So long as you give them their entire claim to land as a sovereign nation, including water, mineral, and air space rights…
And at that point you don’t have much space for the colonial powers left.
And at that point you don’t have much space for the colonial powers left.
The Penobscots, one of the member nations of the Wabanaki Confederacy, have never been displaced from Indian Island (since settling there ~11k years ago), and acquired significant additional land holdings since the 1970s.
How do you know that? If they took land from another tribe 9k years ago do you think we would have a record of it? What if another tribe took the land from them 8k years ago and 7k years ago they took it back? Do you think we can actually determine if that happened?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9th_millennium_BC
I used to live on the next island over (French Island), and your clueless questioning of Penobscot sovereignty is disappointing. Would you also suggest that maybe Natufians should control the Levant?
That is my point. You made a claim but have no evidence to prove it.
>I used to live on the next island over (French Island), and your clueless questioning of Penobscot sovereignty is disappointing.
I don't think you understand what my point even is if you think I am doubting anybody's sovereignty.
>Would you also suggest that maybe Natufians should control the Levant?
I don't think being the earliest inhabitants of an area gives permanent ownership. My issue is we are told we need to give back land to the previous owners. It just seems ridiculous that we should do that when many of the tribes we took the land from did the exact same thing we did.
I'm not claiming anything, it's right there on https://penobscotnation.org. Reach out to Chief Francis or the council if you have questions on their assertions.
> I don't think you understand what my point even is if you think I am doubting anybody's sovereignty.
Good to hear, that doesn't really seem to be the case among Mainers. Note that the Penobscot River has legally been a citizen of the Penobscot Nation since 2018. The State of Maine has repeatedly disputed their claims and legally challenged their sovereignty, finally losing their battle to control pollution in the river last year: https://www.nrdc.org/stories/22-year-court-battle-ends-justi...
> I don't think being the earliest inhabitants of an area gives permanent ownership.
Okay, so who should control the Levant then?
I understand how one could extrapolate from other geopolitical tensions, but there doesn't seem to be much uncertainty in this case regarding Penobscot claims. Yes they lost most of their wider territory through illegal treaties, but they never lost their "capital" on Indian Island. I'm not aware of any other New World peoples who weren't displaced from their ancestral headquarters by European settlers and have maintained continuity of government since before Columbus set sail.
The Penobscots asserted their claim on over half of the land in Maine in the 1970s, and reached a settlement for over $80M in 1980, which they've used to acquire more territory [1]. The only question has been over sovereignty, specifically in terms of environmental rights, with the State of Maine taking on both the tribe and the feds in their failed battle for control over the river.
1. https://generationallandscapesblog.wordpress.com/sugar-islan...
I interpreted your statement as you making the claim. I didn't realize you were just repeating the tribe's claim.
I have no reason to believe they never fought another tribe and took their land. Perhaps they were the original inhabitants of the island, but perhaps not.
Frankly, I don't trust people who refuse to acknowledge taking land from others when their history allegedly goes back thousands of years.
>Okay, so who should control the Levant then?
My preferred solution is to build a time machine and convince the British to retain control over the area. Since that isn't happening the only short term solution I see is for some third party to take control over the area (British Mandate style). Once this third party takes over they can stop the attacks between the two sides and then work on a long term solution. Israel is too militarily strong to be able to easily be taken over so I don't really think it is practical though.
>I understand how one could extrapolate from other geopolitical tensions, but there doesn't seem to be much uncertainty in this case regarding Penobscot claims.
I'm not doubting their claims that they controlled the area when the Europeans came. I'm doubting they didn't kill, steal and cheat others to get the land.
The thing that annoys me about all these Native American claims is how people who are otherwise skeptical about historical claims just accept the Natives' claims without question. It is not just with this tribe, but with all of the tribes. I think it is just a continuation of some sort of Noble Savage Myth or something like that.
>Yes they lost most of their wider territory through illegal treaties, but they never lost their "capital" on Indian Island. I'm not aware of any other New World peoples who weren't displaced from their ancestral headquarters by European settlers and have maintained continuity of government since before Columbus set sail.
My argument isn't that the Europeans took the land from them, but they likely took the land from other tribes. We know native tribes frequently killed each other and displaced tribes.
If killing, cheating, stealing and displacing people is not a legitimate way to gain land then pretty much every country is illegitimate. Eventually we just have to move on. Is there a single group of people that hasn't done bad things to obtain the land and government they have? Europe has mostly moved on and there is rarely (I know Russia/Ukraine is happening) fights about regaining land lost in generations past. It sucks for people to lose land, but I don't see any solution going forward.
If we go back to the Levant example, what is the solution? Keep the existing borders and call it a day? Pro Palestinian people aren't chanting from the river to the sea for no reason. What if we give all the land to the Palestinians? Well the Israelis will feel like they just lost their land and the conflict will continue. Give all the land to Israel? Palestinians will feel like they just lost their land and will fight to get it back.
The only long term solution is get people to accept the principle of forgive and forget. Until people can accept they may not have the land their ancestors had there will continue to be conflicts over land. Maybe some slight adjustments to the existing borders need to be made for cultural, religious, and language reasons for this to work, but until we can move on from past offenses we will continue to kill and displace one another.
In regards to the natives, I don't know what the best way to make everybody feel whole. I don't think stripping land from nonnatives whose families have lived their for generations is the right way to solve this. That is the same thing the Europeans did to the natives. It will continue the animosity over the land. Forgive and forget seems like the only real solution. We may need to make some slight adjustments to borders though. I think giving the natives a few years to file any lawsuits and then calling it good is the solution. If you didn't get your lawsuit in or discovered additional land you think belongs to you, then you just have to forgive and forget.
The scope of government is to uphold the agreements it makes, not unravel the interactions of other parties going back to the dawn of humanity.
We didn't consider it stolen when we first made the agreement.
You aren’t a sovereign if you don’t rule within your claimed borders.
This is, of course, notwithstanding the fact that wars of conquest are illegal in our modern system of international law precisely because they represent an act intended to steal another nation’s sovereign territory… you seem to thing such wars become legal if the invaded party doesn’t successfully prevent the invasion from starting at all.
Yes, the de facto situation is that successfully prosecuting a genocide means successfully stealing land, as happened in what became the USA, but it doesn’t alter the fact that the land was very definitely (in the case of the USA both de facto and de jure) stolen.
Yes, wars of conquest are "illegal" today but that's not a real thing - it's just a declaration by some group of humans who wish it to be. They certainly weren't "illegal" in previous times so any land acquired then is clearly not "stolen".
Let's look at this from a normal legal situation. You own an item that was stolen by thief A. Thief B then steals it from thief A. Should your item be returned to you or to thief A? Your logic would indicate thief A. Nobody thinks that would be the right solution and yet when it comes to native lands nobody cares. I just want some consistency.
If you recognize them as the rightful owner at the time, make an agreement for exchange, then the burden of consistency is on you. Buyers remorse is not sufficient to unwind your obligations while retaining the property.
Another way of resolving this is simply recognizing that conquest does not create obligation, but diplomatic agreement does. It is a matter of integrity and honor, literally, in the sense of do you honor you commitments or are you a liar.
While repugnant to some, I think this is quite clear. In the cases where settlers simply took land by force of arms, they created no legal or honorable obligation. Where they took land by legal agreement, they have created an obligation.
Not only is our opinion irrelevant; our opinion has been abundantly demonstrated to be awful in every single way. We need to stop.
Giving it to the last inhabitant, yes possibly conquerer, is really the only choice we have (apart from doing nothing and stealing the land) - to put things back the way they were.
Im saying that if you fully acknowledge someone to be the rightful owner and something, you dont get to change your mind about paying them, and call them a thief with no new information, and then keep it for yourself.
IF the US somehow discovered evidence that it bought stolen land, and chose to pay or return it to the original holder, that would be one thing.
Simply not paying and keeping something for yourself make YOU the thief and a liar too.
Because individual actors and even nations are discontinuous over the thousands of years we are talking about, we are stuck with treating racial and ethnic lineages as the actors, blurring the lines. The Thief and victim can be the same. Lets say a deceased grandfather (A) was robbed by a now deceased son (B), depriving the living grandchild (C) of their ancestral property. Living Indians, party C, are the decedents of both the thief and victim. It still makes more sense that the stolen goods should go back to them, than stay with recipient of the stolen goods.
Anchoring back to reality, I think the whole thief analogy is bogus. At the time treaties were made with Indians, possession by conquest was considered a valid means of acquisition, and Indians were held to be in sufficient standing to enter agreements.
Rationales which try to retroactively invalidate the historic land ownership by natives, and thereby invalidate contractual obligations, are logically bankrupt if they dont also attempt to identify a rightful owner to return the property to.
Once these treaties expire, assuming they are ignored, the land does become stolen.
I don't expect the tribes to be unreasonable about the land and take up land-grabs, it will likely just be a matter of taxes going to one entity instead of another.
Something being costly does not absolve you of your moral, legal, and honorable obligations. It is not a justification for ex post facto recontracting.
I would like to see the government uphold it's obligations, stop acting weird exceeds these obligations, I work towards permanent Solutions where advantageous. This may include buying out of contractual obligations for purchasing Indian land and rights
To avoid being evil? To be the sort of people who keeps promises?
https://www.penobscothistory.com/historic-preservation/12-tr...
The Penobscot Nation, the oldest government in the Western hemisphere, has never been conquered.
There's a pretty vocal minority on HN (and in tech generally) that are unapologetic supporters of might-makes-right and wholly against the rule of law. It's at least a bit refreshing from the usual set of people who are against the same but too mealy-mouthed to say it outright.
There's no monopoly on arms in this country. Every able-bodied male between 17 and 45 is in the militia and we keep a gun behind every blade of grass.
If it takes the species with it, so be it.
On average it takes two decades for a victim of childhood sexual abuse to disclose their abuse… successful victories of your imaginary “might” at that remove are virtually non existent relative to the number of victims.