Leadership Structure Quotes
In the Nez Perce and most other Native American societies, there were Chiefs and occasionally, for special circumstances, War Chiefs, but few if any other officials, thus producing a very flat, egalitarian society. But the whites had many layers of bureaucrats and petty officials. Governors, The President, Members of Congress, State Legislators, Generals, Sheriffs, Indian Agents, tax collectors, and the like. On the Papago Indian reservation, there was great difficulty on a construction project as even the concept of a work foreman was an uncomfortable notion. No Papago wanted to be directed or ordered about by anyone else even on a work gang. And do no one wanted to assume a position of authority or be responsive to a fellow other than the Chief and the tribal elders.
The Mohawk, as well as the other Iroquois nations had several interesting democratic elements to their governance system some of which Benjamin Franklin tried to introduce into Pennsylvania and nationally. Particularly interesting is the European perspective of the minister who describes the de facto requirement for a type of plebiscite ratification in derogatory terms referring to the people as “the mob”. Some have argued that at the time the most democratic nation on earth was the Iroquois nation.
