On the whole, the race is singularly uniform in its physical traits, and individuals taken from any part of the continent could easily be mistaken for inhabitants of numerous other parts.
This uniformity finds one of its explanations in the geographical features of the continent, which are such as to favor migrations in longitude, and thus prevent the diversity which special conditions in latitude tend to produce. The trend of the mountain chains and the flow of the great rivers in both South and North America generally follow the course of the great circles, and the migrations of native nations were directed by these geographic features. Nor has the face of the land undergone any serious alteration since man first occupied it. Doubtless in his early days the Laramie sea still covered the extensive depression in that part of our country, and it is possible that a subsidence of several hundred feet altered the present Isthmus of Panama into a chain of islands; but in other respects the continent between the fortieth parallels north and south has remained substantially the same since the close of the Tertiary Epoch.
Beyond all other criteria of a race must rank its mental endowments. These are what decide irrevocably its place in history and its destiny in time. Some who have personally studied the American race are inclined to assign its psychical potentialities a high rank. For instance, Mr. Horatio Hale hesitates not to say: “Impartial investigation and comparison will probably show that while some of the aboriginal communities of the American continent are low in the scale of intellect, others are equal in natural capacity, and possibly superior, to the highest of the Indo-European race.”43 This may be regarded as an extremely favorable estimate. Few will assent to it, and probably not many would even go so far as Dr. Amedée Moure in his appreciation of the South American Indians, which he expresses in these words: “With reference to his mental powers, the Indian of South America should be classed immediately after the white race, decidedly ahead of the yellow race, and especially beyond the African.”44
Such general opinions are interesting because both of them are the results of personal observations of many tribes. But the final decision as to the abilities of a race or of an individual must be based on actual accomplished results, not on supposed endowments. Thus appraised, the American race certainly stands higher than the Australian, the Polynesian or the African, but does not equal the Asian.
A review of the evidence bears out this opinion. Take the central social fact of government. In ancient America there are examples of firm and stable states, extending their sway widely and directed by definite policy. The league of the Iroquois was a thoroughly statesman-like creation, and the realm of Peru had a long and successful existence. That this mental quality is real is shown by the recent history of some of the Spanish-American republics. Two of them, Guatemala and Mexico, count among their ablest presidents in the present generation pure-blood American Indians.45 Or we may take up the arts. In architecture nothing ever accomplished by the Africans or Polynesians approaches the pre-Columbian edifices of the American continent. In the development of artistic forms, whether in stone, clay or wood, the American stands next to the white race. I know no product of Japanese, Chinese or Dravidian sculpture, for example, which exhibits the human face in greater dignity than the head in basalt figured by Humboldt as an Aztec priestess.46 The invention of a phonetic system for recording ideas was reached in Mexico, and is striking testimony to the ability of the natives. In religious philosophy there is ample evidence that the notion of a single incorporeal Ruler of the universe had become familiar both to Tezcucans and Kechuas previous to the conquest.
While these facts bear testimony to a good natural capacity, it is also true that the receptivity of the race for a foreign civilization is not great. Even individual instances of highly educated Indians are rare; and I do not recall any who have achieved distinction in art or science, or large wealth in the business world.
The culture of the native Americans strongly attests the ethnic unity of the race. This applies equally to the ruins and relics of its vanished nations, as to the institutions of existing tribes. Nowhere do we find any trace of foreign influence or instruction, nowhere any arts or social systems to explain which we must evoke the aid of teachers from the eastern hemisphere. The culture of the American race, in whatever degree they possessed it, was an indigenous growth, wholly self-developed, owing none of its germs to any other race, ear-marked with the psychology of the stock.
Furthermore, this culture was not, as is usually supposed, monopolized by a few nations of the race. The distinction that has been set up by so many ethnographers between “wild tribes” and “civilized tribes,” Jägervölker and Culturvölker, is an artificial one, and conveys a false idea of the facts. There was no such sharp line. Different bands of the same linguistic stock were found, some on the highest, others on the lowest stages of development, as is strikingly exemplified in the Uto-Aztecan family. Wherever there was a center of civilization, that is, wherever the surroundings favored the development of culture, tribes of different stocks enjoyed it to nearly an equal degree, as in central Mexico and Peru. By them it was distributed, and thus shaded off in all directions.
When closely analyzed, the difference between the highest and the average culture of the race is much less than has been usually taught. The Aztecs of Mexico and the Algonkins of the eastern United States were not far apart, if we overlook the objective art of architecture and one or two inventions. To contrast the one as a wild or savage with the other as a civilized people, is to assume a false point of view and to overlook their substantial psychical equality.
For these reasons American culture, wherever examined, presents a family likeness which the more careful observers of late years have taken pains to put in a strong light. This was accomplished for governmental institutions and domestic architecture by Lewis H. Morgan, for property rights and the laws of war by A. F. Bandelier, for the social condition of Mexico and Peru by Dr. Gustav Brühl, and I may add for the myths and other expressions of the religious sentiment by myself.47
In certain directions doubtless the tendency has been to push this uniformity too far, especially with reference to governmental institutions. Mr. Morgan’s assertions upon this subject were too sweeping. Nevertheless he was the first to point out clearly that ancient American society was founded, not upon the family, but upon the gens, totem or clan, as the social unit.48 The gens is “an organized body of consanguineal kindred” (Powell), either such in reality, or, when strangers have been adopted, so considered by the tribal conscience. Its members dwell together in one house or quarter, and are obliged to assist each other. An indeterminate number of these gentes, make up the tribe, and smaller groups of several of them may form “phratries,” or brotherhoods, usually for some religious purpose. Each gens is to a large extent autonomic, electing its own chieftain, and deciding on all questions of property and especially of blood-revenge, within its own limits. The tribe is governed by a council, the members of which belong to and represent the various gentes. The tribal chief is elected by this council, and can be deposed at its will. His power is strictly limited by the vote of the council, and is confined to affairs of peace. For war, a “war chief” is elected also by the council, who takes sole command. Marriage within the gens is strictly prohibited, and descent is traced and property descends in the female line only.
This is the ideal theory of the American tribal organization, and we may recognize its outlines almost anywhere on the continent; but scarcely anywhere shall we find it perfectly carried out. The gentile system is by no means universal, as I shall have occasion to point out; where it exists, it is often traced in the male line; both property and dignities may be inherited directly from the father; consanguine marriage, even that of brother and sister or father and daughter, though rare, is far from unexampled.49 In fact, no one element of the system was uniformly respected, and it is an error of theorists to try to make it appear so. It varied widely in the same stock and in all its expressions.50 This is markedly