Had the Mississippi Valley been in Europe, Asia or Northern Africa, it would doubtless have been blood-soaked for centuries and dominated by highly organized nations, armed to the teeth. Lying isolated, it presented an almost virgin opportunity to the conquering Teutons of Western Europe.
Freed by their isolated position from the necessity of contending against outside aggression, the inhabitants of the United States have expended their combative energies against the weaker peoples with whom they came into immediate contact,—
1. The Indians, from whom they took the land and wrested the right to exploit the resources of the continent;
2. The African Negroes who were captured and brought to America to labor as slaves;
3. The Mexicans, from whom they took additional slave territory at a time when the institution of slavery was in grave danger, and
4. The Spanish Empire from which they took foreign investment opportunities at a time when the business interests of the country first felt the pressure of surplus wealth.
Each of these four groups was weak. No one of them could present even the beginnings of an effectual resistance to the onslaught of the conquerors. Each in turn was forced to bow the knee before overwhelming odds.
2. The First Obstacle to Conquest
The first obstacle to the spread of English civilization across the continent of North America was the American Indian. He was in possession of the country; he had a culture of his own; he held the white man's civilization in contempt and refused to accept it. He had but one desire,—to be let alone.
The continent was a "wilderness" to the whites. To the Indians it was a home. Their villages were scattered from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from the Gulf to Alaska; they knew well its mountains, plains and rivers. A primitive people, supporting themselves largely by hunting, fishing, simple agriculture and such elemental manual arts as pottery and weaving, they found the vast stretches of North America none too large to provide them with the means of satisfying their wants.
The ideas of the Indian differed fundamentally from those of the white man. Holding to the Eastern conception which makes the spiritual life paramount, he reduced his material existence to the simplest possible terms. He had no desire for possessions, which he regarded—at the best—as "only means to the end of his ultimate perfection."[5] To him, the white man's desire for wealth was incomprehensible and the white man's sedentary life was contemptible. He must be free at all times to commune with nature in the valleys, and at sunrise and sunset to ascend the mountain peak and salute the Great Spirit.
The individual Indian—having no desire for wealth—could not be bribed or bought for gold as could the European. The leaders, democratically selected, and held by the most enduring ties of loyalty to their tribal oaths, were above the mercenary standards of European commerce and statesmanship. Friendly, hospitable, courteous, generous, hostile, bitter, ferocious they were—but they were not for sale.