Changes

:"I make war for plunder, scalps, and prisoners. You [Europeans] are satisfied with a fort, and you let your enemy and mine live. I do not want to keep such bad meat for tomorrow. When I kill it, it can no longer attack me."<ref>Steele, ''Warpaths,'' p. 205, 1757</ref>

:"I make war for plunder, scalps, and prisoners. You [Europeans] are satisfied with a fort, and you let your enemy and mine live. I do not want to keep such bad meat for tomorrow. When I kill it, it can no longer attack me."<ref>Steele, ''Warpaths,'' p. 205, 1757</ref>

The Puritan twist was the sense of God-given mission to eliminate savagery. Perhaps this could be done through missionary work; more effective was the annihilation of obstinate tribes like the Pequot. Compliant tribes would be moved into controlled reservations. Virginia began the reservation system in 1646, forcing Indians to live in restricted all-Indian lands—and similar reservations still exist in the 1990s. Religious groups, especially the [[Quakers]], were always disturbed about the violence and brutality of the wars against the Indians. Controlling the Pennsylvania government, the Quakers avoided warfare and tried to ensure fair treatment of the Indians. Nevertheless, the Delaware Indians went to war, and in 1756 the Quakers were forced to relinquish power to politicians who would actively defend the frontier settlements. A century later, in 1869, President [[Ulysses S. Grant]], in collaboration with Quakers, adopted a "peace policy" toward the Indians. (If the Indians could be made into Quakers, quipped Grant, it would take the fight out of them.) Unfortunately, the policy failed—during its eight years, more lives were lost to Indian attack, more money was spent on campaigns, and soldiers fought more battles with Indians than ever. Subsequently a series of radically different policies were tried, but none seemed to "work." The long-term goal of assimilating Indians into the mainstream of society was not successful, and the opposite goal of preserving the heritage of Native Americans likewise proved deeply flawed.  

The Puritan twist was the sense of God-given mission to eliminate savagery. Perhaps this could be done through missionary work; more effective was the annihilation of obstinate tribes like the Pequot. Compliant tribes would be moved into controlled reservations. Virginia began the reservation system in 1646, forcing Indians to live in restricted all-Indian lands—and similar reservations still exist in the 1990s. Religious groups, especially the [[Quakers]], were always disturbed about the violence and brutality of the wars against the Indians. Controlling the Pennsylvania government, the Quakers avoided warfare and tried to ensure fair treatment of the Indians. Nevertheless, the Delaware Indians went to war, and in 1756 the Quakers were forced to relinquish power to politicians who would actively defend the frontier settlements. A century later, in 1869, President [[Ulysses S. Grant]], in collaboration with Quakers, adopted a "peace policy" toward the Indians. (If the Indians could be made into Quakers, quipped Grant, it would take the fight out of them.) Unfortunately, the policy failed—during its eight years, more lives were lost to Indian attack, more money was spent on campaigns, and soldiers fought more battles with Indians than ever. Subsequently, a series of radically different policies were tried, but none seemed to "work." The long-term goal of assimilating Indians into the mainstream of society was not successful, and the opposite goal of preserving the heritage of Native Americans likewise proved deeply flawed.  

===Misunderstandings===

===Misunderstandings===

The question of the ethics of the Indian wars is fraught with misunderstandings. Some can be cleared up. The Indians were not "native" to North America; they migrated from the Old World like everyone else. (Waves of migrants traveled over the Siberia-Bering Straits-Alaska ice bridge between 30,000 B.C. and 8,000 B.C.) There were many vastly different Indian cultures in North America simultaneously, and over the centuries the inhabitants changed drastically. The "Eastern Woodlands" groups of tribes that lived east of the Mississippi in 1492 had an entirely different society and culture from the Mound Builders who lived there 500 years earlier. Historians and anthropologists debate how many Indians lived north of Mexico in 1492; in 1928 anthropologist James Mooney estimated 1.1 million; some recent estimates are ten times higher. However, all scholars do agree that contact with Europeans introduced diseases to which the Indians were not immune—like smallpox and measles. Vast numbers died in a few decades—perhaps 80 or 90 percent. In Cuba and other islands, all the Indians died out. In California, 99 percent were gone by 1880. The colonists did not enter virgin land; they entered widowed land. Indeed, if there had been no European immigration most of the Indians would still have died out anyway because only a few explorers were needed to bring over the diseases.  

The question of the ethics of the Indian wars is fraught with misunderstandings. Some can be cleared up. The Indians were not "native" to North America; they migrated from the Old World like everyone else. (Waves of migrants traveled over the Siberia-Bering Straits-Alaska ice bridge between 30,000 B.C. and 8,000 B.C.) There were many vastly different Indian cultures in North America simultaneously, and over the centuries the inhabitants changed drastically. The "Eastern Woodlands" groups of tribes that lived east of the Mississippi in 1492 had an entirely different society and culture from the Mound Builders who lived there 500 years earlier. Historians and anthropologists debate how many Indians lived north of Mexico in 1492; in 1928 anthropologist James Mooney estimated 1.1 million; some recent estimates are ten times higher. However, all scholars do agree that contact with Europeans introduced diseases to which the Indians were not immune—like smallpox and measles. Vast numbers died in a few decades—perhaps 80 or 90 percent. In Cuba and other islands, all the Indians died out. In California, 99 percent were gone by 1880. The colonists did not enter virgin land; they entered widowed land. Indeed, if there had been no European immigration most of the Indians would still have died out anyway because only a few explorers were needed to bring over the diseases.