The Bull Inter Caetera (Alexander VI) May 4, 1493,
has been cited for over 500 years to 'legally' justify the subjugation, oppression and genocide of Indigenous peoples worldwide.

"When Christopher Colombus landed in America, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Castille were anxious that they should enjoy the same rights to the lands they conquered in the name of Christ as Portugal had. They applied to Pope Alexander VI who subsequently issued the Bull Inter Caetera granting Castille rights to "all islands and mainlands found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from the Arctic pole, namely the north, to the Antarctic pole, namely the south, no matter whether the said mainlands and islands are found and to be found in the direction of India or towards any other quarter, the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde" provided they had not already been discovered in the name of another king and provided that Isabella and Ferdinand fulfilled his desire that "discovered" people be "subjugated and brought to the faith itself."

From that point on, not just Spain and Portugal, but England, France, and Holland, whether or not they still held to the Roman Catholic Church as the "one true faith" relied on the Papal Bulls that came to be known as "the Doctrine of Discovery" to rationalize subjugation of Indigenous peoples around the globe."
(Nanette Croche)


Separation of church and state in this United States? The Doctrine of Discovery suggests otherwise.

"As early as 1790, federal law reflected the discovery doctrine, but it wasn't until 1823 that the doctrine was formally recognized by the U.S. Supreme Court -- and its full meaning spelled out. In the Supreme Court case Johnson vs. McIntosh, about whether private citizens could purchase Indian lands, Chief Justice John Marshall, in a long, detailed opinion for a unanimous court, established that discovery had been the law on the North American continent since the beginning of European exploration. Indian rights "to complete sovereignty, as independent nations, were necessarily diminished, and their power to dispose of the soil at their own will, to whomsoever they pleased, was denied by the original fundamental principle, that discovery gave exclusive title to those who made it."

In short, Indians couldn't sell their tribal lands to private citizens because their conquerors -- the U.S. government by then -- essentially owned them. Today, that aspect of the 600-year-old Doctrine of Discovery still prevails in U.S. and international law. It remains the principle by which the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Australia continue to control the lands of their indigenous peoples." (Robert J. Miller)