Posted on 03/13/2013 11:16:09 AM PDT by Alex Murphy
A 15th century Catholic decree permitting Europeans to seize Indian land in the New World is a load of papal bull.
That was the message Tuesday from the Onondaga Nation, which is calling on the new Pope to revoke the so-called Discovery Doctrine, which evolved from a papal decree written by Pope Nicholas V in 1455.
“Now is the time for the new leader of the Roman Catholic Church to extend a hand and talk about these issues,” said Tonya Frichner, the president of the American Indian Law Alliance.
The Discovery Doctrine was a key element in the moral justification of the European conquest of indigenous people around the world and remains influential in legal circles.
In the U.S., it is often cited as a way of arguing that the nomadic Native Americans occupied the land but did not own it.
“The doctrine of discovery put us in the same place as the buffaloes and rabbits, roaming the land,” said Oren Lyons, a faith keeper of the Turtle Clan in the Onondaga nation. “We didn't have right of title to land, but rather occupancy.”
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg cited the doctrine in a 2005 ruling against the Oneida Indian Nation. The ruling affirmed the government’s sovereignty over lands, even if they’re sold to an Indian tribe.
If the church were to dissavow the decree, Lyons said it would remove a legal argument against tribal land claims.
Frichner said Onondaga elders first pushed the church to revoke the doctrine in 1992. Pope John Paul II was open to discussions about the the doctrine, she said, but Pope Benedict shut them down.
Talks “were reduced to, ‘Well, this is old history,’” Frichner said.
The Discovery Doctrine is expected to be a hot topic Wednesday as the entire Iroquois Confederacy rallies at the National Museum of the American Indian in lower Manhattan to commemorate a 400-year-old treaty with the Dutch.
The protest against the Discovery Doctrine won’t fade once the white smoke dissipates from the Sistine Chapel chimney. In August, Native Americans will embark on a 13-day canoe trip from Albany to New York City to symbolize the common ground they share with European settlers — a relationship that could be improved with the renunciation of the heinous papal declaration.
“There are over 500 million indigenous people throughout the world — they'd like a response from the Holy See,” Frichner said.
A 15th century Catholic decree permitting Europeans to seize Indian land in the New World is a load of papal bull. That was the message Tuesday from the Onondaga Nation, which is calling on the new Pope to revoke the so-called Discovery Doctrine, which evolved from a papal decree written by Pope Nicholas V in 1455....The Discovery Doctrine was a key element in the moral justification of the European conquest of indigenous people around the world and remains influential in legal circles. In the U.S., it is often cited as a way of arguing that the nomadic Native Americans occupied the land but did not own it....
....Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg cited the doctrine in a 2005 ruling against the Oneida Indian Nation. The ruling affirmed the government’s sovereignty over lands, even if they’re sold to an Indian tribe.
How could it have been written in 1455 when Columbus didn’t find the New World until 1492 ???
papal decree written by Pope Nicholas V in 1455
I thought Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492?
Public school huh? Other lands were being discovered and explored before the Americas.
Indian givers (and takers).
I have legal papers that say I own/have title to land and other property. Now someone I don't know and who has not "paid" for what I own tells me I don't really own it, but only "occupy" it? Houston we have a problem. God has a prior claim, but other men do not.
Alex Murphy:
I wonder if all the Liberals are correct, Mexicans are not illegals as Texas, California are legaly theirs, what say you Mr. Murphy?
“Evolved from”
2013-1455 = 558 years
Perhaps its time to move on, ya think?
Whatever issue there may be with European moral justification for taking native American real estate, it is worth noting that the native Americans themselves required absolutely no such justification when taking it from each other. Lot’s of weaker peoples succumbed to the Aztecs murderous rule, long before Columbus was born.
Pizarro and Cortes only managed to overthrow the Inca and Aztecs because they had armies of oppressed vassal states eager to overthrow their masters.
All that gets ignored by the apologists. I mean, who WOULDN’T accept suzerainty of a far-away ruler if it meant the end of human sacrifice and of a far-closer tyrant?
It was written to support the Portuguese in Africa. The later papal bull by Pope Alexander VI in 1493 split the new world between the Spanish and the Portuguese.
How ‘bout we just agree to not name the Vatican hockey team “Fighting Sioux”?
Skraelings, talk to the Vikings!
“I wonder if all the Liberals are correct, Mexicans are not illegals as Texas, California are legaly theirs, what say you Mr. Murphy?”
Alex is like Fox. He reports, you decide. LOL
We had boomsticks. No decrees needed.
Indeed, some have calculated the native army fighting with Cortez to have numbered 40,000.
Did Nicholas V say anything about Casino compacts with States or tax-free cigarette and alcohol sales?
I guess the Onandagans don’t have much to do.
Maybe they can get the French to Renege on the Louissianna Purchase.
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