There has been a notable absence of a certain topic on the United States Pirate Party website. Something that has been so relevant and so important to the day-to-day for anyone considering themselves “politically involved” that it almost becomes indefensible that nothing has been properly stated on the issue.

Today is a course correction.

There will not be only one topic being tackled today, and by the end of it, dear reader, it’s hoped you understand why this took so long.

Before we can begin, you must keep this question in the back of your mind: “Is this really self-determination?”

In the interest of familiarity, we will first start at a time everyone is familiar with: the American Revolution.

We know the history; Stamp Act, Boston Massacre, tea in the harbor, Shot Heard ‘Round the World, Lexington and Concord, Crossing the Delaware, Yorktown, independence and freedom from Great Britain and the monarchy. Kids are taught this stuff from a young age, and this is how the story of the U.S.A’s founding typically goes.

Less mentioned, if mentioned at all, is the “French-Indian War”, which was actually the North American theatre of the Seven Years War, the first truly world war.

That is where we truly need to begin this story.

The French-Indian War is named as such because the British Army, their colonial settlers, and their American Indian allies fought a war against the French Army, their colonial settlers, and their American Indian allies over the Ohio River Valley; modern day Pittsburgh and the Ohio River.

All that you know to be quintessential Americana was the subject of two European Empires and their colonial settlers attempting to claim land for themselves and their home empires.

The war began when tensions over who controlled the Ohio River Valley boiled over into conflict after a young George Washington (yes, really) and his regiment ambushed, attacked and killed Joseph Coulon de Jumonville, a French officer reportedly sent to warn Washington of their encroachment on French land and was said to be merely on a diplomatic mission.

Again: settlers on this land claiming it to be theirs. French settlers, numbering ~40,000 in 1750, and British settlers, ~1 million, claiming land that they only knew existed with certainty as early as 1503 (when Amerigo Vespucci confirmed it was not Asia they discovered a route to but the New World entirely) for countries that have only had permanent presence on the Américan continent since 1604 (France, Port-Royal) and 1607 (Great Britain, Jamestown).

While the French-Indian War ended in British victory and total control over what was previously French North America (essentially, the Saint Lawrence River, the Great Lakes and Mississippi River and the land around it), it was not the central war to the question of self-determination.

It was the war following the conclusion of the French-Indian War, and the war that would lead to further colonist anger towards Great Britain: Pontiac’s War.

In the middle of all of this, one tends to forget that the European Empires were playing local American Indian populations against one another and signing treaties for protection and monetary gain. Many settlers came to spread Christianity and convert the Natives from their Indigenous beliefs.

Have they been granted the right to self-determination? Is this really self-determination?

Once the more consolatory French were defeated and forced to leave, and once British General Jeffrey Amherst began imposing policies threatening the local population, it was Odawa Chief Pontiac (Obwaandi’eyaag) who realized their way of life in the Great Lakes was in danger.

May 1763, Native Americans attacked multiple forts and drove many British settlers out of the region. Due to this conflict, and out of fear that it could be a perpetual state of conflict between settlers and natives, George III of Great Britain proclaimed there shall be no new settlements west of the Appalachian Mountains in October 1763, and that west of the Appalachians would be designated as Indian Territory.

Remember: that is the land the settlers fought a war over specifically to control.

This, as well as anger imposed over taxes installed to pay off debts of the Seven Years War, would set off a chain reaction that would lead to the colonists declaring independence from Great Britain and seeking their own idea of “self-determination”.

During the Treaty of Paris (1783), which marked the end of the American Revolution (on paper), Great Britain, who had previously treated Native Americans with enough dignity to at least sign and honor treaties, gave away land that wasn’t theirs to give, without any Native American delegation present during negotiations.

After that, the story often falls under the growth of the country, the admission of states and keeping balance in the Union until it fell apart briefly, bloodily. Rarely, if ever, is the story of the American Indian spoken of when talking about the growth of the United States.

Perhaps it is too uncomfortable to think about, but in their pursuit of westward expansion, these descendants of settlers, who twenty years prior called themselves “British”, claimed it was their God-ordained right to claim all the land from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Manifest Destiny, if you will.

While claiming “All men are created equal”, this country systematically had settlers drive the native population from their homes while many of the settlers also held African Americans in chattel slavery and considered them “property” and “3/5ths a person” for census keeping.

Is this really self-determination?

To restate a point from a previous Spyglass article:

“The United States Pirate Party, as part of our platform, advocates for self-determination. As outlined in our platform: “We advocate for the right to free association and self-determination. People living in a political entity should have the right to maintain, alter or conclude their relationship to larger entities, or join in union, if it is the will of the people.”

When Indigenous Americans cannot trust a treaty signed and continuously is driven from their land, is this really self-determination? When Black Americans are still in chains and treated like livestock instead of your fellow man, is this really self-determination?

To say the United States Revolution was a fight for self-determination and freedom becomes tainted when you zoom out and ask: “for who?”

Because if your version of “self-determination” doesn’t include everyone and is only “self-determination” for the in-group, is this really self-determination?

No. In execution, it looked more like genocide and apartheid. Even our own apartheid was simply called “Segregation” after chattel slavery’s “end”. Even the genocide of American Indian populations is boiled down to “leftist talking points” and dismissed.

So why bring this up? Is it to rag on the United States? Is it to hold up a mirror to the worst aspects of the United States and make the U.S. look bad?

No. In execution, I hoped to point out the worst aspects of U.S. history and say “We cannot change that past but we can learn from it and stop it from happening again.”

So what happened? Great Britain allied with a native population to fight a war and immediately turned their backs on them and gave their land away to the settler colonial project without their knowledge, and which the settlers claimed is their God-ordained right to have, leading to apartheid and genocide.

Oh.

Part II coming tomorrow.

uspirates.org/through-the-spyg…