Transcripts For CSPAN2 American 20240704

Sitting alone in my apartment gesticulating on my laptop, its really wonderful too i guess be able to articulate a person to you guys today. So just wanted to give a big thank you to the organization of american historians for putting together this conference and for accommodating all of the different varieties in which people chose to participate, even though i know that came at some great logistical challenges. I also want to thank rachel and bart who unfortunately cant be here today but who was really the one responsible for bringing us all together today. She originally conceived as a roundtable as one thatd would be focused on the civil war in the west but ultimately last year around february decided to focus it on 1862. This is the year when the Republican Party succeeded in passing some of its original campaign promises, abolishing slavery in the district of columbia, the western territories as well as passing the homestead act. It achieved legislative victories that would help the union win the war like the direct tax act of 1862 establishing the First Federal income tax. This was in the year when the fighting and the civil war took a particularly delighted turn with the battlesatan of shiloh d antietam among other strip when it seemedin increasingly likely that france or england might recognized the confederacy and when the congress and later lincoln recognized what many africanamericans free and enslaved had known all along, that this was a war over slavery not just over union. And, of course, the war in the west is even more complicated and im sure will be the subject of much will be discussing in todays roundtable. All of these decisions, events have shaped the world that we live in today here and so it seemed particularly apt 160 years later to think about this a year together in this roundtable. As you might notice, our ranks are somewhat diminished. Unfortunately when wasserman had a family emergency and couldnt come to the conference at all. Regarding coleman unfortunately had his flight canceled, and if you wonder what airline it was, it was united and wasnt able to get here in time for this roundtable. They both asked me to say how disappointed they are to not be able to be with us today. So what were going to do is ask our, the two members of our roundtable to share some thoughts. I will introduce each of them before they speak and then we will open the floor up to a broader discussion. And i really hope that we will be able to do that as a conversation. So first up we have manu karuka who is an assistant professor of american studies and affiliated faculty with womens gender and sexuality studies at Barnard College where he has taught since 2014. His work centers critique ofqu imperialism with a particular focus on antiracism and indigenous decolonization pic he teaches courses on the political economy of racism, u. S. Imperialism and radical internationalism. Indigenous critiques of political economy and liberation peer he is the author of Empire Strikes him indigenous nations Chinese Workers and the Transcontinental Railroad which was published in 2019. I want to echo the thanks to the organizers of the Conference Agenda is a huge amount of work especially in these conditions, and t also to ray lynn. I feel kind of sheepish because it feels like from here the big 1862 doesnt feel so good. I hope we can have a discussion with everyone in the room thanks so much for making the time to join us. So when my remarks today i plan to focus on 1862 as a moment of escalation in the destructive power of the u. S. And the world linking the wartime expansion of both the u. S. Military power wih the development of u. S. Financial institutions. In the relationships between the war or military and financial power in the west socalled and in the caribbean and the links between these two spaces. In its wars in occupations against the seminals which up until that point where the most expensive wars that the us fought until the civil war and wars at the us was militaryly defeated and also against mexico the us war economy had tied together the production of arms in new england with the stabilization of slavery in texas in the deep south. By the early 1860s the war economy marked a confrontation between northern Merchant Capital which required a protected National Market for its further growth and southern agrarian capital which required International Exports to ensure its future. Merchant and insurance capital based in new york city and the Connecticut River valley began, the war paralyzed and divided undertaking a transition from cotton to a diversified portfolio of investments across ranching agriculture mining and industry. As you expected rapid us victory over the confederacy was thwarted by a series of battlefield catastrophes the legal tender act passed on february 25th, 1862 authorized 150 Million Dollars in us treasury notes the socalled greenbacks, which eventually increased the 450 million with an additional half billion dollars in war bonds. Raising funds to support military power over land and sea which would be necessary to defeat the confederacy. It provided a windfall for industrial and military contractors launching the careers of robber barons of the coming period in a further effort to raise war funds and in the face of bitter Political Polarization the revenue act which lincoln signed into law on july 1st, 1862 established both the First Federal income tax and the first tax on inherited wealth and the agency, which would eventually become the irs. These laws in turn set the stage for the series of National Bank acts past annually between 1863 and 1866 which formed a National Banking system giving the us federal government the ability to issue war bonds and authorizing the federal government to regulate and tax the commercial banking system. On april 19th 1861 lincoln had issued a proclamation of blockade against southern ports. The naval blockade was necessary to stop the flow of capital weapons and consumer goods into the confederacy. It was a coercive policy to break the alliance of new york merchants with southern planters, which was running goods by a nassau, bermuda and havana. The us navy began the civil war with 42 ships in active service by the end of 1862. This would increase to 384 ships and by the end of the war the us had the Worlds Largest navy. This navy provided the muscle for an expanded Monroe Doctrine in the decades following the war with active us interventions against caribbean and Central American nationalist movements in the service of ensuring us returns on investment. In cuba over the coming decades the us would leverage Political Economic and eventually military pressure to support an alliance of agrarian and finance capital that was based in north america. At the close of the 19th century the cuban revolution would seek to overturn this pressure. Two days after the passage of the legal tender act on february 27th, 1862 the us executed Nathaniel Gordon cyan of a respectable main family. Gordon was captain of the slave ship erie, which had been apprehended the previous august at the mouth of the congo river carrying a cargo of 897 african captives. This is the first and only time the us executed someone for participating in the slave trade. Six weeks later on april 7th 1862 the british and us concluded negotiations on the leones sewer treaty, which effectively ended us sanction for participation in the slave trade to cuba and brazil in duboiss analysis. This ended us participation legal us participation in the atlantics and the atlantic slave trade. 1862 also saw a transitions in us assertions of power over land. On july 1st 1862 the same day as the revenue act lincoln signed the Pacific Railway act into law the act chartered the Union Pacific railroad and provided land grants to the Union Pacific and the central Pacific Railroad, which is chartered in the state of california. In these corporate land grants the us congress violated treaties at its signed with indigenous nations along the path of the railroad the Railroad Companies use these land grants to raise capital to fund the construction and maintenance of the roads. And these Real Infrastructure that they built. You know raise capital through this finance it moved resources out and it moved troops in. And these real develops took place in a on a global stage the end of the year would see the completion of the first the end of 1862 would see the completion of the first rail line in algeria built by the french and the spread of the rail network and restaurant western india built by the british. On july 2nd the day after he signed the Pacific Railway act lincoln signed the moral act. Establishing the structure of the modern Us Public University through land grants. The moral act was another aspect of continental imperialism. By Opening University education to small Property Owners the act deep in the class collaboration that has shaped settler colonialism. In the analysis of gerald horn by organizing Higher Education around modern disciplines producing graduates and engineering Accounting Administration and management. The universitys produced by the act would train in educate the cadre of corporations and a rapidly modernizing and expanding state. The political economy of our own era of crisis continues to operate within the constraint set in place by land grants to corporations and universities over these two days in 1862. At the end of the year on december 26th the us executed 38 dakota prisoners in what remains the largest official mass execution in us history. In Historical Context of the railway act in the landgrant act the mass execution was another kind of assertion of landbased power. Involve the transition in relating to north america as a space of war to a space of policing a transition which remains unfinished in our own day. Read together. We see the prioritization of the rights of corporations over and against International Treaty obligations. The expansion of land and seabased military power was accomplished through the expansion of finance of finance capital. This in turn set the stage for subsequent developments such as territorialization vigilantism and the abrogation of treaty obligations that provided the context for the sand creek massacre on november 29th. 1864. In the subsequent period following the defeat of the confederacy and the demise of the southern plantocracy the war finance nexus fueled the condensation of us power between the, mississippi and california and in the caribbean. The definitive break in the alliance between northeastern Merchant Capital and southern slaveholding capital around shared investments in cotton led to the development of finance capital investing in industry. By the end of the 1880s us finance capital had in economic terms, nx cuba controlling the production of sugar and Mining Operations burning down old growth forests to establish massive sugar estates building rail and Road Networks to transport raw and finish materials and importing thousands of Seasonal Workers from haiti and jamaica. Have spoken about two executions in 1862 as windows into the transitions in place during that year. Im particularly interested in how the defeat of southern agrarian capital was accomplished not through a revolution in land relations, but instead through a new alliance between finance capital and agrarian capital particularly on the plains of north america and in the islands of the caribbean. I want to end by calling our attention to the saudi execution of 81 prisoners this past march 12th followed by the us shipment of a significant number of patriot missiles to saudi arabia on march 21st as reported in the wall street journal. While the saudis report that they are unable or unwilling to rapidly increase Oil Production to offset sanctioned russian oil for consumers in europe. This is taking place as we witness rapidly unfolding experiments between countries seeking to trade in currencies other than the us dollar. In these recent developments we can see we can also see assertions of power over c and land and attempts to stabilize the petrodollar to project a future for us power. The world remains caught in the grip of the war finance nexus thank you so much. Our next panelist is jimmy sweet. Who is an assistant professor of american studies at rutgers his current book project the mixed blood moment race law and mixed interest during dakota indians in the 19th century midwest analyzes the legal and racial complexities of American Indians of mixed indian and european ancestry with the focus on kinship Family History land dispossession and citizenship. Is dedicated to indigenous language revitalization and preservation and as research is driven by a need to understand the full effects of american colonialism on indigenous americans and how those consequences influence native people today doing so with the hope of contributing to the continued fight for indigenous sovereignty and the healing of indigenous communities, jimmy. Homidakeby chanteo said not the achieves up, you know, that was a formal dakota greeting. I said hello my relatives and thank you for coming to this my mic not working. That working out. All right. Okay. Ill start again. We have the time obviously weve a short few people. I said how many doc efe chante which they are not page use up, you know, and thats a formal dakota greeting and it means hello my relatives and i shake your hands in a goodhearted manner, you know handshaking is a really a big deal and dakota culture and when i was invited to this panel, i intended to talk about the us dakota war of 1862, which is much closer to my area of expertise, but tuna two of the panelists. Were already going to talk about that which unfortunately theyre neither of them are here today. But my thinking lately has been turning a bit more broadly from the from the us dakota war more broadly in scope and and in the time period to think more about native people in the west particularly during the civil war years. So 1862 and the civil war years is a particularly. Horrible moments for native americans. I would i would say its in this moment where the Us Government really goes all out and makes it you know the full policy to dispossess native people of their land and replace them with white settlers. This really wasnt something new the us and other colonial powers in north america have been carrying out genocide and and dispossession of native American People for hundreds of years. But the civil war acted as cover for american lawmakers to explicitly make native land dispossession of a policy of the federal government and so in 1862, weve heard about the the congressional acts of that period the homestead act the Pacific Railroad act the moral act even all of these were legislation that focused on a dispossession of native people and not you know, the dispossession of sovereign indigenous nations, not just individuals but sovereign indigenous nations, and these are sovereign nations at long predates the existence of the United States, but this was a policy intended to remove them from their homelands and replace them with white settlers. In the same years during the civil war. We also see the creation of a large number of territories, colorado, nevada and the dakota territorial governments were created in 1861, arizona and idaho in 1863 and then montana in 1864 a huge swath of the American West then was now, you know government presence and administration was now dramatically increased over this huge swath of native american territory in native american lands, which all these things coupled together this legislation the creation of these territories was really all about using the what was going on in the civil war has covered to dramatically overtake indigenous land. I mean that had always been kind of the practice unfortunately of you know, the American Government and other settler colonial nations and their southern colonial powers before then, but it really kind of ramped up at this moment. And and we also see the the ramp up in violence in this particular moment in 1862. So some of the ones some of these are better known like i mentioned the us dakota war of 1862, you know was was a major war that depopulated the state of minnesota and resulted in you know hundreds of settlers dead hundreds of native people dead and thousands of native people displace from their homes and eventually removed from their homeland in minnesota and one of our commenters who wasnt able to make it today professor gwen. Westerman is actually a descendant of one of the 38 men at least one of the 38 men executed on december 26th. 1862, and i wish she was here to really to give what i know was going to be kind of like a powerful talk about that. But thats one of the better known ones at least you know for historians are theres a decent historiography of that. Another one is the sand creek massacre in 1864 in colorado. Most people have heard of that, you know, and theres some some historical literature on that as well. But there are many many other moments of violence in this particular period in the civil war years particularly in california under what was whats known as the california genocide which was going on for a decade or two before the civil war and continued after but was a particularly bloody time during the civil war. So for example a lot of these are lesser known there, there was the the bear river massacre in idaho of where the us army massacred 280 shoshone men women and children. There was another massacre around the same period in california where settlers it wasnt even the military this time. It was local settlers rose up and murdered probably about 300 jana indians in california, and these are just a name a couple, you know of you know, the more extreme ones but so many of these massacres and these kind of violence was going on in the west during the civil war years and many of them are just completely unknown like particularly those in california just completely understudied you know, and theres people who are more expert on california than i but the native population of california was greatly reduced something Something Like 75 80 i believe not just in the 1860s but on a little bit broader broader timeline in the 19th century from i think Something Like 300,000 to like 30 to 50,000 or Something Like that and its through largely through this settler violence that was going on. But anyway back to the us dakota war in the aftermath of that general john pope, who was the commander of the new department of the northwest. I was created as a result of the war. He wrote to one of his subordinates henry sibley in september of 1862 writing about his thoughts about the dakota people. And he used the word sue. Quote he said quote it is my purpose utterly to exterminate the sioux. If the power to do so and even if it requires a campaign lasting the whole of next year, in fact, it took two years and so he goes on destroy everything belonging to them and forced them out onto the plains. There to be treated as maniacs or wild beasts and by no means as people. With whom treaties are compromises should be made made end quote. Of course, not every army officer, you know had the same views but many of them did like, you know, probably most notably colonel john chippington whos, you know, masterminded the sand creek massacre two years later. But this gets to the the thoughts of the military officers of the time and and some of the people in the lincoln administration. Another aspect of the civil war was that it completely devastated indian territory. Whats now, oklahoma . And this is where the Us Government had forcibly removed, you know thousands of people just to generation earlier and now the civil war, you know devastated their new homeland and so there there were you know thousands of of native people that end up serving on both sides both for the confederacy and on the american side. And that gets us to president lincoln is someone who scholars and the public often view as one of the greatest american president s. But the reality is he did little to nothing to curtail violence towards native people during his tenure. He did nothing to curtail the suffering of native people particularly in indian territory and places like that. Lincoln saw native people as a threat to white settler expansion he perceived the future of the us as one in which Indigenous People would be swept aside and white settlers would occupy their homelands and thats why farley white we have that legislation mentioned earlier the homestead act and so on. His political appointees in the Indian Service at that time called the office of an Indian Affairs now called the bureau of Indian Affairs. They were largely incompetent and they were corrupt that although that wasnt just something from his administration. This was quite common, you know and administrations before and after this is these were political appointees. These were people who worked as indian agents or worked directly, you know in dc washington dc with the office of Indian Affairs. They werent appointed because of their skills or their abilities to work with native people, you know or things like that or even really to carry out the federal policies of the government as it in a relationships or or the treaty responsibilities of the federal government. They were appointed purely for political reasons and so often they had no experience with native people whatsoever and they were there to graft to make money that was a huge problem in the Indian Service of the period is. These indian agents and other workers regularly stole money and and still supplies. It was meant to go to native people as treaty guaranteed supplies or annuity of nudia payments were sent to the indian agencies to be distributed to native people very often these you know, lincoln appointees were you know skimming off the top or sometimes skimming from the top all the way through to the bottom in some cases . Unfortunately, thats one of the causes of the us dakota war was you know, dakota people literally starving to death because a lot of the the local politicians and in the in the state of minnesota who were also often, you know worked for for the government as part of you know, the Indian Service like some of them had been fur traders like henry sibley who was later all the also an army officer. Um, you know, they embezzled pretty much all the money for dakota people and left them starving again, one of the causes of the us dakota war. So this is whats going on the lincoln administration. So lincoln and is a pointy is where most interested in concentrating native people on reservation lands and taking their land then for settler expansion. And if authorities or or militia groups felt it was necessary to commit genocidal violence to achieve that they did so and weve seen that of course with you know, sand creek bear river in various other others of these massacres. So often scholars right of lincoln as just being too busy during his administration with the civil war to do anything to to help native people or really to, you know carry out policies, that would be you know protective of native people in their lands and those kinds of things. But rather lincoln was the architect of his administration. He was the architect of the policies of his administration. He was the architect of the actions that his appointees and people carried out. But anyway, so i want to wrap up my comments just as a kind of historiographical question here of just to thinking about this this historical literature about this this period of native americans during the civil war and im looking forward to a good conversation, but i think theres really a kind of twofold issue with the historiography here one in its a matter of scale like we need some smallscale work and we need more largescale work is on the small scale. Theyre like i said, theres a decent literature on the us dakota war. Theres some work on the sand creek massacre yet another one of our members who couldnt make it today ari kelman has a beautiful book. Well beautiful and its like horrifying and its you know the trauma thats in there of the sand creek massacre and i wish he was here, but obviously they have other circumstances and just werent able to make it unfortunately. Now i lost my transplant. Where was that . Anyway, yeah, so theres some historical work on things like that like sand creek in the us dakota war but so many of these other moments of violence extreme violence. These massacres have gone understudied or in some cases completely not studied at all. Its like we might know the names of them and thats really about it. And so thats one issue is we really need a lot more work of people to dig into these to study these things these particular events that were going on in the civil war period but another issue is we also need more work that takes these events as a whole and give some broader interpretation and understanding of why and how these things happened and how they relate to the civil war and what was going on in that particular period and just before this talk i had lunch with a great scholar Jeffrey Ostler whos in the audience today. He just had his book a recent book come out surviving genocide which gives that broad overview but up until 1860 and were awaiting his second volume which unfortunately says we might be waiting a little while which kind of brings that into to a later date, but thats just one example of the important work being done, but there needs to be a lot more work of not only the small scale stuff of like really figuring out what happened, but then like the broad scale to get more into the meanings of this of you know, how these episodes relate to creation of the United States and coming out of the civil war and issues of reconstruction or the lack of reconstruction in many cases when it comes to Indigenous People in the west after the civil war. Thats it, and im looking forward to our discussion. Well, thank you both for such fascinating and talks that really is giving us a lot to think about. I am going to exercise chairs prerogative and ask the first question, but after that we will open up the floor to your audience questions. So just a quick reminder to go to the microphone in the middle of the room and you know, take the time now to kind of think about what questions you might want to ask. I know theres probably going to be a lot. So these just really fascinating talks. Give us a very make really make the case for why studying the west and looking more broadly at the civil wars so important whether its the caribbean or the north American West and im going to sort of follow up on jimmys points or ending about choreography because i think what both of these talks are showing us is getting us to think more expansibly about the civil war and reconstruction. Obviously, theres been a lot of debate among scholars about how exactly to do that at eliot west has proposed the framework of greater reconstruction to think about the west and the south together as a periods of as larger period of debates over federal control, cape miser and greg downs have suggested some limitations to that instead arguing for thinking about the United States as a whole during this time as a postwar. Nation, and im just curious to hear if you guys have any comments about how we might. Or to expand upon the comments that you already made about how we think about whats happening in the south and whats happening in the readers were the typical textbook . Depiction of the civil war in relation to everythin typical textbook depiction of the civil war in relation to everything else, and youve already talked about that bit. Jimmy talked about the civil war asg cover and you talk about the federal financial expense expounded by the civil war but im curious to hear you reflect more broadly about how we might think about the United States as a whole or whether we should at all. Thats a great question and one i would need to think about a little bit more. But just some comments is, you know, obviously whats going on in the west is very different than whats going on in eastern United States during the civil war. Thekn civil war, the civil war directly in, say, the eastern United States has started the vast majority of historical attention duringte this time, enter some great work particularly recently in the past couple of decades about the civil war in the west, like directly kind ofit like battles between the confederacy and the United States like in new mexico in places like or places like that. There some separate work thinking about i get like bring this up of some of these particular moments with native people. There is a growing historiography of the civil war as fought in the indian territory which saw numerous battlesos which i think its one of the most fought over pieces of ground action in the civil war wass actually the indian territory. Maybe not in terms of numbers of troops on the ground but in terms of just number firefights and things like that. And the aforementioned lunch i had, with jeffrey, and our discussion for this is, you know, we were kind of using that reconstruction really may not be the right word for what was going on in the west is nothing was really reconstructed other than beingng constructed or in many senses deconstructed, these native sovereign nations were being deconstructed and forced onto reservations. At the same time the United States was constructing and expanding their empire on top of these other nations. The one place that probably really needed reconstruction, the indian territory, was not. Lincoln had no real interest in helping the people who were suffering there. Were talking about tens of thousands of people who were refugees in Indian Country as a deviant territory as af result f the war, fled into kansas and things like that that he didnt care much about, and not much was really done after this period i think professor Michael Greene who was on the second half of this panel who is much more of an expert that i am kind of lincoln and his administration might have some more pertinents thoughts. That some of things and think about right now in terms of what that looked like. Ive been reallyee interested in turning back to learn from debates in the 30s among radicals about the interpretations of the civil war as a revolutionary period and debates about the nature of that revolution, what exactly what kind of revolution of course, strikingly we all know about the boys analysis of reconstruction is most revolutionary moment genuinely revolutionary moment that was proletarian revolution that was forceden by the general strike of the enslaved. There were other analyses at the time this is a time in the 30s of course in the depression or its just systemic crisis, social and political crisis all kinds of experiments and working Class Organization and out of these kind come out of that momentt people are reinterpreting reconstruction to not as a proletarian revolution but as a bourgeois revolution, a revolution that opens up within a battle listed between different factions, fractions of the american capitalist class. I think maybe that sounds i dont know maybe that sounds overly abstract but it speaks to the political demands of our moment in some ways, it really interesting ways with the antievictionov movements, movements, experiment and mutual aid in food distribution. And also with the lessons we are learning more broadly hopefully in indigenous histories and understand through indigenous history. One question for me really central question is the question of land and landed property, fr if we go with the latter interpretation of the civil war as a bourgeois revolution, it was revolution lets say between what becomes industrial finance capitalit and southern agrarian capital. No, seems like theres a landed antia great complement to the. There are similarar kinds of revenue share prices in other parts of the world, in developing nations, countries that are developing capitalism. In cuba itself in the coming decades there would be periods ofe time where a nascent industrial capitalist class within cuba which tried to assert its own interest and transform policy. Basically for protection so that there could be more domestic production, and was forwarded at the return by u. S. Economic individually political and military power. Of course in reconstruction across north america we see different, theres a very different set of patterns at play where there is a kind of strengthening. Theres never really a question of agrarian i reform except in e pockets of the south that would learn from the boys right across this expanded United States is that really on the table. Its the opposite, the expansion of this industrial capital, expansion of finance capital is achieved through the expansion of private property claims on land, the x appropriation come illegal x appropriation of Indigenous Lands so i will leave itou at that. Thank you, guys so much for responding to that. I think the issue of land is really key for us to be thinking about, ingenuity, i love that idea of deconstruction. Maybe we need to have a deconstruction, a book about deconstruction to go alongside the masterpiece reconstruction. We will not open the floor to questions of the audience. If you have a question, please go to the middle aisle and ask away. Ill be brave. Thank you. After our sort of critique of lincoln and various heroes, it pushes a lot of buttons that need to be published, so thank you for your comments. Im wondering about the comet or the observations that civil war was a cover for this seems to be that sort of implies a certain, although, now we can do it, no paying attention, that i just want more motivation. I want more evidence of that as opposed to just coincide with the civil war. And also we see if there was no civil war, kind of a counterfactual, that there would still be these policies might still will be taken. The role of the civil war in these policies pure here as a graduate of a landgrant university, uc berkeley, you know, im part of this land confiscation and training of engineers and reorienting financial capital, and thats all true, important observations. But it seems to me there are other things that occurred with just the moral act, for example, the landgrant or how do we balance the critique of this holocaust of native americans and thegs other things that did arise from this progress, this development . Thank you. I think youre right that my comett was probably too strong o worker some of the evidence we do have though is, for instance, of making nevada state in 1864 when it didnt come wasnt n there like the threshold that was usually necessary, i think the number was 60,000 or something, resident and usually not counting native people in doubt here i think you only have they rushedand so through making that estate because theyy could come because there was a civil war and they didnt have softeners or something to tell them you cant vote for that or maybe thats one piece of evidence that would get to what youre saying. If we dug deep we could probably find more. I think youre probably right its probably a little bit of a strong motivator. To get to your second point though, thinking about the moral act and with the creation of landgrant institutions and, of course, we end up in it we tend to look at that. This is a really important point because it does create these Public Institutions that do a lot of good in terms of education of the populace, and a lot of people who never wouldve had since that at about 150, 170 years would wouldve nevee ability to get that kind of education and particularly interested in agriculture education in the early years that we can look at that and say why would we say negative to that . But so often submit other things will look at as these common goods did have extreme consequences for other people. There was the recent article by high country times is that right . High country news, sorry, they came out a couple years ago about the moral act and these schools and way that they dispossessed of native people. I teach at rutgers which is also the Public University of new jersey so im kind of in the same boat there as there is that legacy that this university has. Its a little bit indirect in that case as compared to say school out west just because new jersey didnt have any public land so they basically used land script that they sold so they didnt have like direct access to federaler lands. Thats just like the legacy of so many of things in the United States, ends of the neck spent about 1776 and semimanaged to get roped into that panel as well, im going to be making some comments there about, like the declaration of independence and the constitution which again will look at these really informative Important Documents that neither of those had native people in mind and resulted in an conceivable, inconceivable suffering for Indigenous People. The same thing with a moral act, it is good but also have to recognize what it did intransitive dispossession of native people and with dispossession then comes a host of other thingse quite often lie starvation and loss of ceremonial sites and sacred sites and things like that. I guess what im trying to say is kind of like your first comment of like we need to kind of critique a little bit some of these things that wet uphold in American Culture as beingt realy important and it n doesnt meane should see them as important anymore but rather we have to understand as theny impact peope in many different ways in many negative ways, and those are things need to be explored and addressed, and possibly redressed for people to date and what that might mean in terms of land back for Indigenous People. Ill use that opportunity to give tworo plugs for first the High Country News article that robert lee wrote a couple years ago. Its really, really good about the moral act of landgrant colleges at their effects on Indigenous People. I will also make it part if anyone wants to make their way to the center aisle for Alaina Roberts recent book, leaving her all the while that is a really good job of looking at the land redistribution that did happen in indian i territory among, and ways in which that benefited free to people and africanamericans and the sort of complicated story that happened in indian territories. For those interested in that very complicated story, both of those are really great places to look, if you havent already. Wars cover, i think. For me, i understand not necessarily cover, but the civil war is context and in two like really concrete ways. You know, i talked about the expansion of the navy, but think about the expansion of the army just the number of divisions the number of officers soldiers not but you know offic the officers, they want to keep their careers many of them and was a huge breaking tool and then there were the investments, all of these small investors that have money, they have direct interest in getting a returnrn and investing in the growth of the military so it is the context. I can imagine all kinds of scenarios but it happened in this way and its interesting to read accounts of the soldiers themselves who were sent into foreign territory, territory of other nation who were bitter about being sent to these places under difficult and scary conditions. We send a to fight the confederacy and say why here being sent a text, thats not what we are here for. There contradictions inn this record and in terms of universities, there are controversies there. Im not a stream of education but i think would be interesting to lookdu at german Higher Education which is modernizing and it looks very different than in the United States. There might be lessons understanding the development of universities. A fascinating comparison. Our next question. Thanks for these remarks here. I want to think about 1862 as the beginning of the decade in which the United States radically transform understanding and jurisdiction both in the south and west and all the things you talked about, the enforcement act and asserting federal authority over critical matters understood to be nation to nation or state based or local and National Citizenship as the aspirational form where thinking of coming out of africanamerican and of other communities as a treaty apparatus but the place where two reduce becomes clear, by the end it becomes clear that the forms of capital that while aspirations for their own were afforded in the relegated into arms of contract wage labor. In the f west they simply reduce thee claims and the allotment which in a way the carbonate of what their commanding is the tool of conquest so its a funny contradictory attention in the conversation about land so above to your thoughts about that. I would love to talk more t about that. I think those are great connections. This may be random but hearing you talk drives my mind to the blues. This is the era of sin the reconstruction and development of sharecropping we often associate this with the beginnings and two eclipses radical personnel will, i wonder the patterns you tracking out, what cultural shifts are taking place we can track and stay with us. I appreciate what you just laid out. Speaking of thehe contradictions, some things have a good step but then devastation for others. There are otheron moments your mention of citizenship and my own Research Writing about citizenship in minnesota territory and in minnesota where it was so contradictory where it became partisan but democrats were using people who acquired citizenship to use them for political purpose so for instancega when it was creating thetu legislature and the first thing they did was the native ancestry but they didnt franchise them. There were a number who served in the legislature and there were so many married to native women who were all democrats because of their connection to native people and there are fascinating debates within the Constitutional Convention about these issues of who to enfranchise and things like that but it iss obvious the democrats were only interested in franchising these because they knew they were on their side and would vote for them and if they were, they want or to have any interest in franchising these folks so you can see how something that works good was intended to only for political purposes and another connection from every state legislature had at least some native members. The u. S. Dakota happened h and e local populace turns against native people so theres notmi another person who serves in the legislature until the 1930s. Its like no, were not going to native people and ideas of citizenship is fascinated because there were debates racially, these are folks native ancestry, we should justth consider them white so these weirdd moments but it was shortlived. There were only interested inho citizenship perceived as civilized so that was in the legislation. They created civilized is a legalik category and relate what does that mean . It was meantat to mean assimilad into American Culture and they just play theth part and its le sure, you can vote. You can see where citizenship close Different Things in different people and it could be used in different circumstances so going the other way with hreconstruction, guaranteeing citizenship, the supremeem court made the decision the 14th a amendment does not apply to the americans. The citizenship of native people in limbo and working until the citizenship act. There were allotments or a father who was a citizenship but the idea was we were to hold people and say they can also be a member of the sovereign nation so its contradictory weree before any case where indigenous sovereignty and the expansion they would fight and this would be trouble sovereignty works in favor to uphold that but at the contradictory nature of all of these things and you might get lucky if youre a native person and often it works in the other way. Take you so much. Thank you, i really learned a lot and enjoyed your presentation. When we think about writing and words and weve seen the last few years words like freedom seekers are shipped the way we think about things and i get stuck on the word massacre because it implies innocent and killed for no reason. It is a threat to the United States and we dont think of the question from that angle so if you have other ways to think about what which every time i write it, im not satisfied but if we are going to rewrite the narrative and we want to travel to k12 will beyond, what are some words we are rethinking and what other words could we be using . Massacre doesnt feel like the right term for the reasons you brought up. I think there is another way of looking at this, this is a massacre, the u. S. Fights what and there is ample evidence in the history, the u. S. Attacks civilian homes and their food sources so anna strategy is a good word only thing that perspective it is a big investigation and this is part of a purposeful putter. Another conversation, im not going to go into that but i understand, i could see it does leave this, it doesnt always fit but i think the reason why its so important it was a counter to the term ended a wound in the battle and its like no, its not a battle between two opposing military forces who met on a battlefield, this is a massacre in the sense that the u. S. Army is like their policy, they are attacking coaches and people with majority noncombatant onn purpose to kill them, drive them way and destroy the food supply knowing that results in starvation and death usefulul to combat the idea of battles but youre right, there probably is a better term. I dont have one yet but we always strive with this terminology and is more examination. Thank you, this is really thoughtprovoking. There is a way to think about what happened to mexico city as an example, it is targeting and you are talking about capitalism and i feel one of the themes has been be thinking 1860s of diffef powers and i heard about it in terms of federalization immigration policy and thinking about that in relation to colonialism but theres somethingth about what you are talking about with capitalism and capitalist actors that helps us understand colonialism and federalization but also more broadly about this broader project so i wonder if you could talk about this moment and we see that comeser afterwards, i think theres something particular about this moment and how we think about colonialism and the way in which it changes over time. Thanks, i appreciate that question. I agree if you look at the development of capitalism overtime, it can help us understand some of the motive forces into the this is set in the civil war era is huge extension of military power accompanied by extension of not just financial power but Capital Investment in the institution, Securities Market and this srequires new ways of thinking. People with money have to make these decisions in the Financial Literacy of that time. People how to develop the and these are some of the most wealthy empower people and it tied to the universities and requires new techniques of keeping statistics and keeping accounts, measuring probabilities so investments and institutions to meet explains a lot. One thing to me that is interesting, both of their analyses during the First World War, they had a sense in this. Explaining why the First World War broke out in a much more familiar with the earlier essay he wrote student, a Financial Plan so to me itst suggests retn on investment and a transformation underway. What is interesting is you look at u. S. History and the history of the United States imposing itself over north america expanding into the caribbean. The last quarter of the 19th century we see patterns much earlier they were assessing them and in some ways they anticipate patterns taking place. The rail network written in north america is built in the historical. Prior to this that took place during the construction of railroads so one thing interesting to me is u. S. History in many ways it anticipates we think is imperialism taking place elsewhere. The history and historical changes in colonialism overtimef africa, it looks to north america as a model for the British Empire could capture control over the african continent and ideas of roads were still being worked out in rhodesian regime. Arguably they are still being worked out, the people who made the wealth. Those are some of the ways and dimensionless in this war in friday is still and that is how it is. This particular moment was about the modification of state of land and that was going on to the homestead act and to make native land a commodity that is a product and so many treaties between the federal government and indigenous nations were a majority coerced in some way and forcing them the two except payments are goods or services are getting their plans for federal government so that was part of the project to modify land in the most part didnt they had resources land all over the world. The midwestmi and northern great plainsth, those are based on oobligation so the more was through marriage or ceremony and they had obligations to help you out and its a different Economic System but thats what this relationshipio was between the United States and trying to modify native land and expand onto those. A little more than ten minutes left so for those with remaining questions come up and share the questions in the last few minuteset or so to let panelists reflect. Im curious one thing in the emancipation proclamation which i dont think we have gone over yet. Id love to hear about this act and these, what role this place and how we link these stories . Any other questions . In the current environment we see addressing controversial history on a national statewide history, someone like myself who is a s professional background anyone cares to comment on how to address these . The conversation we were having earlier, incredibly fascinating. I love to be able to expand on both sides and i think that would be great to hear about. A threat to whites, settlerso i was wondering what we think about is a threat to union. This is 7000 even though it requires quite a lot of material to what extent do you think there needs to be a distinction between the u. S. Despite integers fight against alternative american sovereignty that it represents . These events going on in the west, we still have so much to learn about, does it have any direct way this played out . A lot of interesting questions. I can weekly jump in. The emancipation proclamation quickly says, i think it is interesting. There are more rights and this is traced to the 14 the moment so he comes back and wait and it is this question of land. Slavery itself in terms of property was a form of real estate and you are making slavery illegal but keeping real estate and the relation and i think it plays out. Its his case was about taxation of the Railroad Company so it is a question of what they are liable for so it is this underlying question and it is the radical premise in the south, freed people. The question of how to addressn this is profound. Someone who doesnt have experiencepe teaching in public education, i only have public speaking so i can only guess but the question about the language, what is the purpose of studying these histories . I was had senior colleague who taught medieval history observed by teaching the u. S. Survey and create shared common identity which i think i was doing, just off the shirt, ico think would have preferred me to be so there are questions for us, these are questions of language and ill stop there. A lot of questions to answer their. We need to understand but i think more broadly, we need a lot more work on the intersection of africanamerican and native American History and the recent book in this history so theres a lot of work to be done making those connections between these communities and i think we would learn a lot if we had more of that study. Last year i worked with this commission and we had a number ofes questions for a lot of educators who showed up and how we teach this . Me are not trained in that and i felt horrible because i didnt know how to answer that and i feel we should probably i choose at least add to that and i dont have those skills and i think thats the case for too many and we dont know how to talk to a younger audience. Th the questiones about both sides, they were lots of them who joined in dozens of men who joined in and the cherokee. It happens in other places go to. The joint regimen to volunteer they all join to finnegans confederacy and they fight against their own people and there is a lot more work to be done but you might say that indian territory there they are nfighting. A threat to the union army, they had to create a new dependent and troops and things like that and the governor of minnesota had a a quota in the east. I dont know exactly how to answer but it worked and it doesnt need to be a threat, it didnt have to expand on their territory but it is an important question but the overall, troops were being sent all over the place. Maybe some places they shouldnt have been sent but that is in it important question. East and thatthe is another important question that i dont have an answer to. There were certainly native questions in the war. The confederates were captured and w agreed to be from union settlers so an interesting convention but i dont have an answer to the the something to think about. Thank you for fascinating call it and if you are participating in this fascinating discussion, i dont think weve answered all the questions but within a lot of progress and if youd like to stay with us to talk about this more, stay around for the next part of this roundtable. [applause] if you are enjoying, and for the newsletter using the qr code on the screen and receive a week schedule of Upcoming Program like lectures in history, presidency and more incentive for American History newsletter today and want to make history every saturday or anytime online cspan. Org history. It looks like this where you see democracy at work. Get informed straight from the source. The opinion matters the most. This is what democracy looks like. Have to represent the