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SAVAGES AND SCOUNDRELS
VanDevelder demolishes long-held myths about America’s westward expansion and uncovers the unacknowledged federal Indian policy that shaped the republic
What really happened in the early days of our nation? How was it possible for white settlers to march across the entire continent, inexorably claiming Native American lands for themselves? Who made it happen, and why? This gripping book tells America’s story from a new perspective, chronicling the adventures of our forefathers and showing how a legacy of repeated betrayals became the bedrock on which the republic was built. Paul VanDevelder takes as his focal point the epic federal treaty ratified in 1851 at Horse Creek, formally recognizing perpetual ownership by a dozen Native American tribes of 1.1 million square miles of the American West. The astonishing and shameful story of this broken treaty—one of 371 Indian treaties signed during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—reveals a pattern of fraudulent government behavior that again and again displaced Native Americans from their lands. VanDevelder describes the path that led to the genocide of the American Indian; those who participated in it, from cowboys and common folk to aristocrats and presidents; and how the history of the immoral treatment of Indians through the twentieth century has profound social, economic, and political implications for America even today.
What really happened in the early days of our nation? How was it possible for white settlers to march across the entire continent, inexorably claiming Native American lands for themselves? Who made it happen, and why? This gripping book tells America’s story from a new perspective, chronicling the adventures of our forefathers and showing how a legacy of repeated betrayals became the bedrock on which the republic was built. Paul VanDevelder takes as his focal point the epic federal treaty ratified in 1851 at Horse Creek, formally recognizing perpetual ownership by a dozen Native American tribes of 1.1 million square miles of the American West. The astonishing and shameful story of this broken treaty—one of 371 Indian treaties signed during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—reveals a pattern of fraudulent government behavior that again and again displaced Native Americans from their lands. VanDevelder describes the path that led to the genocide of the American Indian; those who participated in it, from cowboys and common folk to aristocrats and presidents; and how the history of the immoral treatment of Indians through the twentieth century has profound social, economic, and political implications for America even today.
350 pages, Paperback
First published April 14, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
August 25, 2024
The Sand Creek Massacre of November 29th, 1864, where a Methodist minister in the U.S. Cavalry and his troops massacred almost 500 Indian men, women, children, and elderly is just one of the shocking things in this book. The U.S. government made 371 treaties with the American Indians and broke them all.
January 3, 2016
The book initially set me off balance. I thought it would be about the frontier, but it starts with a family in the 1950s whose home is relocated, along with many others. Then goes back and forth between the legal history on which treaty law was based, and how - while it was completely illegal - Indian land was seized again. For a while it is like jumping back and forth between two different books, and then it begins to feel more unified, while also becoming more sickening and tragic.
Although at times the verbiage gets a bit thick, ultimately this does explain a lot of how the present conditions came to be. Even when you had people with more honorable intentions, another election could change that, and people on local levels or state levels were often really comfortable with disregarding federal law.
A lot of that can be simply explained by deciding that people are horrible and greedy and will justify anything, which is not exactly untrue, but it can be instructive seeing how it happens. I understand some of the things that seemed contradictory about Thomas Jefferson better now. (FYI, that didn't resolve in his favor.)
Although at times the verbiage gets a bit thick, ultimately this does explain a lot of how the present conditions came to be. Even when you had people with more honorable intentions, another election could change that, and people on local levels or state levels were often really comfortable with disregarding federal law.
A lot of that can be simply explained by deciding that people are horrible and greedy and will justify anything, which is not exactly untrue, but it can be instructive seeing how it happens. I understand some of the things that seemed contradictory about Thomas Jefferson better now. (FYI, that didn't resolve in his favor.)
September 30, 2009
such a sad story. white people suck.
July 20, 2011
"Savages and Scoundrels" is poorly structured and the writing is at best trite. A disservice to the topic.
August 7, 2023
Why are we where we are today?
US history today seems either near-total fiction (1619 Project) or a regurgitation of mythological legends who rode Manifest Destiny from the beginning to our excetionalism we must return to (1776 Report). With the lessons of true history hard to find, let alone teach and improve upon (a more perfect Union), solid books filled with knowledge our society needs rarely come along.
Paul VanDevelder delivers this excellent accounting through a very important lens. In over 50 years of digging for truth, this book is an oasis of truth, verifiable, and easily understandable. Open minds will grow in understanding of why, when, and how our self-governing experiment failed and what we can do to give liberty another chance in our lives. Beyond being a great read, it now becomes an excellent reference tool. It is my sincere hope this book will be studied by many who are worn out by myth and legend but ready for truer insights into the history of the USA.
US history today seems either near-total fiction (1619 Project) or a regurgitation of mythological legends who rode Manifest Destiny from the beginning to our excetionalism we must return to (1776 Report). With the lessons of true history hard to find, let alone teach and improve upon (a more perfect Union), solid books filled with knowledge our society needs rarely come along.
Paul VanDevelder delivers this excellent accounting through a very important lens. In over 50 years of digging for truth, this book is an oasis of truth, verifiable, and easily understandable. Open minds will grow in understanding of why, when, and how our self-governing experiment failed and what we can do to give liberty another chance in our lives. Beyond being a great read, it now becomes an excellent reference tool. It is my sincere hope this book will be studied by many who are worn out by myth and legend but ready for truer insights into the history of the USA.
September 8, 2021
A look at failed Native American policy through the building of Garrison Dam on the Missouri River and the Pick-Sloan Plan which took land that had been profitable and was under water when the dam was done. This a book goes into detail of of how the Native Americans are dealt with in Congress as far as the treaty making and breaking since the beginning.
February 9, 2023
Great book, should be required reading for American history.
February 1, 2010
Good book about how we screwed the Indians. I learned new things (there's so much to learn about this history). Some of the more interesting to me was how the water "development" projects planned and authorized in the 1930s and 40s had devastating effects on tribes as they were built in the 50s and 60s. The section on The Great Smoke in 1851, where at a giant conference on the prairie most of the Plains Tribes reached an agreement with the US to allow settlers to pass through while protecting the Tribes interests, was fascinating. Of course the US didn't hold up it's end of the bargain and eventually forced new "treaties" on the Tribes that took most of their land.
July 12, 2011
Paul Vandevelder's book represents towering work, and stands in the proud and immense line of revisionist historical journalism. The United States comes alive in these compelling and lucid pages, not shrouded in blase myth and superficial evasion that characterizes professional or academic history. This is our inheritance, most decidedly for worse, the "will to empire" that stands revealed in the genocide of peoples then, and in military and economic devastation now. This is history of political forces owning a culture, written as if our reading lives were thirsting for truth, not jargon or "balance."
November 14, 2010
I felt swindled by this book's title. Nothing quite seemed untold. The author traced the legal theories underpinning the decisions that allowed the United States to forcibly conquer North American land in a quest for empire. Yet, I didn't feel that he really explained how it was that those legal theories were selected within the context of the young America. The connection between an available legal theory and its use wasn't really developed. Plus, the book was disjointed and the ideas seemed presented in a random order.
July 13, 2016
A completely different history of the westward expansion, tracing the ongoing trail of broken treaties and land grabs from the Indians back to medieval decrees about the rights of natives in lands 'discovered' by Europeans and also to debates among our founding fathers about Indian rights, land ownership and trust obligations. Unknown to me - the views of Thomas Jefferson about states rights overriding federal protections of and treaties with the Indians. I just felt that the book lacked a little cohesiveness in drawing in the more contemporary story of land takings.
November 17, 2015
Some parts, like chapter 5, were incredibly interesting. However, other parts, like the beginning of chapter 3, were so dense and information packed that you couldn't make sense of it. It didn't help that Mr. VanDevelder loves run on sentences more than he wants you to understand what he's saying.
I would have liked it more if I didn't have to dissect your sentences just to get a basic sense of what you're trying to say Mr. VanDevelder. This isn't anatomy lab, it's a book.
I would have liked it more if I didn't have to dissect your sentences just to get a basic sense of what you're trying to say Mr. VanDevelder. This isn't anatomy lab, it's a book.
June 16, 2014
I had high expectations. This writer works in my hometown at the local Universtiy. This book received awards...but is rather vitriolic and sharp. Did not seem balanced. Don't know if I'll finish it
November 21, 2012
Harrowing, thorough, and urgent. A necessary read for anyone interested in Native American issues and history, with a particularly good and clear emphasis on legal precedent and federal/state malfeasance. Makes Jefferson look like a tyrant, Washington a prophet, and Nixon a voice of moral courage.
February 17, 2016
An interesting recap of how the US broke over 365 treaties with the Indians in order to steal their land.
April 30, 2017
A great lesson to be learned in the pages of this book that showed what greed has done to this country. It should be a required course in American History classes.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews