If the federal government claims that the US is a nation of natives rather than immigrants, that test is no longer met. If the federal government no longer asserts the principle on which its own sovereignty is based, no longer sustains the Doctrine of Discovery. Following Marshall’s reasoning, Native Americans would then have, in his words, a “legal and just claim to retain possession” of what is now the United States of America.
We have a responsibility to know and face our history, the indefensible as well as the praiseworthy. To deny our past as immigrants is to deny ourselves the chance of understanding who we are, for better and for worse. It is also, following the very logic and law of America, to abandon our claim to the dominion over territory, and to restore the land to those who first called it home.
