On page 95 of his biography, Benjamin Franklin relates how some Native Americans got drunk on rum. Franklin relates their justification and discusses it. “ ‘The Great Spirit, who made all things, made everything for some use, and whatever use he design’d any thing for, that use it should always be put to. Now when he made rum, he said ‘Let this be for Indians to get drunk with,’ and it must be so.’ And indeed, if it be the design of Providence to extirpate these savages in order to make room for the cultivators of the earth, it seems not improbable that rum may be the appointed means. It has already annihilated all the tribes who formerly inhabited the sea-coast.”
Franklin implies that white settlers had nothing to do with the absence of Natives from the east coast. They exterminated themselves by drinking too much. This casts Indians in role of annoying children, who do not have to be taken seriously, and leaves whites blameless.
No comments:
Post a Comment