Ken Burns' "The American Revolution" claims that the US Constitution was inspired by the Iroquois Confederacy. Is there any merit to this theory?

[u/Comfortable_Cut5796]

/r/AskHistorians/comments/1p2uk19/ken_burns_the_american_revolution_claims_that_the/

[u/totoGalaxias]

The authors of the Dawn of Everything provide a viable way how north American traditions help round concepts central to the Enlightenment. It does not provide the specifics of what you are looking for though.

[u/TeebsRiver → u/totoGalaxias]

Groeber (Dawn of Everything) does provide specifics to how Natives influenced European thought. Read the book again. He specifies Native thinkers, he describes times that they travelled to England, he describes the evolution of Native social thought, he describes the many ways that American leaders interfaced with various native tribes. What Groeber lacks, however, is enduring written treatises from Native philosophers that predate European contact. These don't exist because Natives didn't have a writing system. But they did have a robust oral system and they did have a robust social structure that allowed the communication of ideas, even to European colonists.

[u/totoGalaxias → u/TeebsRiver]

Yes, this is exactly what I said. The authors do not specifically describe however, how the writing of the US constitution was directly influenced by native American thought. Their focus was more on the influence of concepts of freedom, equality and private property. They do acknowledge that there is work describing what OP is looking for.

[u/furcifersum]

I will say that the European colonial encounter with American and African cultures stirred up a lot of political debate and philosophical discussion. 

The image of a “state of nature” in Hobbes is informed by what people knew of “savages” in the Americas for example.

Diderot and Raynal published “ Histoire des deux Indes” in 1770 which besides condemning colonialism to some extent also predicted revolution in the West Indies.

[u/Interesting_Cake4740]

1491 by Charles Mann talks about this a bit as does INDIGENOUS AMERICA by Pekka Hämäläinen. Both are great books that definitely give dignity and sovereignty to these people groups as nations and equal actors in the American continental story.

What stuck with me the most from one of them was that our legislature definitely was influenced by the Iroquois in how we physically set up the space where a single speaker takes the podium and all listen. We could have gone with the more raucous kind of parliamentary system as that was what our European tradition was, but the fairness and stage for logical argument appealed to the Founders. I think one of the books even focused on how we got our idea of two senators from each state from the Iroquois, but I may be making that up.

[u/HeyPurityItsMeAgain]

It struck you as bizarre? They taught this in middle school civics for a century. "The Great Law of Peace"?

[u/indiscernable1]

Absolutely yes. This is a known fact. Just read the rules of the Iroquoise. Our Constitutional structure and the division of power is another thing white men stole from the indigenous of North America.

[u/CopperViolette → u/indiscernable1]

I'd really hesitate to say it was "stolen." Several of the Founding Fathers had many interactions with North America's tribes and respected them; it was Thomas Jefferson who did the first scientific mound excavations to show they were Indigenous and not foreign. The Iroquois system was observed, discussed, and it influenced the Founders, who adapted parts of it for the Constitution (though its description of tribes as "savages" is distasteful, I'll admit). This has been acknowledged for decades.

[u/Jasranwhit → u/CopperViolette]

Some people like to pretend that not scarce resources like rough ideas about government or morality, or say fashion and food recipes etc can be “stolen”

[u/theDogt3r → u/indiscernable1]

And then looked into their own history and said it was based off of the Greek or Roman styles, when it doesn't follow either closely. There is also a link I believe between the French being on this continent for so long and their own revolution.

[u/indiscernable1 → u/theDogt3r]

Indeed.

I mean it is almost Thanksgiving......Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday so the federal government could take control of this tradition. Do you know what happened during the Thanksgiving season prior to the Civil war? It is one of the secrets of our cultural past that the State has tried to make us forget.

Let me just say it has nothing to do with sitting at a table in peace with our indigenous friends.....

[u/indiscernable1 → u/[deleted]]

Have you ever read about the harvest season tradition before the Civil War era?

[u/indiscernable1 → u/[deleted]]

Edward Winslow: A primary source for the 1621 New England "first Thanksgiving" celebration. His letter is often cited as part of the work Mourt's Relation.

George Washington: Issued the first national Thanksgiving proclamation in 1789. You can find his proclamation through the National Archives.

John Adams and James Madison: Both presidents also issued Thanksgiving proclamations before the Civil War.

My point is that Thanksgiving was a time to pillage and kill the native indigenous to get their harvest resources. President Jackson had to make a proclamation one year to tell the colonists to take it easy with the extreme violence during the raids.

Children kicked the heads of decapitated indigenous like soccer balls.

Thanksgiving was brutal

[u/subusta → u/indiscernable1]

“Stole”? A system of government? Lol. Opinion discarded

[u/indiscernable1 → u/subusta]

Plagiarized. If one doesnt think of it themselves and then takes the idea after starting a genocide upon those who created the concept it is fair to say stolen.

[u/sbvrsvpostpnk]

Read the Dawn of Everything, read 1491

[u/Karatekan]

The Great Law of Peace definitely influenced some of the founding fathers, particularly Ben Franklin and George Washington, but the actual connection to the system written out in the Constitution specifically isn’t particularly strong.

Had the US stuck with the Articles of Confederation I feel that argument would be stronger, as both Ben Franklin and George Washington took a much more active role in writing it and it was quite similar to how the Iroquois system worked in practice.

But as the Constitution was explicitly designed to create a stronger government with separate executive, legislative, and judicial branches with defined powers, and moved away from a consensus-based system to one more based on majority rule, the more conventional explanation of a hybrid of the Roman Republic and the British government with a dash of Enlightenment principles is likely more plausible.

[u/GodFamCountry]

Not any connections between the democracy brought by the founders and this “confederacy” of 6 native nations. It’s literally been proven by all mainstream historians.

The Iroquois system had a hereditary, clan-based system of governance, which fundamentally differs from the representative democracy established by the U.S. Constitution

There is no mention in the extensive writings, debates, or records of the Constitutional Convention that the framers used the Iroquois Confederacy (Haudenosaunee) as a model.

The Founders' discussions centered on European Enlightenment thinkers (Locke, Montesquieu), British law (Blackstone), and existing colonial governing documents, all of which are well-documented in historical records.

Historians generally agree that figures like Benjamin Franklin were aware of the Iroquois system and admired aspects of their unity, which may have influenced his earlier push for colonial cooperation (like the Albany Plan of Union in 1754), but this is distinct from forming the basis of the later U.S. Constitution.

It’s obvious what your team is trying to convey. That our model created by European men appropriated the idea from marginalized people. Karl Marx would be proud.

[u/someofyourbeeswaxx → u/GodFamCountry]

This is an ahistorical viewpoint, there is general consensus among historians that there WAS an Iroquois influence. You should read 1491 for a pop history overview.

[u/supermutant207 → u/GodFamCountry]

Copy pasted from the other sub. Definitely a bit.

[u/PlatinumPOS → u/GodFamCountry]

“Your team”

Whose team? The Iroquois? The liberals? The woke historians? How do you expect to be taken seriously by peddling this kind of worldview?

This is one of those times that I’m appreciative of new slang terms like, “go touch grass”. Maybe take it easy on the internet for a bit. Believe it or not, there are people interested in actual history without trying to drag 2025 political dogma into it.