This document discusses the treatment and perceptions of Native Americans, African Americans, and race in the early United States Constitution and society. It notes that the Constitution referred to "people" as free white persons, considered Native Americans as members of tribes rather than U.S. citizens, and classified slaves as "other persons." It also discusses how Native Americans were viewed as sovereign but still had their lands taken through warfare and treaties. African Americans were not clearly designated as citizens in the Constitution and citizenship became increasingly associated with whiteness in the 1800s. Thomas Jefferson expressed views that Native Americans had potential for intellectual and artistic achievement if civilized, but did not believe African Americans were capable of higher thought or creative works like poetry.

1. “We the People”
• In the Constitution:
• “people” = free (white?)
persons
• Indians are members of
tribes, not U.S.
• slaves are “other persons”

2. Indians and the Constitution
• Indians supposedly sovereign, but:
• warfare continues for their land, i.e.
Miami Confederacy
• Treaty of Greenville 1795
• gives up most of OH and IN
• “annuity” system - federal
government gives $$ every year,
means outsiders have power
Reproduction of a portrait of Little Turtle, also
known as Mich-I-kin-I-Qua, a war chief of the
Miami Tribe, ca. 1790-1812.

3. Indians and
Racism• Not all powerful white
people think Indians are
inferior, but: need to
become “civilized” =
• farm
• own land privately
• organize gender like
Americans do

4. Blacks and the Republic
• Constitution doesn’t state whether
free blacks are citizens
• Naturalization Act of 1790:“free
white persons” can become
citizens
• Into the 1800s, citizenship became
more and more associated with
whiteness

5. Thomas Jefferson
and Race

6. 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.--

7. The Indians, with no advantages of this kind, will often carve figures on
their pipes not destitute of design and merit. They will crayon out an
animal, a plant, or a country, so as to prove the existence of a germ in
their minds which only wants cultivation. They astonish you with
strokes of the most sublime oratory; such as prove their reason and
sentiment strong, their imagination glowing and elevated. But never yet
could I find that a black had uttered a thought above the level of plain
narration; never see even an elementary trait of painting or sculpture.
In music they are more generally gifted than the whites with accurate
ears for tune and time, and they have been found capable of imagining a
small catch (* 2). Whether they will be equal to the composition of a
more extensive run of melody, or of complicated harmony, is yet to be
proved. Misery is often the parent of the most affecting touches in
poetry. -- Among the blacks is misery enough, God knows, but no
poetry. Love is the peculiar ;oestrum of the poet. Their love is ardent,
but it kindles the senses only, not the imagination. Religion indeed has
produced a Phyllis Whately; but it could not produce a poet. The
compositions published under her name are below the dignity of
criticism.