The character of violence brought by the
Puritans was primarily fueled by their idea of religious and racial
superiority. This ignorant idea provided the foundation for justification of
war and violence toward the natives. The Puritans believe that it was their
responsibility in following with God’s will to expand their population and ideas
westward, even at the cost of destroying the “savages.”
For example, the “missionary spirit”
that was expressed by many Virginians (for example George Thorpe) had the aim
of teaching White ideas and practices to Natives through Indian schools and
colleges. This goal of expunging the Indian culture and replacing it with ideas
of the superior was to be accomplished on their terms (Venebles 81-82). The
Virginian settlers brought with them a vast array of European diseases, which
was tremendously detrimental to the native population, and they relied heavily
on the natural resources and help from the Natives for their survival, yet they
considered their tradeoffs to be “mutually beneficial” (Venebles 82).
I find the Colonist’s assumption toward
the Natives to be very much akin to Lewis Henry Morgan’s definition of social
progress. Human progress, according to Morgan, follows a set pattern of
evolution from savagery, through barbarism, and culminates in the ultimate goal
of civilization. He considers primitive peoples to be at the same level of
development as “a child in the scale of humanity” (Huhndorf 30). I believe this
missionary spirit is the largest hubristic fallacy in the settlers’ perception
of the Native Americans, and what ultimately led Opechancanough to fight
against the colonists.
After Opechancanough’s war, the majority
Colonists’ opinion toward the Natives developed a new justification: that
because they had not been the official instigator in the fight, they had just
cause to retaliate. Even John Smith agreed with the notion, furthering that
“[I]t is more easie to civilize them by conquest then faire meanes,” and
further justified it with the comparison to the progress of Rome (Venebles 84).
Most of the other wars in the America’s
began the same way, with a European power that is sure of the supremacy of
their race and ideas, who are willing to save their people at the cost of
destructing another. The Europeans, although they are not the original
inhabitants of the continent, believe they are entitled to it. This idea of
entitlement is still seen today in the ideas and opinions descendants of the
first European conquerors, who being born in the “New World” cannot see it as
belonging to anyone else.
Huhndorf,
Shari M. Going Native: Indians in the American Cultural Imagination.
Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2001.
Venebles,
Robert W. American Indian History. Vol. 1. Santa Fe: Clear Light, 2004.
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