Roots: Aboriginal Land Rights of American Natives

Abstract

The seizures of Wounded Knee and Alcatraz and other similarly assertive acts reflect the mounting fervor with which descendants of the original inhabitants of what is now the United States proper are pressing for recognition. Through political and legal channels they are seeking relief and compensation for injustices committed against them and their forefathers. After more than a century of passivity, one of the nation's most neglected minorities lag astir, seeking the means and muscle for redress. Much of the rhetoric has centered around lands which were appropriated by white men without just compensation to the native inhabitants. Indians, Alaskan natives (including Eskimos, Aleuts, and Indians), and Hawaiians were all caught in the crushing tide of westward expansionism in the America of the 18th and 19th centuries. Their ties with the land were in one way or another loosened by the white man's culture. These changes and the many wrongs committed against them are once again coming to the forefront of national issues.