Steven Newcomb: Colonialism is cornerstone of Indian policy

Indian nations have been dealing politically with the imperial momentum of the United States ever since the 13 British colonies along the Atlantic Seaboard of North America declared themselves to be free and independent states in the late eighteenth century. Our original free existence as nations predates the American empire and its colonial system, and that point ought to be the central focus when it comes to advocating for our rights.

Evidence of the colonial system of the United States is found in our traditional Lenape territory in Ohio. In the late 1930s, a stone column was erected on Front Street in Marietta, Ohio. The column stands across the street from “Pioneer Park” on the north bank of the Muskingum River. An inscription on the column reads: “Here with the founding of this Nation’s first colony and establishment of the first American civil government west of the thirteen states, began the march of the United States of America across a continent to the Western sea.” The stone column was erected to commemorate the sesquicentennial (150 years) since the colonial founding of Marietta in April 1788.