The legal basis for enslaving California’s native people was effectively enshrined into law at the first session of the state legislature, where officials gave white settlers the right to take custody of Native American children. They were assisted by the government, which considered the so-called “Indian Problem” to be one of the biggest threats to its sovereignty. “Whites are becoming impressed with the belief that it will be absolutely necessary to exterminate the savages before they can labor much longer in the mines with security,” wrote the Daily Alta California in 1849, reflecting the prejudices of the day. And settlers themselves-motivated by bigotry and fear of Native peoples-were intent on removing the approximately 150,000 Native Americans who remained. For the state and federal government, it was imperative both to make room for new settlers and to lay claim to gold on traditional tribal lands. In 1848, California became the property of the United States as one of the spoils of the Mexican-American War. But before any of that, one of the new state’s first priorities was to rid itself of its sizeable Native American population, and it did so with a vengeance.Ĭalifornia’s native peoples had a long and rich history hundreds of thousands of Native Americans speaking up to 80 languages populated the area for thousands of years. Today, California’s genocide is one of the most heinous chapters in the state’s troubled racial history, which also includes forced sterilizations of people of Mexican descent and discrimination and internment of up to 120,000 people of Japanese descent during World War II. Sutter’s Mill, California, where John Augustus Sutter struck gold and accidentally started the gold rush.

Dangerous Waters by John S. Burnett