The attitude of the Indian toward the land which the white men coveted was typical of his whole relation with white civilization. "Land ownership, in the sense in which we use the term, was unknown to the Indians till the whites came among them."[6] The land devoted to villages was tribal property; the hunting ground surrounding the village was open to all of the members of the tribe; between the hunting grounds of different tribes there was a neutral territory—no man's land—that was common to both. If a family cultivated a patch of land, the neighbors did not trespass. Among the Indians of the Southwest the village owned the agricultural land and "periodically its governor, elected by popular vote, would distribute or redistribute the arable acres among his constituents who were able to care for them."[7] The Indians believed that the land, like the sunlight, was a gift of the Great Spirit to his children, and they were as willing to part with the one as with the other.
They carried their communal ideas still farther. Among the Indians of the Northwest, a man's possessions went at his death to the whole tribe and were distributed among the tribal members. Among the Alaskan Indians, no man, during his life, could possess more than he needed while his neighbor lacked. Food was always regarded as common property. "The rule being to let him who was hungry eat, wherever he found that which would stay the cravings of his stomach."[8] The motto of the Indian was "To each according to his need."
Such a communist attitude toward property, coupled with a belief that the land—the gift of the Great Spirit—was a trust committed to the tribe, proved a source of constant irritation to the white colonists who needed additional territory. As the colonies grew, it became more and more imperative to increase the land area open for settlement, and to such encroachments the Indian offered a stubborn resistance.
The Indian would not—could not—part with his land, neither would he work, as a slave or a wage-servant. Before such degradation he preferred death. Other peoples—the negroes; the inhabitants of Mexico, Peru and the West Indies; the Hindus and the Chinese—made slaves or servants. The Indian for generations held out stolidly against the efforts of missionaries, farmers and manufacturers alike to convert him into a worker.
The Indian could not understand the ideas of "purchase," "sale" and "cash payment" that constitute essential features of the white man's economy. To him strength of limb, courage, endurance, sobriety and personal dignity and reserve were infinitely superior to any of the commercial virtues which the white men possessed.
This attitude of the Indian toward European standards of civilization; his indifference to material possessions; his unwillingness to part with the land; and his refusal to work, made it impossible to "assimilate" him, as other peoples were assimilated, into colonial society. The individual Indian would not demean himself by becoming a cog in the white man's machine. He preferred to live and die in the open air of his native hills and plains.
The Indian was an intense individualist—trained in a school of experience where initiative and personal qualities were the tests of survival. He placed the soles of his moccasined feet firmly against his native earth, cast his eyes around him and above him and melted harmoniously into his native landscape.
Missionaries and teachers labored in vain—once an Indian, always an Indian. The white settlers pushed on across mountain ranges and through valleys. Generations came and went without any marked progress in bringing the white men and the red men together. When the Indian, in the mission or in the government school did become "civilized," he gave over his old life altogether and accepted the white man's codes and standards. The two methods of life were too far apart to make amalgamation possible.
3. Getting the Land
The white man must have land! Population was growing. The territory along the frontier seemed rich and alluring.