Mark Miller
Dr. Martin Lecker
PDA 110
6 December 2010 Green Buffalo When I would hear that Native American Indians didn’t pay taxes on their casinos, I would say, this is unfair, was it out of jealousy, envy, or ignorance, I think it was the latter. To tell you the truth, I don’t remember ever meeting a Native American Indian, nor have I been on a reservation. What I did know about their culture, I learned from television, until this essay. I intend to argue that the American Indians have persevered in the white man’s broken promises, degradation, and dismal outlook on life, until the arrival of casinos. It is estimated that there were 1500 to 100 million Native Americans living in the United States, before the white man came. By the 1900’s the native population was down to 250,000, pursuant to germ, military, and genocidal warfare. Through the mid 1800s, the U.S. military had one mission, the annihilation of the Native American Indian (Schaap).
The white man started trading with Native Americans shortly after setting foot on North America. These exchanges were arranged under treaties. Those are agreements between two or more self-governing nations. Following the American Revolution, the government used treaties to acquire land from the Native Americans. The treaties were constructed in a way, to take advantage of the Indians. Under the pretense that the tribes were weaker in negotiations, and that they were signing documents written in unfamiliar words, often with no alternative (Native).
The U.S. government has full power in all Native American Indian affairs, in what is called between the government and tribes a trust relationship. This trust relationship refers to the government’s pledge, in the treaties it agreed upon. That it will defend the security and welfare of the Native American tribes, in return for yielding their lands. The Native