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Who is the real father of the United States, George Washington or
Tammanend (Tammany)? In April 1975, I gave a speech on that question at
Michigan State University. I argued that George Washington was a
late-comer and that a famous Delaware (Lenape) leader known as Tammanend
was the original father-figure for the people of the United States.
Most people have heard of "Tammany Hall," a nickname for the Democratic
Party organization in New York City. That name stems from the period of
the U.S. War for Independence from Britain and a democratic revolution.
They chose the name "St. Tammany" because at that time Tammanend, a
Native leader in the 17th centrury, was held up as an ideal statesman
and a symbol of democratic leadership.
The fame of Tammanend spread throughout the colonies and eventually a
parish was named after him in Louisiana. May 1 was celebrated as
Tammany Day for quite a few years. Only after 1890, when the U.S.
turned in a more conservative and anti-Native direction, did George
Washington replace Tammany.
Why did the Atlantic coast British subjects elevate Tammany to such a
high position? Probably it was because the Lenape had maintained a
long-standing position as the grandfathers or elder brothers in a
democratic conferdation and alliance system which embraced many nations
from the Mohican and Mohegan of New England to the Shawnee of
Kentucky,Tennessee and the South. The Lenape themselves had at least
three divisions and several dialects, and numerous self-governing
village-republics, but all lived in peace with each other. Even in the
20 century, in Oklahoma, the tradition was remembered of the Lenape
being grandfathers to many nations.
This great kinship system was extremely democratic and doubtless
Tammanend was remembered in tradition as a wise and benevolent leader,
the opposite of the British king.
Another factor is, however, that many colonial subjects in the Americas
turned towards Indigenous symbols when they began to rebel against
European rule. The Mexicans turned from "New Spain" to embrace the
ancient Native nationality of Meshica (Mecican) and also used the
Mexican name "Anahuac" and the Aztec symbol of the Eagle on the
cactus. In South America, rebels also turned to native symbols, seeking
to revive the Inca Empire in both the Tupac Amaru rebellion and much
later at the Congress of Tucuman.
Tragically, the U.S. colonists turned their backs gradually upon
Tammanend and the freedom he represented. Instead, they chose
slave-owner Washington and a revivial of slavery. African Americans who
were free and who had fought in the revolution were gradually shoved
into an inferior position again and slavery became the ideology of much
of the South.
In South America and Mexico, the white and near-white colonials also
gradually turned their backs upon an Indigenous identity and reverted to
the suppression of Native peoples and peoples of mixed Native-African
ancestry.
But should we not revive Tammany Day, the first of May? It symbolizes,
after all the ideal of living in a just socieity with fair play for all
and without the corrupting greed of the form of capitalism which has
triumphed in so much of the Americas. Tammanend symbolizes our thirst
for wise and benevolent leadership, as opposed to the corrupt,
egostical, self-serving politicians we now usually suffer under.
Professor Jack D. Forbes, Powhatan-Delaware, is the author of Columbus
and Other Cannibals, Africans and Native Americans, Only Approved
Indians, and other books.
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