting trade and establishing local governments. Corporate
charters gave the grantee entrepreneur the absolute right to carry on business:
They gave a divine right to corporations.76 To deny the holder of a corporate
charter the right to do business was to
violate the monarch's divine right to make the decree. The colonization of Abya
Yala was conducted under the authority of corporate charters, making the
domination of Indigenous Peoples a business enterprise. Corporations conducted
the profitable slave trade, the exploited Indigenous resources, and ruthlessly
applied the divine right to profit to achieve ethnic cleansing. Because
corporations operated under divine grants of power, they were immune to most
laws except those that the monarch or the monarch's court placed on them. Civil
corporations, the founders of colonial governments made the law: they were
sovereigns.
40 Business corporations and religious
missions form the foundation of the Christian political system known as the
United States. It should be little surprise that U.S. policy serves business
corporations, both domestically and internationally, and that contemporary
business corporations operate under laws that are crafted by them to favor
profit-making and resource extraction.77 Profit,
which has always been the purpose of colonial trade, continues to drive the
exploitation of Indigenous lands and the extermination of Indigenous Peoples.
The current globalization of trade in the form of water, mineral, timber, and
land privatization converts the homelands of Indigenous Peoples into corporate
property that is used to fuel distant markets and convert the communal property
of Indigenous Peoples into commodities for international sale, barter and
trade. Global corporations operate with the blessing of multiple States and
make their own private laws
that they enforce
on helpless local
populations. This private law-making practice violates
fundamental human rights and is no less genocidal than the colonial activities
of the Portuguese, Spanish, French, British, Dutch, and Russian dominators
acting under the Christian Doctrine of Discovery. The genocidal practices of
domination and oppression of Indigenous Peoples continues unabated today,
drawing authority from Medieval Christian doctrines that have evolved for over
a century. The descriptive terminology may have changed slightly to emphasize
economic rather than religious purposes, but the underlying practices spring
from a common source.
Conclusions and recommendations
41 When the facts and data are laid out, it is difficult to deny the obvious: that individual States and the international community have used the Medieval Christian principles of superiority contained in the Doctrine of Discovery to engage in a thousand-year genocide against Indigenous Peoples. Although the Doctrine of Discovery is the foundation of contemporary international law as well as the domestic law of United Nations member States, human rights violations and practices of domination are considered a "normal" form of relationship with Indigenous Peoples. A rational analysis of the facts clearly shows that the marriage of wealth, power, and religious fervor that spawned the Medieval Doctrine of Discovery continues to live transparently behind the individual and national acts of privilege. It is time to acknowledge and dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery.
RECOMMENDATIONS: Urging international
States and private organizations to examine the Medieval religious biases that
give rise to inequities and irrational practices of domination in domestic and
international policies.
42 First, recognizing that the inherent
sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples is irrevocable, permanent and immune
to revocation by other entities,
it is imperative that the nations of the world
acknowledge that the Medieval Doctrine of Discovery has been become a
systematic form of genocide that continues to interfere with Indigenous
Peoples' exercise of sovereignty without their free, prior, and informed
consent.
42 Second, observing that all peoples
originated from tribal peoples and thus the principles of Christian domination
have been employed worldwide for many centuries to accomplish the extermination
of cultural, religious, and social diversity existing States are encouraged to
examine their individual roles in the genocide of non-Christian peoples and
particularly Indigenous Peoples. This should include analyzing the entwinement
of religious bias with domestic and international policy and undertaking
revisions of the laws that enforce creation of an inferior class of humanity
based on religious belief. These revisions to policies and laws should be
inclusive of the rights of Indigenous Peoples rights as written in the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
43 Third, recalling that the principles of
Christian domination, known as the Doctrine of Discovery, originated with the
Medieval Roman Catholic Church's rhetoric that launched the crusades and
"just war" on non-Christian peoples, the Roman Catholic Church
through the Pope is called upon to expressly and unequivocally denounce the
policies of Christian domination as ethnically biased, morally unjust,
spiritually corrupt, legally irrational, and destructive to the brotherhood and
survival of humankind. This pronouncement should emphasize the need of
political states to engage with Indigenous Peoples to dismantle the
reprehensible systematic human rights violations that are rooted in the
Doctrine of Discovery.
44 Fourth, encouraging renewal and recovery
of relationships between human and non- human beings for the purpose of
restoring balance and well-being to all creatures, the human population is
urged to continue and increase international and domestic dialog about the
roots, purposes, causes and damages that the principles of Christian domination
have caused to the planet and all peoples. This dialogue should include a
serious effort to identify potential remedies and healing processes necessary
for existing and future generations of Indigenous Peoples and human beings to
fully realize their inherent rights and fundamental liberties as free,
independent, self-governing peoples and nations.
******************
Endnotes:
1 The term "Western Hemisphere" is an
uncomfortable term for this discussion. It is used to refer to the continents
of North and South America, which is named Aba Yala, Turtle Island, and many
other names by the Indigenous Peoples whose homelands cover these vast land
masses. The idea of a "Western Hemisphere"
originated with Thomas Jefferson's political position that "America has (not is but has) a hemisphere
of its own, and that the unity of its peoples extended to all their 'modes of
existence.'" Quoting Arthur P. Whitaker, "The Origin of the Western
Hemisphere Idea," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society,
323-326 323, 98:5 (Oct. 15, 1954). Available on JSTOR, go to http://www.jstor.org then search for
"Whitaker origin of the western hemisphere idea." The idea that the
continents of North and South America were entirely separate from Europe and
congruous with the United States was both at once an assertion of United
States' superiority and its claim to have domination rights over the Americas,
senior to all other nations and peoples.
2 International debates and discussion about the
rights of Indigenous Peoples have been on-going at least since the Medieval Christian monarchs of Europe cooperated
with the Roman Catholic Church to conduct religious crusades against the
Indigenous Peoples of Africa and the Middle East. See Dana Carleton Munroe.
"The Speech of Pope
Urban
II at Clermont, 1095" American Historical Review (Reprint) XI:2 (Jan.
1906). Available at Library of Congress Internet Archive.
http://www.archive.org/details/speechofpopeurba00munr. In 1452, 1454 and 1492
Roman Catholic Popes explicitly contracted for, purported to authorize and far
exceeded their authority to approve a series of acts of dominance in which
Christian monarchs were engaged to subdue, dominate, and control non- Christian
(pagan) nations and peoples. In 1492, Christopher Columbus, acting on a
contract between Spain and the Roman Catholic Church, undertook his infamous
project to "discover" and subject non-Christian lands and peoples to
forcible exploitation by Spain and the Church. Up until this time, the dialogue
surrounding Indigenous Peoples was primarily focused on the rights of the
monarch and the Church to profit from the "spoils" of conquest.
Although post-1492 some Christian Europeans disagreed with the notion that
Indigenous Peoples had no rights, even those who asserted the rights of
Indigenous Peoples assumed that it was up to Christendom to define the scope of
Indigenous Peoples rights. Indigenous Peoples themselves were not only excluded
from the debate, they had no knowledge that other nations were in the process
of defining, and limiting the scope of the rights they had always exercised.
Purporting to be superior, Medieval Christians claimed the absolute right to
determine the extent to which Indigenous Peoples' rights would be acknowledged,
if at all. It was not until 1977 that Indigenous leaders were permitted to
enter the United Nations Headquarters in Geneva to speak on their own behalf,
and the first draft of a declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples was
proposed. Thirty years later in 2007, the final Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the UN General Assembly. See NCIV,
"Indigenous Peoples First time to UN in Geneva by Oren Lyons" (May
27, 2010) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLNMEbzm4WM; Robert T. Coulter,
"Commentary on the UN Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples," Cultural Survival, "A Wave of Change: The United Nations
and Indigenous Peoples" 18.1)
(Spring 1994) http://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/united states/commentary-un-draft-
declaration-rights-indige
3 Tonya Gonnella Frichner, "Impact on Indigenous
Peoples of the International Legal construct known as the Doctrine of
Discovery, which has served as the Foundation of the Violation of their Human
Rights," United Nations, Economic and Social Council, Permanent Forum on
Indigenous Issues, 1 E/C.19/2010/13 (Feb. 3, 2010). Available in six languages
at http://undesadspd.org/IndigenousPeoples/UNPFIISessions/Ninth.aspx.
4 Id.
5 Haudenosaunee, American Indian Law Alliance, and
Indigenous Law Institute of North America, "Conference Room Paper on the
Doctrine of Discovery," UNPFII 11th Sess., U.N. Doc. E/C.19/2012/CRP.2
(Apr. 25, 2012). http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/2012/session-11-CRP2.pdf.
(Hereinafter "2012 Conference Room
Paper").
6 The theme of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous
Issues' Eleventh Session (2012) was “The Doctrine of Discovery: Its continuing
impacts on Indigenous Peoples and Redress for Past Conquests (articles 28 and
37 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples).”
(Abstract)
During
that Session, the Haudenosaunee, the American Indian Law Alliance, and the
Indigenous Law Institute of North America presented a paper which expanded upon
“The Framework of Dominance” discussed in a preliminary study on the Doctrine
of Discovery titled "Impact on Indigenous Peoples of the International
Legal Construct known as the Doctrine of Discovery, which has served as the
Foundation of the Violation of their Human Rights". This paper called upon
the UNPFII to:
1. Examine the
underlying assumptions that it is permissible for Indigenous nations and
peoples, and particularly women, to be searched out for the purpose of
domination and dehumanization.
2. Recognize that
the destructive effects of domination and dehumanization continue to be global
in scope.
3. Acknowledge
that use of the term "past conquests" works to confirm that act of
domination by European Christian sovereigns were legitimate.
4. Encourage the
UNPFII to rethink its use of colonizing legal doctrine rather than accepting
pre-defined legal terminology without considering the implications of the term
in use.
5. Call upon
nations to identify and explain a legitimate basis for subjecting Indigenous
Peoples, against their will, to archaic Christian European standards of
domination.
6. Authorize an
international study on the effects of the international construct known as the
"Doctrine of Discovery" upon the health, physical, psychological,
social, well‐being,
human and collective rights, lands, resources, medicines, titles to such lands,
resources, medicines, to be submitted to the UNPFII in 2014 as an addendum to
the UN Year of Indigenous Peoples.
7 Grand Chief Edward John, "Study on the impacts
of the Doctrine of Discovery on indigenous peoples, including mechanisms,
processes and instruments of redress" E/C.19/2014/3 (Feb 20, 2014).
8 Dana Carleton Munroe. "The Speech of Pope Urban
II at Clermont, 1095" American Historical Review (Reprint) XI:2 (Jan.
1906). Available at Library of Congress Internet Archive. http://www.archive.org/details/speechofpopeurba00munr
Pope Urban II's Speech at Clermont in 1095 was an exhortation
to Christians to take up arms and fight against the Muslims, whom the Pope
characterized as enemies of the Church. Although accounts of Urban's speech
were recorded as historical rather than verbatim accounts, the general content
of the speech contains rudimentary elements of later Popes' agreements with
Portugal and Spain to exploit and enslave other Indigenous peoples worldwide.
9 Tupac Enrique Acosta, "The American
Dream and
the Nightmare of Manifest Destiny," on mexmigration: History and
Politics
of Mexican Immigration, Devon G. Peña, ed.
http://mexmigration.blogspot.com/2012/08/guest-commentary-by-tupac-enrique-acosta.html
10 The definition of genocide varies depending on who
is doing the defining. Inconsistent definitions fuel those who would deny
genocide by claiming that the brutalities suffered by a group are not severe
enough to meet a narrow definition. Denial of genocide deprives survivors of
the right to heal. This paper defines "genocide" as it was originally
defined in 1944, when the term first came into use, to describe the killing of
Jews by the Nazis. "Genocide" is derived from Greek genos "race,
kind" (see genus) + -cide and literally means "killing a tribe."
See Raphael Lemkin, "Axis Rule in Occupied Europe" (1943).
Lemkin wrote, "Generally speaking, genocide does not
necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when
accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather
to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of
essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of
annihilating the groups themselves. The objectives of such a plan would be the
disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language,
national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and
the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even
the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups."
In 1945, Lemkin encouraged the United Nations to recognize
genocide as an international crime. He urged, "The crime of genocide
should be recognized therein as a conspiracy to exterminate national, religious
or racial groups. The overt acts of such a conspiracy may consist of attacks
against life, liberty or property of members of such groups merely because of
their affiliation with such groups. The formulation of the crime may be as
follows:
"Whoever, while participating in a conspiracy to destroy
a national, racial or religious group, undertakes an attack against life,
liberty or property of members of such groups is guilty of the crime of
genocide." http://www.genocidewatch.org/genocide/whatisit.html
11 2012 Conference Room Paper.
12 Inter alia
Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States.
13 Caecilie Mikkelsen, ed. "Indigenous World,
2012" (May 2012). New Zealand has the highest percentage of Indigenous
Peoples, numbering 17% of the overall population, Id., 224; Indigenous Peoples in Canada account for only 3.6% of the
total population, Id., 50; Indigenous Peoples in Australia are comprise only
2.5% of the population, Id., 216, and
Indigenous Peoples in the United States constitute 1.7% of the population,
"The American Indian and Alaska Native Population: 2010" 2010 Census
Briefs 3 (Jan. 2012). In China, ethnic minority groups make up less than 9% of
the population but are believed to account for 40 percent of the nation's
extremely poor. "Statistics and key facts about indigenous peoples" IFAD "Rural Poverty Portal."
http://www.ruralpovertyportal.org/topic/statistics/tags/indigenous_peoples.
Of these small percentages, each of these States report that the poverty and
incarceration rates of Indigenous Peoples is far greater than for
non-Indigenous Peoples. For example, the Australian government reports that
Indigenous women are 23 times more likely to be imprisoned than non-Indigenous
women, and Indigenous men are 16 times more likely to be imprisoned than non-
Indigenous men. Poverty tends to mirror the disproportionality between
Indigenous and non-Indigenous Peoples while the level of academic attainment of
Indigenous Peoples tends to be disproportionately inverse to that of non-
Indigenous Peoples. "Indigenous World."
14 "Statistics and key facts about indigenous
peoples" International Fund for Agricultural Development "Rural
Poverty Portal." http://www.ruralpovertyportal.org/topic/statistics/tags/indigenous_peoples
For
example, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) reports that in
Thailand, "more than 40% of indigenous girls and women who migrate to
cities work in the sex trade, and the majority of females trafficked across
state borders in south-east Asia are from indigenous communities."
15 Indigenous children experience lower vaccination
rates, school enrollment rates, and higher mortality rates, school drop-out
rates, violence and exploitation rates, and less participation in
decision-making that affects them. Because of the long history of cultural
oppression, the youth are deprived of their rights to know and practice
their traditions
and
the responsibilities that they must know to carry on as Indigenous Peoples.
"Indigenous children face greater threats to survival" United Nations
Children's Fund (UNICEF) (Feb. 25, 2004)
http://www.unicef.org/media/media_19429.html.
16 Homes and property are disproportionately
contaminated with discharged industrial toxins and pollutants.
17 This typically occurs when colonial Christian
governments approve activities that limit or deny Indigenous Peoples' ability
to control their resources and stabilize their economies. The right to land and
natural resources is a predominant issue for Indigenous Peoples' self-determination,
"Indigenous World" 16, and States are bound to protect Indigenous
Peoples' lands and resources under Article 26 of the Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous Peoples. Yet, purporting authority over them, these governments
engage in removal of valuable resources from their lands while disposing of
hazardous, toxic, and nuclear wastes in or near their communities, effectively
using Indigenous Peoples' territories as a dumping ground.
18 For instance, when governments approve the conduct
of public and private projects in Indigenous Peoples' traditional sacred places
of worship and burial sites and traditional community gathering places,
cultural artifacts and property are destroyed or taken by private individuals,
research institutions, and corporations. By approving these activities, States
continue to undermine Indigenous Peoples' right to maintain, control, protect
and develop their cultural and spiritual heritage. Compare this to the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Articles 11, 12, 24,
25, 26, 29, 31, 32.
19 Governments that forcibly exert paternalistic
control over "domesticated" Indigenous Peoples do not provide adequate
avenues for Indigenous Peoples' forms of justice in their own systems, yet
these same governments deny responsibility for their part in continued human
rights violations. Internationally, the global community of States pay lip
service to Indigenous Peoples' inherent right to live free and independent as
self-determining, sovereign nations; in reality, Indigenous Peoples continue to
be denied equal access to international law-making bodies.
20 "Indigenous World," 16.
21 For example, according to IFAD over 100
pharmaceutical companies have funded studies of indigenous plant knowledge and
specific plants used by native healers. "Statistics and key facts about
indigenous peoples" IFAD “Rural Poverty Portal” http://www.ruralpovertyportal.org/topic/statistics/tags/indigenous_peoples.
Compare
to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Article
24.
22 "Indigenous World,"13. Frequently States
make unilateral decisions to permit public and private exploitation of
Indigenous Peoples' resources and territories without receiving
free, prior, and informed consent from the Indigenous Peoples who will
be impacted. Compare to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples, Articles 18, 19.
23 James Anaya, "Report of the Special Rapporteur
on the rights of indigenous peoples" Addendum: The situation of indigenous
peoples in the United States of America. A/HRC/21/47/Add.1, p.11, ¶ 40. (Aug.
30, 2012).
24 "Indigenous World," 14-15.
25 The characterization of Indigenous peoples as
"non-Christians" and "enemies of Christ" evidences a
psychology of polarization and establishes a hierarchy of domination in which
Christians are encouraged to perceive themselves as superior to non-Christians
and thus entitled to claim the possessions of non-Christians. It encourages the
false assumption that there is a natural divide between those who have been
baptized into the Christian religion and those who have not been. By the Pope
claiming to be the "earthly father" of the world, with an obligation
to ensure the "health of souls" and conversion of all peoples to
Christianity, this doctrinal philosophy establishes a male- dominated
patriarchy, which is contrary to many matriarchal Indigenous cultures. In
keeping with his self- proclaimed position as the "earthly father" of
the world, the Pope claimed for himself the right to recognize secular
governments and was generous with rewarding his "children,"
particularly those monarchs whose zealotry brought more lands under the
Church's domination. The rewards, in the form of exclusive, absolute rights to
exploit lands, resources, and human beings form the basis for the doctrine of
Christian domination. Vestiges of these Papal presumptions can be seen today in
domestic relationships between the government and the governed, in laws
governing the international relationships between modern States, and even in
interactions between individuals. See Haudenosaunee, American Indian Law
Alliance, and Indigenous Law Institute of North America, Conference Room Paper on the Doctrine of Discovery, para. 6, 14
UNPFII 11th Sess., U.N. Doc. E/C.19/2012/CRP.2 (25 April 2012). Located at:
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/2012/session-11-CRP2.pdf
(Hereinafter referred to as "Haudenosaunee/ALIA/ILINA
Paper"); Steven T. Newcomb, PAGANS IN THE PROMISED LAND: DECODING THE
DOCTRINE OF DISCOVERY xxii-xxiii (2008);) ; Pope Nicholas V, Dum Diversas (June
8, 1452); Pope Nicholas V, Romanus Pontifex (Jan 8, 1454); Pope Alexander VI, Papal Bull Inter Caetera (4 May 1493).
26 The Papal Bulls were agreements, or legal
contracts, between the Church and Christian monarchs that were made for the
purpose of spreading the Christian religion, expanding the domination of
Christian empire to nations which did not follow the Christian ideas of
governance, and also for converting the property, resources, and populations of
non-Christian nations into commodities to increase the wealth of Christian
empires and the Catholic Church. Papal Bulls could only claim the legal
authority that Christian Monarchs agreed to recognize. However, the Bulls were
enforced under threat of excommunication which, if carried out, would have
resulted in a war between Christian nations and the offending, excommunicated
nation, so violating a church contract was not a minor action.
27 Inter-Caetera.
Pope Alexander VI expressly stated that every element found in the Portuguese
contracts should be considered part of the Spanish contracts. The Spanish
contract basically restated the provisions of the Portuguese contract without
including specific references to Islamic peoples.
28 David E.
Stannard, AMERICAN HOLOCAUST:
CONQUEST OF THE
NEW WORLD 177,
192-193, 195 (1993); Haudenosaunee, American Indian Law
Alliance, and Indigenous Law Institute of North America, Conference Room Paper on the Doctrine of Discovery, para. 6, 14
UNPFII 11th Sess., U.N. Doc. E/C.19/2012/CRP.2 (25 April 2012). Located at:
http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/documents/2012/session-11-CRP2.pdf
(Hereinafter referred to as "Haudenosaunee/ALIA/ILINA
Paper").
The practices of Christian domination are irrational,
genocidal and systematic, relying on brutality to force non-Christian
Indigenous Peoples to compensate the dominators for doing the Church's work.
The Requiremento, a pronouncement of Spanish law, is an example of how the
Spanish viewed their relationship with the non-Christian Indigenous Peoples.
The Christian Spanish monarch required explorers to conduct a ceremonial
reading of the document (in Spanish) upon coming into contact with
non-Christian, non-Spanish speaking peoples. The pronouncement contained a
recitation of Spain's contained in its contracts with the Church, and a list of
responsibilities and infringements of rights of the non-Christian peoples that
would occur so that Spain could exercise its contractual rights. First, the
Spanish Christian monarch claimed the right to subjugate the non-Christians and
possess their lands and territories, and if they refused to cooperate the
Christians could conduct war, enslave them, take their property, and "do
as much damage as possible" without liability. Second, non-Christian
Indigenous Peoples were required to acknowledge superiority of Church over them
and to cooperate in their forced subjugation to Church and king. If they
refused to cooperate with the Christian agents of the monarch, they would be
considered enemies of the Church and Spain. The result would be a "just
war" in which the Spanish had the right to do "as much damage as
possible" and repudiate all liability, holding their non-Christian victims
responsible for bringing destruction on themselves.
29 See, Bartolomé de Las Casas, Popery Truly Display'd in its Bloody Colors (translated, 1689)
Located at Early English Books Online (EEOB). Sadly, the acts witnessed by de
Las Casas were not unique. The behavior of the Spanish toward non-Christian
Indigenous Peoples took on the quality of a gruesome gladiator sport as the
spread of Christianity came to symbolize tyranny and extermination.
30 Victoria is generally acknowledged as the
"father" of international law because his legal theories established
the fundamental principles of modern international law.
31 Black's Law Dictionary defines natural law as
"A philosophical system of legal and moral principles purportedly deriving
from a universalized conception of human nature or divine justice rather than
from legislative or judicial action; moral law embodied in principles of right
and wrong. Since a "universalized conception of human nature or divine
justice" is a question of perspective (ie, which concepts are
"universal"? Does a dominant minority concentrated in a small
geographic area constitute "universal"? Whose definition of
"human" is employed to determine which group will be used to define human
nature? Which divinity is determines "divine justice"? Who defines
"moral law"?) What is considered natural law differs between
cultures. Hence, natural law is only "universal" within a culture and
therefore it is inherently relative to all other cultures. The claim that
Christian natural law is "universal" is an ethnocentric claim that
Christian society, which is often referred to as "civilization," is
superior to all other societies and cultures.
32 Christian natural law principles, derived from the
Christian concept of "nature and nature's God" include the following
concepts:
A. The fundamental nature of human
beings
The
natural state of human beings is sinful because the original sin of the
"first" humans was transferred to all their offspring. This resulted
in a diminished state of existence, which affected natural "man's"
intelligence and desires. The natural man was considered a natural slave,
characterized by sloth, immorality, violence, lower intellect than their
Christians, and just a step above beasts. Since natural man had a soul, it was
only through Christianity that s/he could be brought into a higher level of
living that was more pleasing to the Christian deity. (Derived from teachings
of St. Thomas Aquinas, Augustine and Aristotle). See generally Anne M. deLong,
"Disrupting the Discourse of Conquest: The Suppression of Sepúlveda"
Available at Lehigh University Library Services,
http://digital.lib.lehigh.edu/trial/justification/newspain/essay/; John Langan,
The Elements of St. Augustine's Just War Theory, The Journal of Religious Ethics [12, 1] 19-38 (Spring, 1984)
Available at JStor http://www.jstor.org/stable/40014967.
B. The creator's purpose for the earth
Although
the supreme creator gave the Earth to human beings to hold in common, he meant
for the land to be improved. Therefore, those who are willing to be industrious
gain a natural right of ownership which is superior to others who continue to
use the Earth in common with others. See Anderson, 24-25, quoting John Locke,
Second Treatise on Government, Ch. 5, § 32, 34 & 41 (1690).
C. A paternalistic form of government
is good and necessary
The
absence of agriculture, trade, commerce, economic development, time-keeping,
and cultural achievements such as science, art, engineering, and literature is
evidence that the natural state of humans is one of sloth. Therefore, a
sovereign authority is necessary to motivate humans to achieve a
"higher" level of living, and that is the role of Christian
government. Anderson, 21, quoting Franciscus de Victoria, De Indis et de Ivre
Belli Relectiones 151-157 (Ernest Nys ed.) (J. Bate trans., Carnegie
Institution 1917) (orig. ed. 1557).
D. Christian duty to
"convert" the world to their religious beliefs
According
to the New Testament story of the Good Samaritan, Christians are the natural
neighbors of everyone, therefore, unless they are causing harm, non-Christian
Indigenous Peoples cannot refuse admission to
their territories. (text p. 20). Christians, under this version of natural
law, also have a natural right to preach the gospel to non-Christians, since
this was commanded by God. Anderson, 20 quoting Victoria.
E. Just war
If
non-Christians attempt to prevent the free preaching of the Gospel, they deny
the natural law rights of Christians, since it is the duty of Christians to
save souls of non-Christians. If non-Christian peoples cannot be persuaded to
accept Christianity, just war may be waged, the peoples may be enslaved, and
their property may be confiscated. Anderson, 20 quoting Victoria. Just war had
many proponents including St. Augustine. See Langan, Elements of St.
Augustine's Just War Theory.
F. Religion as Secular Law
When
Christianity is incorporated into a nation's legal system, Christian principles
are said to be "secularized" because they become part of the civil
law system. Thus, a secular legal system can be based wholly on religious
principles, and as a result establish religious principles as the basis for
law, but because the authority to invoke the law comes from the government and
not the Church, the law is considered "secular" or "civil"
law and not "religious" law. "Secular" law does not mean
that religion is no longer being embraced by the state. Rather, in this case it
means that the principles of the Christian religion have been systematically adopted
as the legal basis for the laws. In essence, the monarchies rationalized a way
to legitimate the use of Christian religious law without directly relying on
the Pope as the authority. As an example of how the United States continues to
rely on Christian principles in its "secularized" legal system see Johnson v. M’Intosh, 21 U.S. (8 Wheat.)
543, (1823), upon which rests the government's claims to Indigenous property
land within its political borders.
G. Civilization
Natural law is an exposition on how Christians expected the
world to be ordered, and describes the concept of "civilization," and
how Christian principles would be forced on the non-Christian world. Hence,
when Christian nations proclaimed that it was their duty to "civilize"
the "heathens," that terminology was a short-hand way of expressing
their intent to force non-Christians to abandon their traditional customs and
live according to Christian religious principles.
The Papal edicts and the concepts of Christian natural law
formed the Medieval understanding of the Doctrine of Christian Domination, aka
the Doctrine of Discovery, during the Age of Discovery. Christian Natural Law
subsumed the principals of superiority employed for centuries by the Popes to
justify domination by the church. The same principles were the basis for
secular law and became the foundation of the Law of Nations. Using the
precedential doctrine established by the Church secured the "first
discoveries" of Christendom from infringement by any nations that were
within the "family of nations" regardless of whether they
acknowledged the exalted position claimed by the Pope, because they all agreed
to be bound by "secular" law that institutionalized their shared religious dogma that alleged Christian
nations had inherent superiority.
33 Charlemagne, Constantine, and other monarchs have
been credited with popularizing the notion that kings have a divine right of
rulership that makes the sovereign infallible. The notion is an old one.
Victoria's principles of Christian natural law gave a new twist to an old
concept .
34 Robert T. Anderson, et al. "American Indian
Law, Cases and Commentary," 16 and 21-22 notes 1, 2 (West 2d ed. 2010).
The first Christian peoples who arrived from Britain did not make a distinction
between wealth and religion. They literally carried written corporate charters
from the King and the Bible that they viewed as written religious
law
of their God. The fusion of wealth and religion was not accidental: The idea
that wealth is sacred is a fundamental tenet of the religion they practiced,
and one that required the religion be portable so it could be used to support
exploitation of global resources.
35 Inter Caetera.
36 El
Requiremento, 1513.
37 Anderson at 21, quoting Franciscus de Victoria.
38 Id.
39 [S]hould any of said islands have been found by
your envoys and captains, [we] give, grant, and assign to you and your heirs and successors, kings of
Castile and Leon, forever, together with all their dominions, cities, camps,
places, and villages, and all rights, jurisdictions, and appurtenances, all
islands and mainlands found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered
towards the west and south ... we make, appoint, and depute you and your said
heirs and successors lords of them with full and free power, authority, and
jurisdiction of every kind. Inter Caetera.
40 Anderson at 21, quoting Franciscus de Victoria.
41 Id.,
Based on teachings of St. Augustine.
42 Id.,
Based on teachings of Christ recorded in the Gospel of Matthew.
43 Id.
44 Quoted from Romanus Pontifex, which is the Church
contract with the Portuguese. Similar contracts had been made before and after
the Romanus Pontifex, and it was understood that the right to carry on trade
for financial gain was a primary provision. Therefore, although not
unequivocally expressed in each contract, the trade provision was implied by
the language. The Spanish later obtained an addendum to their contract Inter
Caetera which expressly stated that all the rights and benefits enjoyed by the
Portuguese also applied to the Spanish. See Pope Alexander VI, Eximiae
Devotionis, 3 May 1493
(http://clc-library-org-docs.angelfire.com/Eximiae.html).
45 See generally Bartholomé de Las Casas first-hand
accounts of Spanish brutalities in the Americas, described in Popery Truly
Display'd in its Bloody Colors, translated 1689. Available at Early English
Books Online. (http://eebo.chadwyck.com/home).
46 Wagner, Henry Raup; Parish, Helen Rand (1967). The
Life and Writings of Bartolomé de Las Casas. University of New Mexico Press.
Although the Spanish engaged in widespread destruction of
Indigenous Peoples, the voices of detractors were raised against the
dehumanizing theories and practices. These Christian-based legal doctrines on
war, land, and intelligence were controversial in their day, as they are today.
For example, Victoria’s contemporary Bartolomé de Las Casas argued in two
treatises on the "Just Title" that the only legality with which the
Spaniards could claim titles over realms in the New World was through peaceful
proselytizing, not through cruel policies and violent colonization. Public
debates were also held on the legal status of Indigenous Peoples in 1550
shortly after Victoria made his recommendations to the Spanish King. In the
public Valladolid debate of 1550, Bartolomé de Las Casas argued that Indians of
the New World were full humans, while Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda argued that they
were subhuman and required Spanish (Christian) masters to become civilized.
47 Laws made by governments are referred to as
"secular law". As used in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the
term "secular" had a different definition than it does in the
twenty-first century. In modern English "secular" means devoid of
religious or spiritual basis. However, as used in the Late Medieval and Early
Modern eras, "secular" was defined as those things relating to
temporal, or worldly matters. Even though a system of government might adopt
wholly religious laws, the State controlled the worldly affairs of its citizens
so the body of governmental law was considered temporal, or "secular"
even if religious belief was inextricably entwined in every law and policy.
Victoria's Christian natural law principles that were adopted into the Spanish
legal system contained the biases, assumptions, and superstitions about
non-Christian peoples that had become part of the Christian belief system
through the centuries of Medieval-era inquisitions and crusades.
48 Tupac Enrique Acosta, "The American
Dream and
the Nightmare of Manifest Destiny", on mexmigration: History and
Politics
of Mexican Immigration, Devon G. Peña, ed.
http://mexmigration.blogspot.com/2012/08/guest-commentary-by-tupac-enrique-acosta.html
49 For example, see Rhode Island Royal Charter (1663);
First Charter of Virginia (1606); The Massachusetts Historical Society, Francis
Kirby to John Winthrop, (Dec. 1631) in III Winthrop Papers, 55-56
(Massachusetts Historical Society 1943).
https://archive.org/stream/winthroppapersv3wint/winthroppapersv3wint_djvu.txt
50 The colonists who established their corporate
settlement in the area of what is now Boston, Massachusetts maintained that the
Old Testament Abrahamic prophecies and promises which were the legacy of the
Jewish people- the "Chosen People" - were transferred to Christians
who, because of their service to the Christian god, gained the privileges
reserved for the "Children of God." Upon landing in North America,
the colonists allegorically saw themselves as having reached Caanan - the
promised land - and as a result, they viewed the Indigenous Peoples as the
"Cannanites" whose destruction God had commanded, and themselves as
the historical Children of Israel, charged with slaughtering the peoples of the
land and claiming the wealth for their supreme being. The colonists reenacted
the Old Testament conquest with frightening religious fervor and justify their
murderous behavior by creating colonial laws and policy based on their
religious beliefs. Gail Forsythe-Vail, A
story of Joshua, Jericho, and Massachusetts, presented at Dismantling the
Doctrine of Discovery International Conference at Arizona State University West
(Apr. 20, 2013).
51 The method in which they accomplished their purpose
was genocidal in its magnitude and ingenious in its execution. Infamous is the
account of Christians gifting disease-laden blankets to deliberately spread
infections. Between 80 and 96 percent of Indigenous Peoples throughout the
Americas were destroyed by European diseases. Anderson, et al., American Indian Law, Cases and Commentary,
27-28 (Apr 2010). Smallpox took the heaviest toll and cause the greatest
suffering, but other methods of extermination were equally shocking. Official written
accounts praise the acts of burning villages of undefended women, children and
elders while they slept in their homes; food caches and ripening crops were
systematically destroyed to ensure that those who remained would suffer
starvation during the sparse winters. The primary purpose was to eliminate the
Indigenous Peoples of the "Promised Land" to make exploitation of
their property cheaper and easier.
52 Anderson, 28. John Winthrop to Sir Simonds Dewes
(June 21, 1634) in III Winthrop Papers 171-172 (Massachusetts Historical
Society 1943). (Quote translated to modern English).
53 Id.,
quoting John Winthrop letter to John Endecott (January 3, 1634) in III Winthrop
Papers 149 (Massachusetts Historical Society 1943). (Quote translated to modern
English).
54 Id.
55 Johnson v. M’Intosh, 21 U.S. (8 Wheat.)
543, (1823).
56 Marshall uses the term "European" in his
original writing. Since a non-Christian European sovereign would be excluded
from the rights of discovery, use of European is misleading and technically
incorrect. "Christian" is a more accurate descriptor and is inserted
here.
57 M'Intosh
at 587.
58 Id. at 588.
59 M'Intosh
at 572-573 (emphasis added).
60 M'Intosh
at 589, 591.
61 Acosta.
62 M'Intosh at 589 (emphasis added).
63 M'Intosh
at 590.
64 "So, too, with respect to the concomitant
principle, that the [non-Christian]64 inhabitants are to be considered merely
as occupants, to be protected, indeed, while in peace, in the possession of
their lands, but to be deemed incapable of transferring the absolute title to
others." Quoting M'Intosh at
591. Note: For purposes of accurate terminology and illustration, the term
"non-Christian" is substituted for "Indian", which is a
pejorative term coined by the Christian dominator to deny the diverse
nationalities of Indigenous Peoples within the political boundaries of the
United States.
65This opinion conforms precisely to the principle
which has been supposed to be recognised by all [Christian]* governments, from the first
settlement of America. The absolute ultimate title has been considered as
acquired by discovery, subject only to the [non-Christian]* title of occupancy,
which title the [Christian]* discoverers possessed the exclusive right of
acquiring. M'Intosh at 592. See supra
64 and infra 71.
*Note:
For purposes of accuracy and illustration, the term "Christian" is
substituted for "European."
* * *
"It
has never been contended, that the [non-Christian]* title amounted to nothing.
Their right of possession has never been questioned. The claim of [Christian]*
government extends to the complete ultimate title, charged with this right of
possession, and to the exclusive power of acquiring that right... The very
grant of a charter is an assertion of the title of the [Christian]* crown, and
its words convey the same idea. The country granted, is said to be ‘our island
called Rhode-Island;’ and the charter contains an actual grant of the soil, as
well as of the powers of government. M'Intosh at 603. *See note at Supra above.
66 Charles the Second, by the Grace of God, King of
England, Scotland, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith … [W]e have been
informed … on the behalf of … the purchasers and free inhabitants of our
island, called Rhode Island, and the rest of the colony of Providence
Plantations … in America, that they, pursuing, with peaceable and loyal minds,
their sober, serious, and religious intentions, of godly edifying themselves,
and one another, in the holy Christian faith and worship, as they were
persuaded; together with the gaining over and conversion of the poor ignorant
Indian natives, in those parts of America, to the sincere profession and
obedience of the same faith and worship. King Charles II of England, Rhode
Island Royal Charter (1663). Rhode Island Secretary of State,
http://sos.ri.gov/library/history/charter.
67 Id.
68 And further, know ye, that we … have given, granted
and confirmed … unto the said Governor and Company and their successors, all
that part of our dominions in New England, in America, containing the Nahantick
and Nanhygansett, alias Narragansett Bay, and countries and parts adjacent …
together with all firm lands, soils,
grounds,
havens, ports, rivers, waters, fishings, mines royal, and all other mines,
minerals, precious stones, quarries, woods, wood grounds, rocks, slates, and
all and singular other commodities, jurisdictions, royalties, privileges,
franchises, preheminances, and hereditaments, whatsoever, within the said
tract, bounds, lands and islands aforesaid, or to them or any of them
belonging, or in any wise appertaining; To have and to hold the same, unto the
said Governor and Company, and their successors, forever, upon trust, for the
use and benefit of themselves and their associates … yielding and paying … to
us, our heirs and successors, only the fifth part of all the ore of gold and
silver which, from time to time, and at all times hereafter, shall be there
gotten, had or obtained, in lieu and satisfaction of all services, duties,
fines, forfeitures, made or to be made, claims and demands … rendered, made or
paid. Id.
69 Message of President James Monroe at the
commencement of the first session of the 18th Congress (The Monroe Doctrine),
12/02/1823; Presidential Messages of the 18th Congress, ca. 12/02/1823-ca.
03/03/1825; Record Group
46;
Records of the United States Senate, 1789-1990; National Archives. Available at
http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=23
70 Theodore Roosevelt's Annual Message to Congress for
1904; House Records HR 58A-K2; Records of the U.S. House of Representatives;
Record Group 233; Center for Legislative Archives; National Archives. Find the
transcript at http://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=true&doc=56.
71 Id.
72 Franklin
Roosevelt’s Good Neighbor Policy, 1936, The Gilder Lehrman Institute of
American History. Available at http://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-by-era/world-war-ii/resources/franklin-roosevelt’s-good-neighbor-policy-
1936.
73 List of interventions and source materials are on
file with the author.
74 History of Corporations, Risk Encyclopedia
http://www.riskencyclopedia.com/articles/corporation/75
Id.
76 Id.
77 International trade agreements, often written under
the advice and at the urging of powerful corporations, reflect the desires and
interests of profit-making rather than sound, responsible social policy.
*************************
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©C. Boshell, SGF September 2015
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The Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Doctrine of Discovery:
Medieval Christian theology at the heart of modern international policy
Medieval Christian theology at the heart of modern international policy
©C. Boshell, SGF September 2015
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