What is the origin of democracy?
Posted: September 30, 2005
by: Tom Wanamaker / Indian Country Today
SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Ask a non-Indian historian where American democracy was born and you'll likely get answers ranging from Philadelphia to Williamsburg, or perhaps from Boston to the Mayflower. Ask Oren Lyons and he'll direct you to the shores of Onondaga Lake, not far from present-day Syracuse.
''Columbus and the conquistadors didn't bring democracy; neither did the Mayflower,'' Lyons said. ''Democracy was here in America. Freedom, democracy, women's rights, suffrage and peace were all here.''
The Haudenosaunee (also called ''Iroquois'' or ''Six Nations'') revere a prophetic figure called the Peacemaker, who gathered their ancestors together on the shores of Onondaga Lake centuries ago to halt decades of warfare between them and create the world's first democratic government.
This Great Law of Peace bound the Cayuga, Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, and Seneca nations (and later the Tuscarora) into a powerful and prosperous confederacy that dominated what is now upstate New York until they were overrun by non-Indian settlers after the American Revolution.
Lyons, Faithkeeper of the Onondaga Nation, spoke on Sept. 16 at McNaughton Hall on the Syracuse University campus. His topic - how the founding fathers of the United States were influenced by the traditional Haudenosaunee methods of governance in their framing of a new form of government for the American colonies during the 1780s.
''Today's event came about as an effort to understand the Haudenosaunee role in the formation of the U.S. Constitution,'' said Robert Odawi Porter, Seneca. Porter is director of the Center for Indigenous Law, Governance and Citizenship at the Syracuse University College of Law, which invited Lyons to speak in commemoration of U.S. Constitution Day.
During the colonial era, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, which stretched across much of what is now western, central and northern New York, exerted great influence over and among other Indian tribes throughout the region. Likewise, colonial governments treated the Haudenosaunee with considerable deference.
''The Six Nations were involved in all land-based meetings in the Northeast during colonial times,'' Lyons said. ''We set the protocol and showed the Europeans how to have a meeting - no interruptions, listen to each other, define the issues, one speaker at a time.''
During this era, Lyons observed, the term ''Americans'' actually meant ''Indians.'' Most European residents of the colonial governments considered themselves subjects of the British Crown.
Lyons cited a 1744 meeting in Lancaster, Penn. involving four colonial governors and the leaders of the six Haudenosaunee nations. At that gathering, according to Lyons, an Onondaga chief told the governors that their colonies ''would never amount to much'' if they did not unite as the Haudenosaunee had done. Historian Cadwallader Colden's notes of the meeting were later sent to Philadelphia, where a printer named Benjamin Franklin published them.
Ten years later, Franklin initiated the Albany Plan of Union, a proposal to create a royally appointed President-General and a 48-member Grand Council, elected by colonial legislators, to provide for unified colonial governance. Mohawk Chief Hendrick met with the colonists to advise them on Haudenosaunee ways. The plan never came to fruition, but contained many elements that would later reappear in the U.S. Constitution.
(For more information on the Albany Plan of Union, visit Albany Plan of Union or
Constitution
The U.S. Constitution turned 200 years old in 1988. Efforts by Lyons and others to obtain federal acknowledgement and recognition of Haudenosaunee influence over early American leaders like Franklin and George Washington, led first to talks with Sen. Daniel Inoye, D-Hawaii.
During the second session of the 100th Congress in early October 1988, both the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives passed resolutions that: ''acknowledge[d] the contribution made by the Iroquois Confederacy and other Indian nations to the formation and development of the United States'' and ''reaffirm[ed] the constitutionally recognized government-to-government relationship with Indian tribes.''
The resolution, H. Con. Res. 331, also reaffirmed the federal government's trust responsibility and obligation to tribal governments and acknowledged the need to uphold treaties with Indian tribes.
''The Six Nations were fundamental to the whole democracy idea,'' Lyons said.
The speaker briefly turned his attention to the land rights litigation filed by the Onondaga Nation last March. The action seeks recognition of Indian title to roughly 2.3 million acres of land stretching from Pennsylvania to Ontario, centered on Syracuse. The litigation also seeks a strong Indian role in efforts to clean up Onondaga Lake - one of the most polluted bodies of water in the United States (see ''Onondaga seek voice in lake cleanup,'' Vol. 25, Iss. 11).
''We want to make central New York a clean place - to collectively show the way,'' Lyons said.
Lyons made a point of thanking Nancy Cantor, the university's chancellor, and David Smith, vice president of Enrollment Management, for their recent ''Haudenosaunee Promise.'' This innovative scholarship program, announced on Aug. 19, offers free tuition, room and board at Syracuse University to students of Haudenosaunee ancestry who qualify for admission to the school.
''They [Cantor and Smith] showed us great respect,'' Lyons said, himself a 1959 Syracuse graduate and All-America goalkeeper on the university's lacrosse team. ''They met with our council and opened the doors of education to the Haudenosaunee people. We thought it would be a courtesy visit - we were surprised by the offer.''
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Last updated on October 07, 2005