Tribalism

“ Migrations and enforced removals placed tribes under conditions of strange environment where new customs and institutions were necessary, and in this condition civilization had a greater influence, and the progress of occupation by white men within the territory of the United States, at least, has reached such a stage that savagery and barbarism have no room for their existence, and even customs [Pg 077] and institutions must in a brief time be completely changed, and what we are yet to learn of these people must be learned now. ”

“ But little by little, as the tribe grows in numbers, and in power and intelligence, as it comes to capture slaves in battle, and to unite with other tribes, there comes to be an hereditary chieftain and a group of his leading supporters, his courtiers and henchmen. When the society has evolved into the stage which we call barbarism, there is a permanent superior caste; there are hereditary priests, who have in their keeping the favor of the gods; and there is a subject population of slaves. ”

“ Among the lessons to be learnt from the life of rude tribes is, how society can go on without the policeman to keep order. It is plain that even the lowest men cannot live quite by what the Germans call “faustrecht,” or “fist-right,” and we call “club law.” The strong savage does not rush into his weaker neighbour’s hut and take possession, driving the owner out into the forest with a stone-headed javelin sent flying after him. Without some control beyond the mere right of the stronger, the tribe would break up in a week, whereas in fact savage tribes last on for ages. ”

“ The constitution of the tribe—the origin and keystone of the social system—had been, in the beginning, as much a matter of reckless chance as the mating of himself and Ada; small wandering groups of men, who had come alive through the agony of war and famine, had been knit together by a common need or a terror of loneliness, and insensibly welded into a whole, an embryo community. ”

“ They have become fat and lazy. They have borrowed the white man’s vices, but have ignored his virtues. When not fighting with the pale faces, the tribes were, thirty and forty years ago, incessantly at war with each other, thus actively promoting the fate which surely awaited them as a people. Their pride, even to-day, is to display at their belts not only the scalps of white men and women taken in belligerent times, but also the scalps of hostile tribes of their own race. ”

“ Why do we need a Tribe to try men? It’s natural that the Tribal concilium should be swayed by prejudices and fears and hatreds. In the courts, justice is regulated by laws, by precedent, by the wisdom of ages. In the Tribe, it is the moment’s sentiment—right or wrong—sympathy or hate or revenge. Tribesmen may think they’re impartial, but they’re men, acting with only their own wisdom, often acting unwisely, sometimes cruelly. I—I think that I’ll resign from the Tribe!”
His father cleared his throat and held up his hand. Robert looked around. ”

“ When therefore a fraction of a tribe from domestic feuds has broken off from its main body, to which it is held by no law or compact, and has gone to another settlement, may it not be the point of honor with them not to use the language of those with whom they have quarreled, but to have one of their own. ”

“ But obvious identity of interests could be recognized only so long as the tribe remained very small. So soon as its numbers became large, patent diversities of interest, based on individual selfishness, must appear, to obscure the larger harmony. And as savage man migrated hither and thither, occupying new regions and thus developing new tribes and ultimately a diversity of “races,” all idea of community of interests, as between race and race, must have been absolutely banished. It was the obvious and patent fact that each race was more or less at rivalry, in disharmony, with all the others. ”

“ As the evolution of the race progressed, there was gradually developed a rude system of tribal government, administered by acknowledged chieftains, who claimed and obtained unquestioned obedience. So, too, victory or defeat became gradually the chief factor in determining the home of each tribe. These tribal boundaries were, however, by no means arbitrary lines of exclusion, and, in fact, there were frequent visits of friendship between the different sections of the race. ”

“ A parallel process is seen in the multiplication of those lowly-organized tribes above described. When one of them has increased to a size that is either too great for co-ordination under so rude a structure, or else that is greater than the surrounding country can supply with game and other wild food, there arises a tendency to divide; and as in such communities there often occur quarrels, jealousies, and other causes of division, there soon comes an occasion on which a part of the tribe separates under the leadership of some subordinate chief and migrates. ”

“ The great evil of the epoch of tribal war is its reaction on the human spirit. The continual struggle of ambition draws forth egotism, the desire to dominate for mere domination, the sense of separation and antagonism between man and man, tribe and tribe, province and province. ”

“ Here as elsewhere in the primitive life of man the strong dominated the weak—there were tribes that were superior, mentally and physically, to their neighbors, and in every tribe there were men who arose above the masses, while among these stalwarts there was a chief who was in every case a real hero to his people. ”

“ I have seen tribes rise from a state of barbarism to a condition in which they are as civilized in their institutions, in their religion, and in their social refinement and habits, as citizens of the United States, and all this has been done within half a century. ”

“ Every man who was not a tribesman was an enemy. If the tribe increased beyond what the land could maintain, it fought another tribe and wrested from it the land and drove it away or exterminated it, with complete indifference to the fact that this dispossessed tribe spoke the same tongue, had the same social organism, was of the same blood. ”

“ All that would serve you faithfully in it, will be called enemies and traitors to the new, and friends to the late rebellious establishment. Such therefore will not dare to offer themselves to your choice; and, if they did, would be mobbed, or imprisoned. You must choose only such as are recommended to you, the ragged and famished tribe that are brought over; men of desperate fortunes, the beggarly plotters against your present happiness, fiery and implacable bigots, half papists, engaged malcontents, or rapacious vultures ”

“ All these tribes would fight well for us at first if there were to be a rising outside, but after a bit they would join their own kind, as they both feel and say that white and black blood can never mingle because we despise them. ”

“ A vast tumult reigned from one extremity to the other of the most populous and fertile portions of the continent. Tribe was bribed to fight tribe, community to raid community. To every native chief, as to every one of his subjects, was held out the prospect of gain at the expense of his neighbour. ”

“ What do you suppose would become of them if one were to suddenly organize a negro tribe of darkest Africa into a republic? Why, under such loose rule as ours, the poor savage beggars would gnaw each other like dogs—they would, really! ”

“ Leaving these tribes, that are incapable of civilization, on one side, we come, in our journey upwards, to those which understand that if they wish to increase their power and prosperity, they are absolutely compelled, either by war or peaceful measures, to draw their neighbours within their sphere of influence. ”

“ These tribes, contending in a most unequal strife with the forces of modern civilization, more readily falling victims to the vices of white men than accepting their virtues, are entitled to the just consideration and protection of the government, as its wards, from whom, or their ancestors, have been taken their soil and their homes. ”

“ Every individual had the support of the entire tribe. Under such conditions, the social motives, the moral feelings, the subordination of the individual to the whole, must have developed to the utmost. With the further development of society, the tribes are dissolved and their places are taken by new unions, by towns and peoples. [42] New formations step into the place of the old ones, and the members of these groups carry on the struggle for existence in common against other peoples. ”

“ But when the offender belongs to another tribe, and that tribe, for one reason or another, refuses a compensation, then the offended tribe decides to take the revenge itself. Primitive folk so much consider every one's acts as a tribal affair, dependent upon tribal approval, that they easily think the clan responsible for every one's acts. ”

“ Tribal society is characteristic of savagery and barbarism; so far as known, all tribal societies are organized on the basis of kinship. The transfer from tribal society to national society is often, perhaps always, through feudalism, in which the territorial motive takes root and in which the kinship motive withers. ”

“ Few men, unless carried away by a whirlwind of fury, care to involve a tribe in the far-reaching consequences alluded to, and bad as the custom of blood feuds is, I think there can be no doubt that it acts as a curb upon the passions of these wild tribesmen. ”

“ At the bottom of all the trouble we find, as usually to be expected henceforward, the secret activities of the far-reaching Triad Society, which seized the occasion to foment into open rebellion the dissatisfaction of the tribesmen with the glaring injustice they were suffering at the hands of the local authorities. ”

“ Everywhere there prevailed linguistic segregation,—divisions into autonomous groups called tribes or stocks, and within each of these, equally autonomous clusters, whose mutual alliance for purposes of sustenance and defence constituted the basis of tribal society. The latter clusters were the clans, and they originated during the beginnings of the human family. Every clan formed a group of supposed blood-relatives, looking back to a mythical or traditional common ancestor. ”

“ We find a loose confederacy of tribes, aware of their common origin, yet too jealous of local names and rights to combine for a common end, too selfish to help one another until the danger of one has become a tragedy for all. ”

“ The settled folk had the weight of numbers on their side; the herdsmen might raid and loot, but they could not stay. That sort of mutual friction might go on for many generations. But ever and again we find some leader or some tribe amidst the disorder of free and independent nomads, powerful enough to force a sort of unity upon its kindred tribes, and then woe betide the nearest civilization. ”

“ Some of the tribes attach themselves to chiefs of their own choice, to whom they pay a certain tribute from the produce of their labor or hunting expeditions, while others live without any government or laws whatsoever, and only elect a chief on going to war. ”

“ Every tribe and section of a tribe has its internecine wars, every family its hereditary blood-feuds, and every individual his personal foes. There is hardly a man whose hands are unstained. Every person counts up his murders. Each tribe has a debtor and creditor account with its neighbours, life for life.... They consider retaliation and revenge to be the strongest of all obligations. ”

“ But at any rate we may observe that the tribes were militant communities engaged in a constant struggle for existence with other similar communities, and that in such communities it is essential to the safety of each and all of their members that all the classes which contribute to the fighting strength should be kept contented and zealous in the common cause, and that therefore it is necessary that none of those classes should be oppressed and that each should have its fair share in determining their common action. ”

“ In rare instances the remembrance of a common origin keeps several tribes together in a kind of union under the chief of the oldest tribe, from which the others have branched off, but as a rule the tribes hold proudly aloof and are hostile to each other. They attack each other, plunder the tents, carry off the women, children, and servants, and drive away the flocks. ”

“ That is to say, that these tribes, hastening on as they are doing to the collapse of their tribal organizations, have nothing else to stem the universal undermining that is going on, always with acceleration, than the creeds, moral code, habits, customs, social and political systems of Western Civilization, that is, the equipment of a people differing essentially,—physically, morally, and intellectually. ”

“ He claimed and was given right to free maintenance by the tribesmen, and he distributed the land among the householders of the tribe. These householders owed no allegiance to any other authority than the chief, on whom they depended for everything and to whom they owed implicit obedience.
Every man who was not a tribesman was an enemy. ”

“ That those tribes can not exist surrounded by our settlements and in continual contact with our citizens is certain. They have neither the intelligence, the industry, the moral habits, nor the desire of improvement which are essential to any favorable change in their condition. ”

“ As I have elsewhere tried to show, the genesis of the persecuting spirit is to be found in the conditions of primitive society, where "above all things the prime social and political necessity is social cohesion within the tribal limits, for unless such social cohesion be maintained, the very existence of the tribe is likely to be extinguished in bloodshed." ”