Iroquois Confederacy

The Iroquois Confederacy was a political and social alliance of five Indian tribes (later six) who lived in the northeastern part of North America. The Iroquois are also known as Haudenosaunee, meaning “people of the longhouse.” The nations that were members of the confederacy were the Cayuga, Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, and Seneca, and later the Tuscarora. Long before Europeans arrived on the continent, the Iroquois had formed a complex, democratic society. In fact, some historians consider the Iroquois Confederacy one of the world's oldest democracies.

The dark times

The story of the founding of the Iroquois Confederacy is known today through oral, or spoken, history, handed down from generation to generation of the Iroquois people. The story probably blends people and events from the Iroquois past and it does not provide dates, but most historians accept it as a very useful outline of Iroquois history.

Some time before European contact, the Mohawk, Onondaga, Seneca, Cayuga, and Oneida nations engaged in near-constant warfare. The darkest times were during the reign of a warlike Onondaga chief named Todadaho, who was feared far and wide. Many accounts describe him as a cannibal, and in fact, in some native northeastern cultures people believed that eating their victims in battle gave warriors better fighting skills.

Into this violent era entered the prophet Deganawida, a member of either the Huron or the Mohawk tribe. Deganawida grieved to see so much war and conflict in the world around him, and he traveled far from home seeking solutions. In his travels, he met Hiawatha, who was a Mohawk or Onondaga and told him of his hopes for peace and good government. Deganawida believed that the creator of all things had given humans the power to reason, and that by using clear thinking they could find the path to a balanced, peaceful society. Hiawatha was captivated by Deganawida's words and offered to serve as his orator (someone who makes public speeches). Together they traveled to a Mohawk village to begin teaching people the rules for a peaceful society.

Deganawida eventually won the Mohawks over and went on to convince the Oneida, Seneca, and Cayuga nations to join the Mohawks in a

union of tribes. Using nonviolent and respectful persuasion, Deganawida was finally able to convince even Todadaho to give up his constant fighting and join the union. Deganawida then planted the Tree of Peace as a symbol of the confederacy at the Onondaga Nation near present-day Syracuse, New York . The confederacy called itself the Haudenosaunee, or people of the longhouse, because they pledged to live peacefully under one government, in the same way several families might live together as distinct units under the protection of one roof. Some historians date the union around 1100 bce, though others believe it happened later in history, sometime between 1350 and 1550 ce.

The rules of the confederacy

The Iroquois nations created an oral constitution called the Great Law. Under its rules of government, the Grand Council of Chiefs, made up of forty-nine chiefs from the five tribes, led the confederacy. The Grand Council gathered at Onondaga to establish laws and customs and to guide the interaction of the members of the confederacy. Each tribe had an equal voice in the council, and the system was mostly democratic. Iroquois women played a major role in decision making. Deganawida, who came to be known as the Great Peacemaker, is credited with creating the advanced political system. As the council developed over the years, it tried to negotiate among peoples, whether in relations between tribes or in treaties with European settlers arriving on its lands.

When the American colonies were established in the Northeast, the united Iroquois nations presented a strong front to avoid invasion of their lands. One of the Iroquois’ strengths was their willingness to include new members within the confederacy, such as the Tuscarora nation of North Carolina and members of the Huron tribe. By 1677, the confederacy was one of the most powerful groups of North American Indians, consisting of approximately sixteen thousand people. It stretched over a large area of what is now New York State and beyond.

Influencing the founding fathers

In the eighteenth century, the American colonists were eager to form their own democracy. Impressed by the democratic Iroquois Confederacy, they sought the advice of the Iroquois when preparing the Albany Plan of Union of 1755, an attempt to unite the original American thirteen colonies under one federal government as the Iroquois had united its nations. In 1787, founders of the new nation, Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826), John Adams (1735–1826), and John Hancock (1737–1793) were all inspired by the Great Law of the Iroquois Confederacy as they debated the writing of the U.S. Constitution .

The Iroquois became divided during the American Revolution , the colonists’ war of independence from England (1775–83). Some Iroquois groups fought on the side of the colonists and others fought with England. Before the war was even over, the new U.S. government allowed land companies to buy up most of the Iroquois lands. The internal division weakened the once-strong Iroquois union, and the confederacy began to fall apart. Many Iroquois groups, particularly those who had fought with the British, left for Canada, never to return. The Iroquois who remained held onto as much land as they could. Today, their descendants own eight reservations in New York and Wisconsin . The Iroquois Confederacy was the country's eleventh-largest Native American group in the year 2000, according to the U.S. census.