https://www.nps.gov/places/lewis-and-clark-enter-into-louisiana-purchase.htm

European powers based their claims to the Louisiana Territory on a European legal theory called the “Doctrine of Discovery.” The first European nation to “discover” lands unknown to them could then lay claim to those lands.

The Doctrine of Discovery minimized the right of Indigenous people to their own lands. It only allowed Indigenous communities to retain a so-called “native title.” This meant they could occupy and use, but not own, their own homelands. It still required Europeans to negotiate treaties with Indigenous leaders to fully take over their land.

The French first claimed the territory west of the Mississippi River in 1682 and called it La Louisiane after King Louis XIV. French settlers knew about Indigenous nations who had lived, farmed, and hunted near great cities like Cahokia for millennia, but according to the rules that the European leaders wrote, Indigenous claims were not as valid as those of these new arrivals.

France, Britain, Spain, and eventually, the new United States of America, vied for and divided up this land that had been occupied by many people since time immemorial. This back and forth culminated in 1803, when the United States agreed to pay France $15 million for 818,000-square-miles of territory west of the Mississippi River that France claimed. With this purchase complete, the U.S. government could negotiate directly with Indigenous communities for their lands.

One of President Thomas Jefferson’s main goals for the Lewis and Clark Expedition was to establish contact with as many Indigenous people as they could and understand “the extent & limits of their possessions.” Once armed with this information, the United States could take these lands, either through treaty or through force.

For Indigenous people west of the Mississippi River, the Louisiana Purchase was the beginning of a hundred years of land loss, forced relocation, and threats to traditional lifeways.

Cairo to Olmsted

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Cairo to Olmsted

Cairo to Olmsted

Cairo to Olmsted

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Cairo to Olmsted

Cairo to Olmsted