Posted on 07/13/2007 9:11:02 AM PDT by kawaii
Haven’t read this yet, but my revisionist history antennae are twitching. Searching for a large grain of salt ...
This was part of the NYS grade school civics curriculum by 1983 at the latest.
I highly doubt that the founding fathers were wowed by the algonquin round table
Well, I’d first like to read the Great Law of Peace, to see what’s in it.
How does it really matter?
Since they left europe to form a new country based on these ideas before even meeting this indian tribe, I’d say his argument is wrong.
Also since the tribe was run by a chief in a structured way and not a democratic approach, I’d say he is wrong.
i think if it’s a made up fairy tale and the schools teach it as fact it matters a lot.
would you like your children to be taught that aliens made the pyramids?
Anoter PC phantasm
The Iriquois, wyandot, huron and pequat were hardly inspirational.
How would anyone know what really influenced the writers?
Chingagook might disagree!
It’s an old thesis, and the answer is no.
"This isn't very current but I'd heard this claim in another venue and I'm trying to figure out how many state schools teach this, and what facts are accurate."
Read the excellent recent biography of John Adams by David McCullough and you will find that John Adams himself was the Founding Father contributing much of the original concepts. Adams was classically educated and his concepts came from enlightened thinkers in Europe, particularly England and France.
The Iroquois were an especially gifted and organized people, but the notion that American concepts of freedom came from them is hogwash and nothing more than leftist and revisionist gobbledygook.
The one thing we should be able to agree upon was that our founding fathers put together a remarkable set of ideas which was opposed by the elitists and divine rightists then just as it is now, albeit under the color of different wording of their shallow arguments.
It is also worth noting that the Iroquois Confederation was the result of hundreds of years of internecine warfare long before the Europeans arrived. Such warfare has been repeated almost everywhere on the planet as the economic base moved from the hunter/gatherer phase to the herdsman/farmer phase. The Cherokee (included in my family heritage), generally considered to be the most civilized of tribes are so considered because they were one of the first to develop a written language. Guess where they got that idea?
I have to agree with you.
33 Questions About American History You're Not Supposed to Ask, by Tom Woods.
Highly recommended.
their numerous writings outside the constitution rife with quotes from enlightment philosophers, and allusions to freemasonry perhaps?
I thought they got the inspiration from Pogo.
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