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  • Essay / Research to find out if conflict between Europeans and Native Americans was inevitable

    When Europeans began migrating to the New World, problems began almost immediately. These issues involved land use, religion, and disease. Owning land was extremely important to European settlers. In England, as in most other countries, land was synonymous with wealth and power. Many settlers who came to North America could never have owned land in Europe because they were too poor. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay The first Europeans to settle the northeastern New England region wanted land. There weren't many settlers and there was enough land for everyone to use and plant crops. It was easy to live together. The Indians helped the settlers by teaching them how to plant crops and survive on the land, but the Indians did not understand that the settlers were going to keep the land. This idea was foreign to the Indians. As the years passed, more and more settlers arrived and took more and more land. They cut down trees. They built fences to keep people and animals out. They demanded that the Indians stay off their land. Another problem between the settlers and the Indians concerned religion. The New England settlers believed that Christianity was the only true faith and that everyone should believe in it. The Indians were satisfied with their own beliefs and did not wish to change them. As a result, many settlers came to believe that Native Americans could not be trusted because they were not Christians. They began to fear the Indians and view them as evil. Other events also led to serious problems between the Native Americans and the newcomers. One of the problems was illness. For example, some settlers carried the bacteria that caused smallpox, although they themselves did not become ill. Smallpox had caused deadly epidemics in Europe, but it was unknown to the Indians. Their immune systems had not developed any protection against the disease. It killed entire tribes. And smallpox was just a disease imported from Europe. There were others who also infected the Indians. In "Peaceable Kingdom Lost: The Paxton Boys and the Destruction of William Penn's Holy Experiment" by Kevin Kenny, Kenny states that conflict between Europeans and Native Americans would have been inevitable if Europeans' greed for land had not stood in the way of the harmonious relationships that were established between the two. Several things led to the destruction of William Penn's Holy Experiment. The Paxton Boys played a major role as their hunger for land sparked waves of frontier violence that reached the height of all-out war against the Indians (text p. 211). People also didn't care about the treaties that were signed. or agreements that were made before they even settled the New World. William Penn, to whom King Charles II had given the land, thought it was not his place to give it. “According to him, the land belonged to the Lenape Indians who lived there long before settlers arrived” (Quakersintheworld.org//The Holy Experiment). He wanted to create a world in which Europeans and Indians could live side by side, but conflicts got in the way. Kenny also states that "the violent seizure of Indian lands became the norm rather than the exception" (Text p. 213) to emphasize the.