In the early nineteenth century, the United States assumed ownership of all of the Oregon Territory through “right of discovery”, first adjudicated in the United States Supreme Court in 1823 in Johnson v. M’intosh (Supreme Court of the United States 1823).[i] This ownership remained tenuous as it relied on the European protocols of exploration and discovery. Europeans, and later, Americans, believed that only through the exploration and mapping of formerly unknown lands could land be legally claimed. Tribal nations did not explore and map their lands in this manner, relying in large part on oral and experiential knowledge of their … Continue reading Imagining the American Nation, and Ignoring the Tribes