Revisionist History - Merciless Indian Savages | First America

Episode Date: August 27, 2026

There's a sentence in the Declaration of Independence that almost no one talks about. It's the last grievance: “He has excited the merciless Indian Savages”, it reads, "whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions." We’ve all been told the American Revolution was fought over taxation and representation. But that's not what the Declaration of Independence says. According to our founders, what they were most upset about was Native Americans. How did we miss that? That's the question at the heart of a new Pushkin podcast called First America. It’s hosted by Rebecca Nagle, an Indigenous author and the host of Crooked’s This Land podcast. First America reveals the true story of how the United States came to be, and how our current political moment is 250 years in the making. It unveils how the founders’ treatment of Indigenous nations—and their resistance—shaped US democracy.  Here's episode 1. Rebecca sits down with historian Ned Blackhawk (Western Shoshone) to talk about how hunger for Indigenous land drove the Revolution. Find more episodes of First America wherever you get podcasts.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

There's a sentence in the Declaration of Independence that almost no one talks about. It's the last grievance, the climax. The thing the founders were most angry about, and it isn't about taxes or representation, like we've been told. It's about Native Americans. He has excited the merciless Indian savages, it reads, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions. America celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding this year, and somehow for a century and a half,

America managed to skim right past that line, or explain it away, or simply forget it was there. How does a whole country miss a point of its own founding document? That's the question at the heart of a new podcast called First America. It's hosted by Rebecca Nagel, an indigenous journalist, and the host of Crooked's This Land podcast. First America reveals the real story of why the colonists rebelled, what kind of government they created, and crucially, how our current political moment was 250 years in the making.

We have a word for the stories nations tell about themselves that leave out the uncomfortable parts. We call it a myth. First America isn't interested in myths. It's interested in unveiling how the founder's treatment of indigenous nations and their resistance shaped U.S. democracy. Here's the first episode of First America. Hear more episodes of First America on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get podcasts.

Where do you want us to park in here? I think you have to park in here. The port is that way? Yeah, the port's that way. On a cold day in January, I visited Fort Snelling in Minneapolis. I was there with my friend Nick Gastis. He's a history professor at the University of Minnesota, an assistant. citizen of the Lower Burrell Sioux Tribe.

This is the historic Fort Snelling. I want to walk closer to it. Can you just describe what the fort looks like? Well, the fort has a guard tower, and then there's a wall that surrounds the entire fort. There's a series of barracks. Next to the historic buildings are modern-day trash cans to let you know this is a tourist attraction.

School kids come here on field trips. This is a sacred site for Dakota people, which was later appropriated by the U.S. military to build their fort. So look at that bald eagle. Told you were going to see one. Yeah. I wish the United States never appropriated the eagle. Do you hear him? Look at him.

He's coming. Right towards us. I mean, I don't know, man. I don't know how you can. You can't believe in the power of this stuff because those things happen for a reason. I told you we were going to see one. The history of what happened at Fort Snelling is significant to the Dakota people, and that history is acknowledged at the site, but you have to go and find it.

It's like a healing site right over here. It's next to an underpass. Down a long set of stairs on the edge of the woods. What the memorial looks like? Yeah, so it's like a camp circle, but in the center, it looks like there's prayer ties, sage, tobacco, etc., wrapped in cloth. And they're also prioritized in the trees that surround us. Who do you think left the prayer ties in the trees? I'm assuming it's the descendants of those who experienced that genocide.

Over 1,600 Dakota people were held here during the way. winter of 1862. This is the area, actually, where the concentration camp was actually at. Dakota people, people who dared to stand up to the United States, were put into a concentration camp, and all kinds of atrocities happened. The concentration camp was just one part of a broader campaign to expel all Dakota people from the state of Minnesota. The campaign also included death marches, massacres,

bounties placed on indigenous heads, open-air prisons, and mass executions. There was a lot of malnutrition, purposeful starvation. There were reports of women being raped and violated. You know, it's a site of horrors. Do you think most people who come to this spot, do you think that they come here to honor the atrocities? that happened here? No, they're doing winter sports, recreation.

I mean, you can see right here, you can see these parallel tracks. People cross-country ski through this area. While we were standing there, some hikers walked by. Hi. Hello. Walking around Fort Snelling with Nick,

it felt like this perfect metaphor for our country. All our terrible history, it's there. We just don't know how to talk. about it. This all started as a conversation between Nick and me about four years ago. We were frustrated, well, I was pissed at how Native people are erased from the story of America. We wanted to tell the history of the United States with Native people written back in. I wanted to correct the record. When we were in the car, Nick's phone rang.

I'm going to... He pulled up the news on his phone. Breaking witnesses report. A woman was shot in the face by ice while trying to flee in central Minneapolis. Earlier that day, a woman named Renee Nicole Good had tried to block ice agents with her car. An agent had just shot and killed her. Damn, the photos are really bad. Oh, God.

It looks like a deployed airbag. It's just covered in blood. We parked and watched the video. Wow. That's awful. When I was in Minneapolis last January, thousands of ICE agents were on the ground. It seemed like a residential neighborhood.

Federal agents had been rounding people up, including children, and sending them to detention facilities. People were afraid to leave their homes. Parents stopped sending their kids to school. interesting given what we were talking about this morning of the history of Dakota people being rounded up and violently forced out of Minnesota. When I started this project, I thought I was making a history podcast. I read books. I interviewed historians. I went to important sites. I traveled across the country.

But then this thing kept happening. I would be in a place learning about America's past. and then the same thing would happen right here in our present. You're listening to First America, the true story of how the United States came to be, and how our current political moment is 250 years in the making. From Pushkin Industries and Critical Frequency, I'm your host, Rebecca Nagel. Gohink, Dawton, to like a yet, Trinikin-Lan,

citizen of Cherokee Nation. I didn't go to Minneapolis to report on ICE. I had come to interview Nick. We just happened to be at Fort Snelling the day Ice shot and killed Renee Good. I don't know about you, but I don't believe in coincidences. I canceled my flight home and stayed to report on what was happening. The next morning, there was a protest, back at Fort Snelling. Because Fort Snelling is also the site of ICE's headquarters

in Minneapolis. I was curious why you guys came today, because, I mean, you know, someone was literally killed yesterday for standing up to eye, so is it scary to be here today knowing the island? Yes, it's scary, and I'm angry, and the anger overcomes the fear.

I have a good friend, and she lived in Denmark during the German occupation, and she has told me over and over again, you cannot be quiet. You must end up, because silence is what allowed this to happen in the Second World War. Far are we from the historic fort selling?

Just right across Highway 62 here. Do you know what happened there? Oh, no, no, don't ask you those kinds of questions. I'm not good with history. It's a historic fort. It's historic. Yeah, I'm sorry to put you on the spot. I mean, the reason this is all happening here is because of the ice offices that are there,

not because of the historic fort. But the 14th, 60s is actually a concentration camp for Dakota people. I'm just curious if any of that history feels relevant to what's happening now. Yes, clearly, you know. But I mean, our state. I mean, yeah. I mean, you watch that video. Thank God that person was there taking the video on their cell phone yesterday.

So everyone can see what happened, you know. After leaving the protest, I went back. to see Nick Estes at his office. The murder of Renee Good and the history of Fort Snelling are actually inseparable. First of all, ICE is headquartered on the Fort Snelling area campus. Do you know if that's because it's federal land? Yeah, it's headquartered there because it's federal land. And why is it federal land?

It's federal land because it was once a military reservation from the Zebulin Pike Treaty of 1805. And that was a treaty signed between some Dakota leaders and the United States government to create a military outpost. It's not just the same place. The same thing is happening. People are being hunted in their neighborhoods and their schools, places that were considered sanctuary sites, such as hospitals and churches, are no longer off limits. 150 years ago, they were hunting us down to kill us, and now they're hunting down immigrants to deport them. While I was out reporting this project, a lot happened. Ice killed people in the streets.

I watched a kid in bunny ears get detained. Our government abducted the leader of Venezuela and started a war with Iran. Analysts kept talking about the stages of authoritarianism. And I found myself asking this question, I think a lot of people are asking, how is this happening? How is all this happening in the United States? The answers I kept hearing, YouTube, lonely white men, the economy, didn't feel like enough. I started to wonder if maybe the explanation was deeper than all that, deeper than anything going on right now.

I'm still trying to figure it out. But the more time I spend in the past, the more the present makes sense. Maybe the answer is in that history we don't know how to talk about. I'm Ruby Carr, the host of the podcast, Encore. Check out our brand new episodes featuring music from the show that everyone is reheating as we speak. Heated rivalry.

Join me as I go behind the songs that brought Shane and Elia together. I'll tell you the stories of Fice, My Moon, My Man, wolf parades, I'll believe in anything, and tattoos all the things she said, and how they all became a part of this global phenomenon. Stream encore on Iheart Radio, crave, or wherever you get your podcasts. The first place I went on my quest to put Native people back in the story of America was the Declaration of Independence. This year is the 250th anniversary of the signing of that famous document, and it made sense to me

as a starting place. I mean, it's the most popular origin story of our country, right? But it turns out what I thought I knew about the declaration was wrong. Native people aren't missing. We're there. We're one of the most important lines in the document. But somehow no one knows about it. When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people

to dissolve the political bans which have connected them within others. A couple of summers ago, on a hot July day, this man, in a large coat and a feathered hat, walked up a small set of stairs, surrounded by revolutionary war reenactors, bayonets, and the twin speakers of the Park Service's PA system. He began reading the Declaration of Independence. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all... men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

At the time of the document's creation, a lot of people were illiterate, and printing stuff was slow and expensive. So word spread through public readings like this one. The history of the present king of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries in history. I think of the Declaration of Independence like a breakup letter. Our founders are breaking up with George III, King of England. And the Declaration is that part of every breakup, or at least every bad breakup, where you tell the other person everything they did wrong. If Thomas Jefferson and King George were having it out on the front lawn, Jefferson would have his finger in George's face yelling, and another thing.

For imposing taxes on us without our consent. And so the declaration is basically this long list of complaints. He has plundered our seed. A lot of historians say that list has an order. Ravaged our coasts. It starts with smaller grievances. Burn our towns. and ends with the biggest ones.

And destroy the lives of our people. We've been told the American Revolution was fought over taxes and representation. But the last complaint, the thing our founders were most angry about, goes like this. He has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages. There's a racial slur in the Declaration of Independence. Native people are called savages. Alongside those lofty ideals, our founders included their deep hatred for indigenous people. The merciless Indian savages whose no rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions.

In case you need a refresher, the popular story of the American Revolution goes like this. Britain unjustly imposed taxes on the colonists and they got mad. But every time they protested, like when they threw tea into the Boston Harbor, the king just imposed harsher laws. The colonists started to see their king as a tyrant. Some started talking about independence. Late one night, Paul Revere rode his horse to warn militias waiting outside Boston that the British were coming. The next morning, the militia squared off against the Brits.

And the revolutionary war began. A year later, our founding fathers gathered in Philadelphia to write the Declaration of Independence. But for two and a half centuries, that did. document has been telling a different story. According to our founders, in their own words, what they were most angry about was Indians. How did we all miss that? Can you please introduce yourself? Hi, I'm Ned Blackhawk. I went to Connecticut to find out. And what's your tribal affiliation? I'm Western Shoshone. And what do you do, Ned? I teach history. Where?

Yo University. I was the first tenured American Indian to teach at Yale. Wait, I just kind of want to back up, like, in the entire history of Yale, you're the first Native person to get tenure here? Yes, and I'm still the first. So the only? Tenured faculty member, yes. Is it ever lonely? Um.

Ned wears a long ponytail and the kind of sweater you imagine a professor would wear. Ned and I have been talking about this history for years. He, along with Nick Estes and some other indigenous scholars, help shape the idea for this podcast. I wanted Ned to tell me the story of why the founders hated indigenous people so much they put it in the Declaration of Independence. Ned says that story starts a couple decades earlier with this big, big war. Was it kind of like World War Zero? No, it is the first World War. It started as a fight over who would control North America, and it eventually covered the globe.

Great Britain won, and they got a bunch of land from France. This land spans from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico and from present-day New York to Minnesota. The colonists are thrilled. All across British North America, columnists are rejoicing. Sermons are being offered in Sundays' pamphlets and almanacs are being written about land possibilities in the interior. and there's this kind of growing sense of shared kind of euphoria that the British government and the British Empire are not just the largest in world history,

but also the most virtuous and or free. Those celebrations come to a halt in the summer of 1763 when news spreads of an indigenous uprising. The land England took over from France is still controlled by indigenous nations. What England actually wins in the war, in real terms, is forts. About 13 forts stationed around the Great Lakes. As a new Fort Boston town, England thinks it can push Native nations around.

They don't listen to the Native peoples. They don't trade with them adequately. And that angers indigenous leaders. An Odawa chief named Pontiac forms a multinational indigenous military alliance to push back. But could you just tell me a little bit more about who Pontiac? Paniak is. Paniak is an Adawa leader, and he's fallen into close affinity with a preacher who's Delaware or Lenape named Nielan. Nielan is the Delaware prophet. Paniak is the political leader, and together they start articulating a vision for the future that is transformative.

They decide that they no longer want their followers to rely upon. the goods of Europeans. And it's a process kind of similar to what the colonists are going through. Because once they start reimagining themselves in these ways, they decide that they're going to drive the English out. Pontiac and his soldiers go around and attack British forts. One of those attacks was particularly brilliant. Some Anishinaabe warriors go to this fort in northern Michigan,

as they often did to trade. But while they're there, they pretend to play. a game of lacrosse right outside the fort. And one ball makes it over the fence. And so they ask if they could kind of get their ball return. And so the fort officials are opening the doors to return the ball that's been taken. And flood of warriors come in and destroy the fort. Pontiac's military alliance attacks forts all over the Great Lakes region.

Remember, England took over about 13 forts. while Pontiac and his alliance destroy eight. They signal to the English that peace is going to be more costly than war has been for you. And another costly war for the crown is a big problem. England is broke, like broke, broke, broke. That global war England spent almost a decade fighting, it was expensive. The crown doesn't want to pay for another one. And they decide, okay, we'll make peace with Pontiac.

And why would the king do that? Because, like, England is a global empire, so why wouldn't the king of England want more land in North America? Okay. Have you ever been to India? No. Have you heard of the Caribbean? Yes. Okay.

The English crown governs millions of people around the world. The British colonists in North America are a small percentage of that. The overwhelming economic priorities that the British Empire has in the Western Hemisphere revolve around places like Jamaica and Burma. Barbados, not Virginia or Massachusetts. Is that because Barbados makes the Crown more money? Correct. Because Barbados produces large quantities of slave produce, alcohol and sugar, that can be consumed across the British Empire.

So in the interests of Britain, this global empire, peace with indigenous nations makes the most sense. It saves the Crown money. It serves the Crown's interests. To preserve peace, the King of England gives Pontiac and his Confederacy what they want. The proclamation line of October 1763 draws this perimeter along the crests of the Appalachian Mountains. The Crown promises to keep settlers off their land. So everything east is British North America.

Everything to the West is to be reserved for the Indians. While peace with indigenous nations serves the Crown's global interests, it angers the colonists because it takes from them what they want most. More land. Land mania, we might say, overwhelms the colonial system. Gentry leaders, people like George Washington, understood that their lands were becoming increasingly less valuable. People like Washington and commanding their enslaved populations to help bring nutrient-rich soils from the bottom of river beds.

Because the fields are so different. Because this fields have become so depleted. People like George Washington made money from this thing called land speculation. They'd buy up land that still belonged to indigenous nations to sell for profit once indigenous people were pushed out. The King's new boundary? It messed up their whole scheme. The boundary line angered regular and poor people, too. People who couldn't afford to buy private property often squatted on indigenous land.

Pioneers, frontiersmen, settlers, whatever you want to. to call them, we're already living west of the king's line. And there are numbers of settlers who are forced back east. And they don't like it. And there's this other thing about the king's concession to Pontiac the colonists don't like. Peace. You have to understand that the colonists have been at war with indigenous nations for most of their lives.

And now the king wants to make peace with their enemies. And in fact, the British are going to give them ammunition. They're going to trade. with them, they're going to recognize them. Hey, wait a minute. Didn't we just fight with you to control this world? To help cement peace with Pontiac, England arranges to bring gifts and supplies. This was how diplomacy between indigenous nations and European powers worked back then. 80 supply of mule trains are coming. Massive, actually, logistical undertaking, if you think about it. At Pittsburgh awaits these traders who are going to take these goods to Pontiac's Confederate

The colonists organize a militia, basically a band of angry white men with guns and attack the convoy. The first shots of the American Revolution are fired in March of 1765 when one of these backcountry militia groups known as the Black Boys attacks a British force, escorting trade goods to Pontiac. They're not attacking indigenous people. The Black boys are attacking British troops. They say things like, we are willing to die to disrupt and disrupt. destroy these relationships. So before the colonists are willing to die for lofty ideals like freedom and liberty and independence, they are willing to die to stop the crown for making peace with indigenous nations.

And we know why they are willing to die for this cause, because they wrote a song about it. The black boys create an anthem. And that anthem calls native peoples the enemies of man. I asked Ned to read part of it for me. On March the 5th and 65, their Indian presence did arrive. But when this property is designed to serve the enemy of mankind, it's high treason in the amount. What does that line mean? It means that the British trading policies of supplying native peoples are supporting the enemies of not.

not just settler society, but mankind more broadly. The Britain is committing treason not to the crown, but to humanity as a whole. And so this vision of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for mankind, the first time mankind is being articulated that I'm aware of is in deeply anti-indigenous settings. Hating indigenous people, seeing us as less than human, helps the colonists come together and form a unified identity. It helped them come together to fight for independence. I do believe the start of the fall of the British Empire, North America,

began on the Pennsylvania frontier. The sense of lawlessness or essentially fashioning one's own self-governing principles and practices, this is happening in Pennsylvania, before it's happening in Massachusetts. We teach the origins of the American Revolution as this drumbeat of violence and protest happening in Boston over taxes. But years before any of that, colonists are firing guns at British troops over native land. And to my knowledge, that Black Boy's history that we've been discussing has yet to appear in any U.S. history textbook. why we can't tell that story is a mystery to me. Before I left Yale, I gave Ned a present.

You want me to open this? You may or may not want it. Declaration of Independence Shotglass. Thank you so much. What does it say? We the people. What to you does that shot glass represent if we think about how Americans think about their history?

I wanted to say something that it's easily digestible. Goes down smooth. I think we as a country are losing a real sense of understanding about our nation's past. The declaration, which is full of these beautifully rendered sentences and paragraphs about enlightenment ideals does also have this darker history to it. Why is it important for the darker part of the Declaration of Independence and the American Revolution? Why is it important that Americans know about it? Well, if we don't understand the full context in which our nation was founded,

we won't understand the full context in which our nation now finds itself. I'm mad that Native people have been written out of the country. the story of the revolution. But I'm also baffled by it. I mean, it's kind of wild, right? It's not like you have to dig through the archives to find out that hunger for indigenous land drove the revolution. It's right there in the Declaration of Independence, in one of our country's most famous documents, in one of the most famous documents in all of human history. But somehow no one knows about it, It feels like a magic trick, like making a rabbit disappear into a hat. And when I started this project, that's what I thought I was up against.

The pervasive and systemic erasure of Native people from U.S. history. I thought the thing people couldn't see was me, my community. And then I started to realize what's missing from the story of America. It's bigger than that. After I left Minneapolis, I kept hearing politicians. say the same thing. What is happening right now in America is fundamentally un-American.

This is just so un-American. I understand where this comes from. It comes from the part of the Declaration of Independence we were taught. The all-men are created equal, life, liberty, and happiness part. But when we tell the whole story, the truth of how and why our country was founded,

the present moment doesn't feel like a contradiction. violently rounding people up, putting people in detention, even shooting anyone who gets in the way. Our government has done this before. Not once, not twice, many times. We just don't talk about that history because it happened to indigenous people. I keep hearing people go to Nazi Germany or Putin's Russia to try and understand the rise of fascism. We don't need to leave the United States to understand the horrors of authoritarianism. It's right here in our own history.

And if we want to root that authoritarianism out, we have to know where and how it started. If we think we can win by defeating one leader, it will be like pruning a weed. It will only come back stronger. I thought what was missing from the story of America, was native people. But then I realized without us, that story is wrong. What's missing from the story of America is the truth. I want us to know how we got here.

Because without that, we will never find our way out. Coming up on this season of First America. Are you guys big Chiefs fans? Hell yeah, yes. Chiefs on three, one, two, three. Chiefs! I feel like that's going to happen a lot. Do Native Americans still exist?

Maybe. I don't really think so. So the entire plan for funding the federal government was acquiring indigenous land and selling it. You were running for your lives, and you saw behind you everything you knew being burned down. What democracy rounds an entire ethnic group up at gunpoint and puts them into a conversation. concentration camp. Like, not a strong democracy, not a durable democracy. I would say not even a democracy. It's not. It's not a new thing. This is what we've done. We're good at this. If you like what you're hearing, please leave a review. It's one of the best ways to help listeners find this show. You can also support First America by subscribing or sharing episodes with your

friends. First America was made possible by the generous support of the Henry Luce Foundation in the NYU Yale American Indian Sovereignty Project. Additional support came from Indian Collective, First Nations Development Institute, Yehavia Tom of San Manuel Nation, Borealis Philanthropy, and Black Liberation Indigenous Sovereignty Collective. Our fiscal sponsor is Red Media. I dream this project into the world in collaboration with an amazing group of indigenous scholars, including Maggie Blackhawk, Fondalak Ojibwe,

Ned Blackhawk, citizen of the Timoke tribe of Western Shoshone, Phil Doloria, descendant of the Standing Rock and Yankton Sioux tribes, and Nick Estes, citizen of the lower-burwell-sou tribe. I, Rebecca Nagel, citizen of Cherokee Nation, also reported, wrote, hosted, and executive produced the show. First America is produced by critical frequency and distributed by Pushkin Industries. Our managing producer is Amy Westervelt. Senior producer and sound designer is Brendan Baker.

Our story editor is Audrey Quinn. Jules Bradley, Kim Netter v. Peterson, and Jordan Gass Porre are our producers. Our editorial consultant is Connie Walker, citizen of the Okinae's First Nation. Fact-checking by Naomi Barr. Our partnerships director is Lindsay Crowder. Our development consultant is Jenny Lawton. Our theme song is by Raven Chacon, who is Deney. Scoring by Laura Ortman, citizen of the White Mountain Apache tribe, and Raven Chacon.

Artwork by Kelly Gonzalez, citizen. of Cherokee Nation. The team at Pushkin is Greta Cohn, CEO, Eric Sandler, Chief Strategy Officer, Grace Ross, VP of Business Development, Morgan Ratner, Director of Marketing, Owen Miller, Content Delivery Associate, Kiroposi, Creative Partnerships Manager, Jordan McMillan, Social Media Manager, Brian Strabinick, Senior Analytics Manager, and Jake Flanagan, Production Council.