Indians would have become 'civilized' on their own

Eric Reagan

Date published: 11/4/2005

Edward Hudgins asserts that American Indians are better off because of Columbus ["Columbus helped all of us find a better way--yes, the natives, too," Oct. 12].

However, we have no way of knowing what else would have happened--because it did not happen. We cannot say.

Hudgins states: "Yes, they could enjoy family and friends, tell tales of bringing down buffalo, and imagine that the stars in the sky painted pictures of giant bears and other creatures. The ancestors of Europeans did the same."

This statement reveals that inhabitants of the Americas--to varying degrees, depending on the group and their geographical locations--would most likely have developed their own improvements in the quality of life, over the course of time, despite the absence of Europeans in the Americas.

Even a cursory study of ancient American Indian cultures seems to point to an evolution toward civilization.

Consider Hopi ruins near the Rio Grande that archaeologists conclude had on-demand running-water systems and other refinements over an "animal existence." The Incas' great highway and communication systems are another example.

The Americas were the last of all the continents to be inhabited by humans, it is believed, so it therefore follows that the peoples of the Americas were behind the peoples of many other parts of the world.

Columbus may have "jump-started" American Indians toward a more "civilized" existence, but it is not a place they wouldn't have gone to on their own, given the time to do it.

We can never know what direction things would have gone in without the Europeans and other peoples--who, by the way, owe many of their own advancements to an earlier Islamic and an even earlier Hindi culture.

Brattleboro, Vt.

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Date published: 11/4/2005