Repudiations
Repuidations of the Doctrine of Discovery by religious organizations and faith communities
Recent posts
A Comment On NARF’s Amicus Curiae Brief Filed on Behalf of the National Congress of American Indians and the Inter Tribal Association of Arizona, LLC, in Support of the Tohono O’odham Nation Permalink
Steven T. Newcomb examines the contradictions in the Native American Rights Fund’s amicus brief opposing construction of a U.S.-Mexico border wall on the Tohono O’odham Reservation.
A Right of Discovery? Permalink
Steven T. Newcomb traces Chief Justice Marshall’s “right of discovery” in Johnson v. McIntosh back to the 1496 Letters Patent to John Cabot and its command to subjugate, occupy, and possess.
A Comment on Making All the World America
Peter d’Errico comments on Timothy Bowers Vasko’s Making All the World America: Native Information and the Doctrine of Discovery (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2026), in conversation with Steven T. Newcomb’s review.
Book Review of Making All the World America
Steven T. Newcomb reviews Timothy Bowers Vasko’s Making All the World America: Native Information and the Doctrine of Discovery (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2026).
Domination Chronicles: Where Are We Now? Permalink
Steven Newcomb and Peter d’Errico ask why domination must be treated as the beginning of serious inquiry, not the end of the conversation.
S06E12: How the Revolutionary War Reshaped Haudenosaunee Governance Permalink
Tom Porter discusses how colonization and the Revolutionary War reshaped Mohawk and Haudenosaunee leadership, identity, and survival.
S06E11: What Changes When Earth Is Your Mother Permalink
Haudenosaunee teachings connect ceremony, matrilineal leadership, the Thanksgiving Address, and a living relationship with Mother Earth.
Domination Chronicles: Tribal Sovereignty 101 Permalink
Steve Newcomb and Peter d’Errico unpack tribal sovereignty, limited sovereignty, federal anti-Indian law, and the language trap of domination.
S06E10: How Colonial Law Shaped Modern Data Extraction Permalink
Jordan Loewen-Colon traces how colonial property law survives in AI systems, data extraction, platform consent, and Indigenous data sovereignty.
Domination Chronicles: Untrustworthy Trust - Domination, Fear, and Fearlessness Permalink
Newcomb and d’Errico examine the federal Indian law trust doctrine as a euphemism for domination rather than a protective obligation.
JCRT Publishes The Second of Two Special Issues from the 2023 Mapping the Doctrine of Discovery Conference
JCRT publishes the second of two special issues from the 2023 Mapping the Doctrine of Discovery Conference, with scholarship on history, law, and justice.
Vol. 25 No. 1 (Spring 2026): Challenging the Justifications of Domination through Law: Indigenous Resistance and the Undoing of Christian Empire Permalink
Part 2: Indigenous Resistance and the Undoing of Christian Empire This entry connects Doctrine of Discovery scholarship, Indigenous sovereignty, law..
An Appeal to the American People—Overturning “Federal Indian Law” Permalink
Steven J. Schwartzberg urges Americans to overturn Federal Indian Law by confronting the colonial assumptions that still shape U.S. jurisprudence now.
An Intergenerational and Perpetual Imperium of Domination and Subjugation of Indigenous Peoples: The Doctrine of Christian Discovery and Royal Supremacy Permalink
Phillip Rodgers Falk argues that native title and colonial sovereignty preserve Indigenous subordination through terra nullius and racial hierarchies.
A Postscript: Sovereignty is Still the Issue Permalink
This postscript argues Indigenous nations need full sovereignty, rejecting settler carve outs and urging a healing return to precolonial lifeways now.