This essay will be an article review of Benjamin Madley’s “California’s Yuki Indians: Defining Genocide in Native American History.” Benjamin Madley is an Assistant Professor of History at UCLA and specializes in Native American’s, the American West, and Genocide in World History. This article, from the first sentence to the last, is quite absorbing and readable.
1) The author’s main purpose in writing this essay is to attempt to define whether or not the killing of California’s Yuki Indian Tribe constitutes genocide. His guideline, or “rubric,” for judgment comes from the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention’s definitions of genocide.
2) The author’s main thesis argues that scholars have written extensively, and with promise, on Native American genocide in California on an ethnic level, but have neglected to write about these instances on a tribal level. His purpose, therefore, is to raise awareness about the individual Yuki tribe, while keeping in mind the questions of repercussions such awareness raises and asking such questions dutifully requires answers (sometimes in the form of “formal apologies” or “monetary reparations.”) The author attempts to do this in several steps: the first is by outlining the factors that created a disagreement between white settlers and the native Yuki Indians. The second aim is to examine the responsibility of both parties involved; both the Yuki Indians and Local, State, and Federal Governments.
3) The author effectively challenges other historical viewpoints throughout the article. He references and pays homage to some of his scholastic predecessors and outlines their contributions to scholarly work regarding Indian genocide in California. However, Madley challenges some of the shortcomings of their work, noting that “despite the work of these scholars, too little has been written about California at the tribal level.” (306) He also challenges some classical interpretations that link the cause of decline in Indian populations primarily to disease. Madley challenges Shelburne Cook’s implication that disease was the primary cause of death for the California Indian, stating, “apart from venereal disease, which likely decreased reproduction through sterility and fetal death, there is no evidence of lethal ‘Old World’ epidemics among the Yuki between 1854 and 1864. So, what killed them?” (309).
4) The author effectively uses primary sources to build an argument that immigration by Anglo-Americans, and the legal and moral policies they subsequently adopted, created a sense of racial tension between settlers and the Indians which directly lead to war, bloodshed, and genocidal massacres (specifically, the Yuki Tribe). Madley directly quotes California’s Governor, Peter Burnett, in 1851 as saying “a war of extermination will continue to be waged . . . until the Indian race becomes extinct, must be expected.” (309) He also cited California legislative acts as evidence to support the notion that settlers inflamed tension between themselves and the Yuki Tribe. He notes that in April 1850 the government passed “An Act for the Government and Protection of Indians,” which, among other things, empowered white settlers to arrest Indian adults who were deemed to be “loitering” or “leading an immoral life.” Perhaps the most egregious portion of the act, however, required court officers to dispatch bounty hunters to catch any Indian accused of the aforementioned acts, and subsequently hold them in prison for up to four months. (312)
5) The overall design of this article is one of the most impressive features. The author neatly outlined the course of the essay in the abstract (and the introductory paragraphs) and rigorously followed the pattern while providing an absorbing account of historical analysis. Additionally, this article is quite readable for a novice on the subject of genocide in the California Indian population. 6) Considering that I am a relative novice on the subject, I do not have a strong recommendation to improve the essay, as I found it quite useful, readable, and informative. However, a shorter essay concentrating on a specific time period may be more useful for those with extensive knowledge of this material. 7) This essay makes for an enjoyable read for any audience; however, since the author thoroughly explains the background and tension between Tribes and settlers, novice readers can benefit exceptionally from this article. 8) This article clearly delineates the historical tension between settlers and Native Indian Tribes in California from the 1850’s through the late 1860’s. The article shows how tribes thrived prior to Anglo-American arrival and then demonstrates the socio-economic development of the Yuki Indian Tribe after American settlement.
9) This article supports the notion of competing visions by outlining the huge disparity in actions between Anglo-American settlers and Yuki Indians. The Yuki Indians, as demonstrated in the article, did not out-populate the terrain in which they lived (The Round Valley) and survived off of the natural resources. Madley, however, demonstrates that the Anglo-American settlers moved to California in response to “James Marshall’s gold strike [which] triggered mass immigration.” (309) In a little over a decade, the non-Indian population in California rose from 13,000 to over 350,000. 10) For further information on this subject one might read Virginia Miller’s “Whatever Happened to the Yuki?” or Frank Baumgardner’s “Killing for Land in Early California.” However, Benjamin Madley’s article alone is quite useful for a novice reader trying to understand the historical problems between Native American’s and white settlers. Though the article is specifically written about the Yuki Tribe, the historical background outlined throughout the essay provides illuminating insight that can help shape a more informed opinion.
Works Cited:
Madley, Benjamin. "California's Yuki Indians: Defining Genocide in Native American History." The Western Historical Quarterly Autumn 39.3 (2008): 303-32. Web.
