We hear a good deal of talk these days about indigenous people and especially how us white folks have abused them and destroyed their peaceful 'Noble Savage' existence. More on that another time.

What is little understood and almost completely unappreciated is that all of us originated on the African Savannah.

The populations of every place on the planet migrated at some point to where they now reside. 

For example the American Indian tribes arrived in America around 15,000 BCE, crossing the Bering Land Bridge from Asia. There were other such migrations around 8,000 BCE.

The point is that they were not originally from here and thus are migrants like the rest of us.

I will concede that those Asian migrants were likely the first to arrive here and therefore did not need to deprive any previous inhabitants of their property.

That having been said the earliest arrivers could be considered homesteaders if they claimed a specific territory as their home. If such were indeed the case they could not morally be removed from such places without compensation agreeable to them as was the case with the Lenape Indians who sold Manhattan to the Dutchman Peter Minuit for the equivalent of $24.00. The Lenape sold the land cheaply since they believed that it was hunted out.

One difficulty one encounters when discussing this issue is that most Indian tribes were nomadic calling no specific place their home.