America at 250: The Founding Story We Tell—and the One We Don’t
by Kelly K. Hallman (Cherokee Nation citizen), Founder and Executive Director, Indigenous Justice Circle
As the United States marks its 250th anniversary, it is a time to celebrate the origins and future of American democracy. But if this moment is only about commemoration, we miss a deeper and more necessary opportunity: to examine where our democratic ideals come from, what was left behind in building them, and how they could be strengthened.
Long before 1776, systems of governance flourished on this land. The Haudenosaunee Confederacy, one of the world’s oldest continuing democracies, organized multiple sovereign Native Nations under the Great Law of Peace—a framework built on consensus, accountability, and shared responsibility.i Early American leaders studied these systems. Elements of federalism, symbolic unity, and deliberative councils in the U.S. system echo Haudenosaunee practices.ii
But what the United States adopted was partial—and selective.
In borrowing structure, the framers set aside core elements of the Indigenous systems they observed. Most notably, they excluded women from political authority. They also denied basic rights to African Americans and Native peoples themselves, building a democracy that claimed universality while limiting participation to a narrow segment of the population.
That contradiction still shapes our nation today.
What Was Left Out of the Translation
Indigenous governance systems were not perfect. The Haudenosaunee Confederacy and others faced internal tensions, conflict, and change—especially as European contact introduced new pressures. Their political processes could be slow, their roles structured by tradition, and their systems not designed for large, heterogeneous states.
But they also reflected a broader understanding of governance that the United States did not carry forward: one rooted in relationships—between people, among genders, and with the natural world.
Among the Haudenosaunee, women held real political authority. Clan Mothers did not simply advise; they selected leaders and could remove them when necessary.iii Among another Iroquoian Nation, the Cherokee, women held central roles in agriculture, land stewardship, and community life, with influence that extended into political and spiritual spheres.iv
This authority was not abstract. It was embedded in daily life—through responsibility for land, food systems, and cultural continuity.
European American women, by contrast, were legally constrained at nearly every level. They could not vote, rarely owned property independently, and were excluded from formal political power. Their roles, while vital, were largely separated from authority.
Indigenous systems did not offer modern equality in the way we define it today. Women’s roles were structured and demanding, and political participation often followed established cultural pathways rather than open access. But compared to European systems at the time, they offered a broader integration of women’s authority into governance and community life.
That difference matters.
A Democracy Built on Exclusion
The United States did not simply overlook these elements—it moved in the opposite direction.
From its founding, political participation was tied to race, sex, and property ownership. Women were excluded. African Americans were enslaved or disenfranchised. Native peoples were not recognized as citizens within the system that had drawn, in part, from their own political traditions.
This narrowing of participation shaped the structure of American democracy itself. It prioritized individual rights over collective responsibility and property ownership over relational accountability. It also separated governance from the natural world, turning land into a commodity rather than a shared foundation for life.
Over time, the country expanded rights, often through struggle and resistance. But those expansions have been layered onto a system that began with built-in exclusions.
The Question of Balance
Historian Theda Perdue’s work on Cherokee society highlights an organizing principle that helps explain what was lost: balance. Cherokee communities relied on complementary roles between men and women and on reciprocal relationships with the natural world.v
This balance was not static or ideal. It had to be maintained amid changing conditions, and it could be disrupted—by conflict, by economic shifts, and most profoundly by colonization. Still, it reflects a different starting point than the one embedded in the U.S. system.
Where American political structures often emphasized control—over land, labor, and governance—Indigenous systems more often emphasized interdependence. That difference continues to shape debates about equity, sustainability, and power.
What Revitalization Looks Like Today
Across communities today, there are ongoing efforts to recover elements of these earlier frameworks—not by attempting to recreate the past, but by adapting its principles.
These efforts often focus on strengthening women’s leadership in community decision-making, rebuilding intergenerational ties through mentorship, and reconnecting younger generations with land-based practices. They emphasize governance as something lived—rooted in relationship, responsibility, and shared experience.
They also recognize constraints. These approaches must function within modern legal systems, economies, and diverse populations. Revitalization is not restoration—it is negotiation between past knowledge and present realities.
A Parallel Challenge for Native Nations
This conversation is not only about the United States as a whole. It also applies to Native Nations themselves.
During the 1930s, under the Indian New Deal, many tribes were compelled to adopt written constitutions modeled on that of the U.S. These frameworks supported self-government in important ways, but they often carried forward the same limitations: centralized authority, electoral structures that replaced consensus-based processes, and governance models that sometimes reduced the roles of women and clan-based leadership.
In some cases, these systems displaced older forms of governance that had distributed authority differently—across families, clans, and community relationships.
Today, many Native Nations are reexamining these structures. That process does not mean rejecting modern governance. It means asking whether existing systems fully reflect community values, and whether elements of earlier practices—consensus decision-making, distributed leadership, accountability across generations—can be reintegrated.
That reassessment mirrors the broader American moment. Both the United States and the Native Nations within it are working with inherited political systems that contain both strengths and exclusions.
Looking Forward Without Romanticizing the Past
There is a tendency, especially in anniversary moments, to look for simple narratives—either celebratory or critical. But the history of democracy on this land resists that simplicity.
Indigenous governance systems offer lessons, but they are not blueprints. They were shaped by specific cultural contexts and faced their own limitations. The U.S. system, similarly, has evolved over time while carrying forward its original contradictions.
What matters is not choosing one model over another but recognizing that the current system is not inevitable or necessarily complete.
At 250 years, the United States has an opportunity to reassess what it values in democracy—not just representation, but accountability; not just rights, but relationships; not just participation, but balance.
That same reassessment is happening, in different ways, within Native Nations navigating the legacy of imposed constitutional structures.
A More Grounded Anniversary
The United States did not invent democracy on this land. It adapted and reshaped ideas that were already present—while excluding key elements that contributed to their durability.
Acknowledging that does not diminish the American project. It clarifies and holds the promise to strengthen it.
A more honest accounting of the past—one that recognizes both influence and omission—can help guide what comes next: a democracy that is more inclusive, more accountable, and more responsive to the realities of the peoples and natural environments it now governs.
i https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2023/09/the-haudenosaunee-confederacy-and-the-constitution/; https://lawshun.com/article/when-did-the-haudenosaunee-signt-the-great-law-pf-peace
ii https://www.museumofindigenouspeople.org/post/indigenous-ideas-haudenosaunee-confederacy
iii https://blogs.loc.gov/law/2023/09/the-haudenosaunee-confederacy-and-the-constitution/
iv https://www.thefreelibrary.com/Cherokee+Women%3a+Gender+and+Culture+Change%2c+1700-1835.-a054176369; https://nativeamerican.mythologyworldwide.com/the-role-of-women-in-cherokee-spiritual-traditions/
v https://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/bison-books/9780803287600/cherokee-women/
