On behalf of the entire staff, i would like to thank you for coming. We are delighted to have Roxanne Dunbar with us who has led a life devoted to social justice activism starting in the 1960s when she belonged to an armed underground group through to her efforts for the womens liberation and over several decades now the advocacy for the rights and recognition. Along the way, roxanne taught at California State University and has written or edited a number of books including several on native americans and other Indigenous People and a couple of memoirs. Earlier this week the Foundation Awarded the Freedom Prize lifetime achievement. [applause] roxannes latest work examines the culture in the United States and looks at what is described as the racist roots. The conventional view of the amendment links to the designer of the citizens of the nation to protect themselves from tyrannical government but roxanne portrays it a little bit differently as an instrument of White Nationalism, racial dominance and violent social control. She argues that the support for the right to keep and bear arms was intended to facilitate the genocide of native americans and enabled shareholders to control their human property. It devolved into the gun violence of the more recent times and violence manifested in Mass Shootings at home and militarism abroad. This cultural Analysis Shows the american laamerican law and soce nations history of racial and class violence is obviously a provocative argument but it does reflect the conflicted love and hate relationship. A review in Publishers Weekly send the argument to be disturbing and unfamiliar to most, but the evidence is significant and shouldnt be ignored. Please join me in welcoming Roxanne Dunbar ortiz. Ask the [applause] thank you for coming out on this cold night. I come from San Francisco where we think that its cooled when it gets 60. So i have a lot of clothes on. Can you hear me . Okay. First i want to acknowledge that we are here today on stolen land prior to invasion and occupation this is the home of part of the territory of the algonquin speaking peoples made up of farmers, fishers and traders who lived in town right here where washington is now thats were the center of a thriving trade from all the nations in the interior. Its been going on for some time and is not original to me but i put it in this form most of it is academic, but a number of native scholars have theorized the same interpretation as have africanamerican scholars. Some commentators in th and the public, not these scholars, they say look for reasons they have such a strong appeal in the United States in comparison to other societies. But few of them explore those reasons, so that is the purpose of this book. But, instead of dismissing the Second Amendment as antiquated or not actually meaning what it says, i argue that understanding the purpose of the Second Amendment is the key to understanding the gun culture of the United States and possibly the key to a new consciousness about the lingering effects of White Nationalism. The Second Amendment is a simple statement a well regulated militia necessary to the security of a free state, the rights of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infring infringed. The National Rifle association guarantees the right for every individual to bear arms while guncontrol advocates maintain developed states continuing to have their own militias emphasizing the well regulated and this is manifest in the national guard. There is a problem with that because the respective state militias were already authorized by the u. S. Constitution when the amendment was added. To execute the law of the union and repo invasions article one, section eight. The president is a commander in chief of the militias and when called into the Actual Service of the United States so given what we now call the state National Guards are descendent from the state militias which were repurposed from the colonial militia why was it added as one of the enumerated rights of man in the bill of rights and the constitution is basically about the right of the government, not the right of the people but the collective document about the powers that,s about individual rights. So the fact that the Second Amendment is there means Something Different an than is already in the constitution. The Second Amendment along with the other nine constituted individual rights and the references are voluntary. I will read a bit from chapter one which is the Historical Context of the amendment. The angloamerican settlers broke in the 18th century paralleled the search and destroy annihilation of learning which they slaughtered families and expanded the boundaries of the colonies into these territories. It continued across the continent for another century of unrelenting u. S. Wars or conquest. That was the goal of independence and the militias using violence against indigenous noncombatants with the goal of total domination. These forces were met with resistance movements and identified with leaders, Little Turtle and a blue jacket and the shawnee. The genocide would have been complete circuit of the eastern half of the continent was ethnically cleansed of native nations by 1850 through forced relocation in the territory west of the mississippi. All of those names they are all reservation but they are not from there, they were before them. The program of expansion and the civilization and Agricultural Society in the Great Lakes Region began before the declaration of independence and began with the french and indian war socalled 1754 and between france and britain and europe. Over 1763 had fled to the world trade tower and Colonial Holdings for nearly two centuries. In the treaty of paris, they ceded canada and all claims east of the mississippi to britain. In the course of the war they intensified the use. It was into the territories of the miami and confederation identified with the leadership in the Great Lakes Region spreading to the illinois and ohio countries. By the end of the war, significant numbers had taken the colonies boundaries and led to speculation to the fortunate few. To the dismay soon after the treaty of paris was signed, king george 3 issued a proclamation prohibiting british settlement last of the allegheny mountain change. Ordering those that settled in to relinquish the claims had returned to the king comes 13 colonies or somewhere else in the british empire, soon it became clear that the british authorities needed far more soldiers to enforce as thousands ignored it and continued to pour over the mountains squatting on Indigenous Lands and provoking indigenous resistance. In order to enforce the proclamation line, the British Parliament imposed stamp act they had to be paid in british pounds, not local paper money. It marked the rebellion in the control but didnt tell the whole story concerning what the tax was four to pay for the cost of housing, feeding into transporting soldiers into expanding into the indian territory the complaints iterated in the declaration largely focused on the measures to prevent his subjects from granting more land. For instance, they have the insurrections among us and have endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of the front tears the savages whose known rule of warfare is an end distinguished destruction of all. Im not sure why you are not taught that at school. They were within the colonies and illegal speculation in the lands was rampant. In the southern colonies especially farmers that lost their land for more efficient but rushed for the native farmlands over the Mountain Range should. Of these militant settlers who call themselves rangers created a framework for the United States to appropriate the native territories and kept eradicating them across the continent for the following century. They were dependent on them for support and after the war of independence, they relied on the military to protect their settlements. They were in the first wave of the war. The uncontrollable momentum and request for the subjugation have to find the way throughout the colonial period. Its not just in terms of the right but also the requirement to bear arms which is crucial to the integrity of the state and the conception of the security achieved. The british withdrew from the war of independence to maintain the sovereignty over the 13 colonies giving up territory in the ohio country. Not to the defeat of the british transfer was a nightmarish disaster for all east of the mississippi and ultimately all of north america. The withdrawal in 1783 opened a new chapter of unrestrained violence and colonization of the continent. It began in 1785 but it wasnt approved by all the states until 1791. Then the congress got to work on a plan for colonization over the Mountain Range before it was even seized. The Land Ordinance of 1785 established a system for surveying and distributing being auctioned off to the highest bidder. If set forth a procedure for annexation via military occupation, transforming into territorial status and control and finally statehood when they outnumbered people or when wereu got to taking half of the inhabitants. These were the first goals of the republic revealing the motives. Was the blueprint for taking the continent reaching all the way to the pacific. They laid out a marketable squarthe marketablesquare land t new. They were the products of the colonial elite including George Washington who took surveying teens into the ohio country making them one of the most successful land speculators in the colony. Trump actually comes closest in his career. The wealthiest were all speculators. By 1850 it was the wealthiest economy in the world. President Thomas Jefferson described the states intentions for the expansion. Taking the land by force was not an accidental or spontaneous project. It was second only to freedom of speech. Theyll colonial settlers had the purpose of seizing their lands and resources into the native communities fought back. Virginia where we are, the first colony forbade any man to travel and a few years later and other required the of them to take ars with them to work and attend church or be fined. In 1658 today ordered every cell or home to have a functioning firearm and later provided to government loans to those that couldnt afford to buy a weapon. The governments made locals such as the requirement for the firearm. They were fined from missing ammunition and no men were to appear at a public meeting. They stayed on the books and were created as new colonies as they were founded. The Second Amendment ratified in shrine an of these as constitutional law. The continuing significance of that freedom to bear arms specified in the bill of rights reveals the Cultural Roots of the United States that appeared even in the present as a sacred right. Several of the colonies had declared independence in 1776 massachusetts, New Hampshire and new jersey, pennsylvania vermont and virginia have already adopted individual gun rights measures into their state constitutions. They declared themselves independent as states. There wasnt even any discussion or argument about this being one of the amendments in the constitution. They were used as slave patrols forming the basis of the culture after enslaving people was made illegal. That is the inseparable over half of the colonial reality that is implicit in the Second Amendment. The first to be shipped or the eventual 13 colonies that became the United States took place in 1619. When they arrived in virginia most of the labor being used in the first decade was made up of british and other food in danger tendangerthemselves for varyings of time. But african slavery was different. Some historians think they were considered servants but the strong probability is even if they were listed as servants, the more familiar category, they were viewed as being different or treated differently and in fact were slaves and this is a part of what had bee has been gn for the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Others presumed the settlers of north america were reluctant but that seemed to be a notion where the doctor bit of discovery promulgated by the mid15 century legalized to capture and enslavement of the people of west africa the Transatlantic Slave Trade took off. First within the european markets especially this one, then in 1492 it reached the caribbean and has been in effect for over a century when the seaboard was wrenched by the indigenous farmers by the english usurpers. To the mid20 century most was colonized under the doctrine of the discovery. So, this was a doctrine that gave half the world to the portuguese and spanish and the other powers got in the act and declared it the doctrine of discovery even though they were protestant countries that supplied to them but its still the law of the land. It was included and decided in some positions in the team 20s that applied in the United States. The only barrier to introducing all of the other colonies would have been ethical emerged in territory that had once been one of the seven original birthplaces of agriculture in the world. Tens of thousands of years developed by the other indigenous agricultural societies. Appropriated by the settlers, they become economies based on the enslaved labor into people for profit where they were forced to do the periphery. Having these populations as well by the late 17th century, theyve been developed which included the three patrols drawn from the already existing militia. They were following the french and indian war prohibiting expansion since their wealth relied on accessing more and more land with intensive production for the market they were taking survey teams and of course also George Washington was a land speculator. They designed a governmental economic structure to serve the private property of each for all of the primary actors forming the government. The white male Property Owners and nearly all where he is the genius of finance. They intensified as the United States had more for the patrol that grew accordingly. The ethnic cleansing was complete and formed the basis for the capitalism and world trade. It gave an institution in decline at the end of this century. There were around 100,000 living within the boundaries of the state of mississippi and louisiana. There were more than double and in 1860, more than 750,000 double the gang, tripled. The militaristic powerhouse of the United States became by 1840 the arrived from real estate which included enslaved africans as well as the appropriated land. The United States was founded as a capitalist state hence the term this was exceptional and has remained exceptional. Gun proliferation and gun violence today are among the legacies. Now i want to read a poem that i include in this book, a spoken native novelists. This is in the book that came out last year. What will the Genocide Memorial Museum contained in what will it exhibit it will be a 50foot square. There will be only one visitor allowed any one time. There will be no furniture. They would have to stand or sit on the floor or lie on the floor if they feel tired. They must remain for one hour. There will be no music of the only soundtrack will be random gunshots used throughout american history. What will the one photo be . At 40 a baby in snow. To introduce some more contemporary statistics. I will finish with this and hope that we have a good conversati conversation. I think all of you know that there are 300 million firearm outside the police from outside of the army in the United States and that as they population of the United States. 74 are male and 82 are white which means that 61 of all adults that own guns are white men into this accounts for 21 of the total population. The top reason is for protecti protection. What are the majority of men so afraid of . Does anyone believe that the centuries of racial and economic domination to the United States have left their traces in the cultural views or institutions its not likely given the evidence to the contrary. It is compounded by the lack of acknowledgment of violence across the continent that continued such as the legal segregation and institutional racism, criminalization of incarceration. Another countr contributes to te firearms so that is one of the chapters. Thank you. Ask him if we [applause] its been something thats concerned me more and more. What other countries or just in your scholarship and studies of other countries have you looked at and what would you suggest for solutions to bring down the gun violence problem . European countries are people who always wonder why youre there so manare thereso many gud states. So, there are gun laws and am very familiar with the rifle over the shoulder walking down the street there is a law that requires each home to have a weapon. They dont really have an army there is no gun violence at all and even in places where you think even geneva because this is where the United Nations is where the refugee center, there are places from all over the world and there is no gun violence. Its just so rare that its hardly a statistic. This is why they are rather dubious. I dont think it will happen until there is a big shift, but even if they could, i dont think that they would be affected because the gun culture is so deep in this history into the case of australia is brought up because it is true that australia, new zealand and canada, the three to four british settler colonies and colonialism is the most violent and genocidal eradication of people. No genocide forced. They eliminated all the people there by hunting. It was a sport to kill the Indigenous People. So, they had the same computer history and they had this horrible mass killing. It was very much like the ones that we see quite regularly in such a shock in the whole country that the Prime Minister at the time asked the people can we make a law banning and controlling weapons, everything having to be registered that was very successful and its held pretty well from what ive read its one of the major arguments that the regulation works. In canada, i don dont excuse u saw the wonderful film bowling for columbine, but he explores some of these things and has a little 32nd cartoon about pilgrims killing indian and its like she knows but he couldnt work it into the film he asks the question and finds they have very few gun laws and the provinces have more control but they have very little gun violence and really thats one horrible mass shooting which was directed towards women a few years ago, but they dont have the gun culture. So ive been studying this for years and years, what is the difference. What do you think is the main difference given the similarities ask anybody . Slavery may be, capitalism, really capital for some. Others came later and it now dominates the world and is linked with militarism. One thing the country still has, they dont have military bases all over the world. Military bases all over their own country, endless wars going on. So what i say is the United States is an exceptional state, just not in the way that the city on the hill is exceptional and i think one of the problems is the constitution, the whole origin story about the sacredness and the Second Amendment is presented as a sacred compact. They have the apartheid regime, the dutch reform and i think that we should question how they pay tribute to the nation of laws, but incarceration is leg legal. For some of us to think about forming the locally constitutional writings, most in the world have constitution and they seem t seemed to get alonge without one. Those who have them do not worship them. They are not being cut in stone. I think that we have to start understanding that because basically the Second Amendment is one of the causes that perpetuates gun violence because it has its own momentum. This started, these mass killings started as well as the nra turning from a recreational gun club. In 1976 there was a coup in the nra and they were paralleled in the civil rights movement, so i think that the gun culture has been revived. Theres a lot of good statistic about the gun industry. She blames the industry for coming and the nra for selling guns. Its like blaming me sees for Consumer Spending or credit card debt. Theres a lot of dysfunction around these things for sure but in order to argue that she has to want that they were not important before. It doesnt occur to her apparently but it was created to order by the army of the west. She doesnt mention that. So, leaning out what is the history of the United States is no way that we can understand or control the gun culture. When i started writing this bo book, it was actually two years ago when the slaughter by the young white nationalists and you havent seen it yet because trump wasnt elected yet. Charlottesville came and charleston was, this young man i study him and tried to go to his trial but i never did get there because he was very interesting, 20yearsold or something that already for this White Nationalism in on his Facebook Page he had flags from rhodesia. We should study White Nationalism a little bit more because it is an undercurrent. I come from mobile oklahoma and i have members of my family, white nationalists, not many, but relatives, cousins and things that some who do gun shows a. Of those of us that know about it know that it was thriving all this time theres a backlash to a Safer Society in the 1950s that was kind of resurgence ande and then these mass killings began at accelerated. Thats why i say its taken on a momentum of its own and in that time frame, the portion has doubled in the United States. Its not about money and the Democratic Party is held up on this idea that 300 million a year they spend on lobbying that is nothing compared to what exxon. What they do is they monitor everything every Congress Person is doing and every state legislature and even cities. They have volunteers and chapters. They do this because it is a sacred thing. They then swarm that candidate. That is what they are scared off and they know if they just dont do the grassroots organizing. That is being erased now with the new law to come into our state in california or new york with the right to open carry or close kerry to maintain a. I think all of the efforts going into trying to think rationally about the gun culture and Second Amendment. Thats why i felt compelled to write this book. It seems obvious that you know the history. All the facts are there. None of these things are secret archives of documents to. Every document you want to find its just that historians are having a conference right now. Those that do u. S. History. I called and the keepers of the secrets. Everything we do lots. Its resilient because you are not getting to the problems. I always give long answers. Im sorry. Weve got to get this under control. Did that happen so why were people willing to give up their right to keep and bear arms. It gets the cowboys and indians, my dad was a cowboy when he was young. They had guns that kill rattlesnakes, weber people like billy the kid, but i have a whole chapter on this. People dont know much about it over the date referred to as the border, but they were confederate guerrillas and they were able to come up their image was remade because they introduced riding a horse fast shooting people at random. They were all slave owners and then they became bank robbers and train robbers. They were just psychopathic killers. But the first westerns that were made and holds the oklahoma before hollywood even existed with some of them playing the roles, these became imprinted into the western look gunfighter nation. They introduced this in theaters and theres a kind of imitation of art. Why were they willing to leave them outside . Because the need for work. Some were criminals of course he and the criminals will carry a firearm that is a given. I dont think cowboys per se. A part of it is like dragnet idolizing lawenforcement. But its for some patriarchal reasons in expressions like th that. Its not something that we can resurrect. Remember that was in all white controlled nation at the time. Thank you so much. I think what is so important in the conversation its the way that we use it to accurately conceptualize what we are experiencing right now so for me it is more of a pedagogical question because as a professor of history that is what is important about your story is that you come from an organizing activist background so how do we also develop a politic and transform society so the students eight team to 24 what are the ways we can develop this historical literacy given the conditions we are experiencing right now . My students are challenged in a different way and that they are at that first line of experiencing and the detrimental effects of coming from the working poor communities and just understanding that history in order for them to make them anticipate the next five to ten to 20 years. So this is more like the apex of the supremacy right now. In the last book from three years ago in indigenous history of the United States, surprisingly it really took off. It was for a general educated audience that all of my other books have been kind of scholarly books on memoirs. Its prettit pretty much is theg just this is only one part of it