Reparations and Native Americans

A quick description of reparations and how Native Americans deserve reparations from America's injustices done to them.

One of the big topics in ethical philosophy is reparations. According to the Oxford Dictionary, the meaning of reparations is defined as the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged. In a perfect world, reparations given would return the victims to the situation they were in before the wrongs have been committed. Usually, reparations occur when injustices have been committed against a group of people. A few instances of the US giving reparations to victims of injustices were the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 which gave victims of Japanese Internment 20,000 dollars each and the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act which transferred land and money to native Alaskans.

Aristotle believed that reparative justice entails the restoration of a moral state of equality that was violated by the injustice that occurred. What this means is that reparations should restore the victim’s “situation” to what it was before the injustice occurred. If a country takes a group of people’s land, the reparations should include giving those people their land back. This is a simplified version, but it does the best way of showing what Aristotle meant. Depending on how much time passes and the amount of injustices that took place, more reparations might be in order. There should not just be reparations for the injustices, but also for the effects that the injustices had. If a country took land from a group of people and in doing so developed a continual generational hatred for that group of people that makes their everyday existence much harder than anyone else, the country that caused the first injustice should also remedy the effects of it. When Aristotle says “restoring the moral state of equality”, it includes the effects of the injustice that happened.

It seems as though the first victims of “America’s” oppression tour were Native Americans. If you are completely oblivious to the history of America, I can give you a brief rundown of what went down. Native Americans occupied this land for thousands if not tens of thousands of years before 1492. Long story short, Europeans colonized America and in doing so killed Native Americans due to diseases brought from Europe, and through war/violence. Not only were a majority killed throughout the following centuries, but most were displaced due to the colonization.

Now that we have that brief and borderline “unjust” summary of what actually occurred we can now move forward to discuss ways, if any at all, would be satisfactory in repaying Native Americans for the injustices done to them. Widely known as reparations, it is important to discuss the process of remedying the damage/harm caused by an unlawful act, in this case, the mass murder and displacement of Native Americans. Now you might be asking, “How in the world can we possibly remedy what happened? Are we responsible for remedying something that we are not the perpetrators of? Didn’t this occur hundreds of years ago?”. If you are asking those last two questions, I may follow up with the question “Who hurt you?”.

On a more serious note, I believe we are 20000% responsible for remedying things that we have benefitted from, in this case, the colonization of America. The reason we have benefitted from the colonization of America is that we are living in a country that would not have existed if this colonization had not occurred. Therefore, we are directly benefitting from it. Whether we want to or not is up for discussion, but the fact remains that if you are or did live in the United States, you directly benefitted from the crimes committed against Native Americans. If you do not want to be responsible for remedying past injustices of a country, simply move. This isn’t “Oh if you don’t like it then move” because the people this is directed to have legitimate concerns with a country. For instance, we hear a lot of people say “If you don’t like it, then move” to people that have an issue with the healthcare system, student loan situation, etc. If that person leaves, the problem will not be solved. They should want to stay to fix the issue. When I tell you to leave the country if you have an issue with repaying Native Americans, I plan on solving that issue with or without you, therefore you leaving the country does not affect the outcome.

Another important side note to mention is that the whole reason for wanting to remedy past injustices should be because we want everyone to not only be treated equally but also give everyone appropriate equity. Native Americans have received an exorbitant amount of unfairness in general. When repaying Native Americans, we should not only make things right in terms of rectifying past injustices but also give them what they need to succeed. The reason for this is because if “America” was never colonized by anyone then it seems reasonable to infer they would have been thriving. For this reason and many others, we owe it to them to make them succeed in our country because we took that opportunity from them.

The next step after establishing that Native Americans should receive reparations is to decide what those reparations should entail. The most common answer seems to be money, but I am not sure that would be most beneficial unless the Native American community thinks so. To find the appropriate reparations, the Native American community should decide because they know what will help them succeed best. Whether that be more land, resources or money, then so be it. It does seem that many Native American leaders would prefer the return of sacred land rather than financial compensation. Native Americans are more than deserving of receiving the same privileges as the people who benefited from their losses. In a perfect world, their reparations would be to give all their land back, but logistically after all that time this would be impossible. I am not claiming to be an expert on the Native American plight, but they deserve reparations from America and should have the main say in what reparations they see appropriate.