Native Influenced United States

Benjamin Franklin has been quoted giving a good deal of respect toward the government system of the Iroquois. What would it take to have the United States to adopt more more Iroquois government and culture without butterflying away the revolution itself?
 
Have one or more prominent works about Iroquois government written pre-Revolution with lots of comparisons to Roman or Athenian democracy to increase their perceived republican credentials. Iroquois symbolism popular in the fashion of Greco-Roman statues and gods while maintaining a distinctly "American" flair. Similar to how native americans were used as personifications of America in earlier artistic depictions.

It's pretty easy to incorporate more since there's little to no evidence that any Iroquois ideas were used.
 
I had a notion in another WI asking about the formation of Indian states in the USA. One (of many) obvious problems being that no distinct, particular Native American nation amounted to a population comparable to a US state. It is very difficult to judge the truth of this impression before the 20th century to be sure since there were no reliable censuses of Native peoples, whereas of course in 1776 the smaller colonies joining the revolution were small indeed!

However it did seem evident to me that if all the Native American peoples (known in such a low-probability ATL as this as simply "Indians" of course) were grouped together, then their numbers would fall in the ballpark of a US state. I postulated a visionary (to speak kindly of myself) notion of an Indian Confederation which would group all tribal territories, scattered about the growing USA, into one political entity of equivalent status to a single US state--they'd send two Senators to the Senate and a number of Representatives to Congress varying from just one to however many would be proportionate to their total population.

Getting such a thing started would be the big hurdle. Of course keeping it in being despite strong interests wanting to take it apart would also be tough, and especially so in the face of dissensions among separate Native peoples all grouped together like that--every tribe's most mortal traditional enemies would of course be included.

Handwaving it into existence and persistence though, I figure the longer it does last, the more integral to the US system it becomes. By now, such a Confederation would presumably hold a great deal of US land, notably in the west, and have a medium-small population ranked among states, somewhere around Tennessee IIRC.

If we had a TL where such an institution existed, I would think that despite Anglo chauvinism about superior Euro-Christian ways, a great many elements of Native culture would indeed transfer over to Anglo culture, particularly in politics. The Confederation would be in some ways a microcosm of the Union as a whole and all sorts of issues might be resolved there to serve as examples of how to do it on a national scale.

The trick, again, is to get it started, and I suppose the focus of your question is on the pre-Revolutionary period. If certain Native peoples and colonial governments had evolved extensive formal relations, producing individuals who identified as belonging to their people but moving in respectable colonial circles, became the face of their peoples, and these peoples were not just in one region but several, and they formed the notion of a collective federation of Native peoples who would seek to bring all Natives under their collective bargaining wing, and finally a decisive majority of these worthies resolved to lead their respective peoples to support the Revolution in return for formal recognition of this collective body representing all Indians who submit to the United States, then you'd have some grist for your mill right there.
 
Have one or more prominent works about Iroquois government written pre-Revolution with lots of comparisons to Roman or Athenian democracy to increase their perceived republican credentials. Iroquois symbolism popular in the fashion of Greco-Roman statues and gods while maintaining a distinctly "American" flair. Similar to how native americans were used as personifications of America in earlier artistic depictions.

It's pretty easy to incorporate more since there's little to no evidence that any Iroquois ideas were used.
I like it, nice and simple. Anybody else?
 
Native American PODs are the One-Easy-Trick-to-Weight-Loss banner ads of alternate history dot com. Everybody goes into elaborate contortions to make better scenarios, when the reality is laughably straightforward.

If you want to lose weight, do the research about what you should eat, then only eat that. Exercise some, sometimes. If you want a TL with the native peoples doing better - get a POD that preserves or increases their population.

Yes, sure, it's technically possible for OTL's Native Americans to have done better in the USA, avoid Andrew Jackson or similar, maybe. Avert a couple massacres by militias or the army. Just like you can lose weight short-term in a dozen unwise ways.

Anything that increases the population of a tribe, nation, confederation, or even of citizens without a tribe will result in greater influence on American culture and open potential for dramatically different political and territorial arrangements.
 

jahenders

Banned
Native American PODs are the One-Easy-Trick-to-Weight-Loss banner ads of alternate history dot com. Everybody goes into elaborate contortions to make better scenarios, when the reality is laughably straightforward.

If you want to lose weight, do the research about what you should eat, then only eat that. Exercise some, sometimes. If you want a TL with the native peoples doing better - get a POD that preserves or increases their population.

Yes, sure, it's technically possible for OTL's Native Americans to have done better in the USA, avoid Andrew Jackson or similar, maybe. Avert a couple massacres by militias or the army. Just like you can lose weight short-term in a dozen unwise ways.

Anything that increases the population of a tribe, nation, confederation, or even of citizens without a tribe will result in greater influence on American culture and open potential for dramatically different political and territorial arrangements.

While the numeric angle is certainly the surest way, there are lots of ways to get to that point, such as:
- Less natives die from European diseases
- Natives more densely populate and use their lands (vs spreading out/migrating)
- More native tribes/nations joining to form confederations
- Multiple native groups being put on the same reservation or multiple reservations being made adjacent to one another
- Swifter, more cohesive native response to European encroachment

So, it is reasonable to discuss these (and other) ways in which native relative strength, and impact, could happen
 
While the numeric angle is certainly the surest way, there are lots of ways to get to that point, such as:
- Less natives die from European diseases
- Natives more densely populate and use their lands (vs spreading out/migrating)
- More native tribes/nations joining to form confederations
- Multiple native groups being put on the same reservation or multiple reservations being made adjacent to one another
- Swifter, more cohesive native response to European encroachment

So, it is reasonable to discuss these (and other) ways in which native relative strength, and impact, could happen

1. The only way for less natives to die of European disease is to somehow have a far, far earlier spread of variola minor, which would kill far fewer of them.
2. Not possible in places like the East Coast, where villages moved every few decades because natives would use up the soil in their agriculture. At least I believe that's what I read, and that explains why that even though American Indian agriculture was more productive than European agriculture, why they never formed major cities in North America outside of the Mississippians (which of course collapsed).
3. Doable, but it would need to happen earlier to have them as solid as something like the Iroquois Confederacy. And too early, and they still wouldn't appreciate the threat Europeans posed. Remember that for many peoples, for the longest time they thought of Europeans as nothing more than another tribe, albeit one with very nice trade goods.
4. Worked horribly, to say the least, when they put the Navajo and the Apache on the same reservation. I wouldn't trust Europeans to ever make that sort of thing work knowing the utter failure of US Indian policy despite the general lack of bad intentions.
5. Nope, because many natives liked to use Europeans as a "beat stick" so to speak to defeat their rivals. That was how things worked since the 16th century with Cortes in Mexico and de Soto in North America. Plus Europeans had the best trade goods. Who would possibly want to get shut out of that network? Natives also quickly became dependent on European goods and gained severe dependencies on them, to the point where they lost significant parts of their traditional way of life. This was known by some colonial officials, and used several times, like in the conflict against the Catawba as well in an attempted 18th century Spanish colonial policy to sell Indians crappy goods to enrich Spain as well as to make their skills decay enough so Spain could easily beat them (it didn't seem to work for Spain, but the intention was very clever and reasonable).
 
While the numeric angle is certainly the surest way, there are lots of ways to get to that point, such as:

I don't want to be a dick about it, but you've missed my meaning. Two of the five you mention are exactly what I meant: increasing the population was what was necessary. You seem to have assumed I meant something like an extra domestication or different land use and family size issues. Far from it. I mean population, by hook or by crook. The Iroquois, for example, sustained relevance to the Revolution by means of mass adoptions.

- Less natives die from European diseases

I should have thought this one in particular was obviously included under the heading:

If you want a TL with the native peoples doing better - get a POD that preserves or increases their population.

- Natives more densely populate and use their lands (vs spreading out/migrating)

While we can agree that this would be a healthy and effective strategy for a people to choose compared to most OTL reactions to Europeans, I personally believe such a community could never approach the long-term survivability or cultural impact of a group that just simply had more living members. Do you disagree?

- More native tribes/nations joining to form confederations

This is probably the most common one, and the one I posited about 5-8 years before I joined AH.com in 2003. Arguably the ultimate POD relating to Native American history. Also, it's a pretty good illustration of my core point.

If you mean geographically distant groups doing so, I would disagree with that. If you mean something more regional, it depends: Had the Old Northwest tribes all stood with Tecumseh, would it really have made much difference? Probably not.

If the southern "Civilized Tribes" had had their own version of the man, and
they had completely rallied around him, that would be different. The population and economic disparities were much more manageable. But how plausible is that level of unity, really? If you can convince me that there's a way to get the neutral tribes off the fence without strengthening their population relative to the Europeans, okay, but I have an interest in this area and in my time on the board haven't seen the case made especially strongly.

This is my point, really. It's something that technically could have happened, but the PODs/assumptions required to fundamentally change the outcome are so many that they inevitably stretch the bounds of plausibility. Whereas increasing their population, through whatever means, would accomplish the same goal with far less "ifs" and would make more native tribes and nations open to joining confederations, because those confederations success would be more plausible to prospective members. No?

- Multiple native groups being put on the same reservation or multiple reservations being made adjacent to one another

This is one of the things meant by increasing population, although I can understand that it was not clear.

- Swifter, more cohesive native response to European encroachment

Okay, granted to a degree. If Mr. Rolfe et al had been driven into the sea, if the Indians had properly raided Plymouth early on.... Near-first contact PODs are definitely a different matter.

But, as metalinvadernumbers points out, this is actually itself a POD that is fairly unlikely.

So, it is reasonable to discuss these (and other) ways in which native relative strength, and impact, could happen

I hope my point is clearer to you now. Once Europeans were established and receiving steady immigration, it takes a long series of improbable PODs to accomplish what can be achieved by the simple expedient of arranging for higher populations in one or more groups.
 
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jahenders

Banned
I hope my point is clearer to you now. Once Europeans were established and receiving steady immigration, it takes a long series of improbable PODs to accomplish what can be achieved by the simple expedient of arranging for higher populations in one or more groups.

I think we're half agreeing. I agree that for Natives to have a greater influence on the development of the US, they have to be more powerful and sheer numbers are key to that. Your earlier post seemed to take that as a settled issue where the details weren't worthy of discussion. I was noting that (though it comes up quite a bit) it is worth discussing and then pointed out some of the PODs that could achieve that.
 
I think we're half agreeing. I agree that for Natives to have a greater influence on the development of the US, they have to be more powerful and sheer numbers are key to that. Your earlier post seemed to take that as a settled issue where the details weren't worthy of discussion. I was noting that (though it comes up quite a bit) it is worth discussing and then pointed out some of the PODs that could achieve that.

I don't think they have to be more powerful, simply more popular and culturally relevant to the United States. If you make them more numerous and powerful you run the serious risk of of making them a legitimate enemy to American expansion to be overcome rather than embraced. The colonists already had an antagonistic relationship with the Native Americans, making them more powerful is only going to increase tension, not promote cultural adoption.

The prompt asks for more native influence on American political and cultural institutions, not a direct acceptance of the natives or their culture. The easiest way to do that is to make them popular in the public's mind and tie their culture to the idealism of the Revolution while at the same time decreasing the Iroquois' actual strength so that they aren't seen as a threat.
 
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