### Menu

- [Home](/)

- [About](/about/) [Contact](/contact/)

- [Open Access](/open-access/)

- [Peer Review](/peer-review/)

- [Editorial Board](/editors/)

- [Journal Archive](/archives/)

- [News](/blog/)

- [Religious Theory](/religioustheory/)

- [Search](/search/)

- [Submissions](/submissions/)

### The New Polis

                    ![The New Polis is an online publication dedicated to critical theory, social analysis, and political philosophy and theology.](https://files.jcrt.org/images/tnp.webp)

The New Polis is an online publication dedicated to critical theory, social analysis, and political philosophy and theology.

                    ![The New Polis Journal is a peer-reviewed academic journal publishing cutting-edge work in political philosophy, social theory, and related fields.](https://files.jcrt.org/images/tnpj.webp)

The New Polis Journal is a peer-reviewed academic journal publishing cutting-edge work in political philosophy, social theory, and related fields.

	Whitestone Foundation

### Get in touch

The Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory (JCRT) is a publication of The Whitestone Foundation, a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation registered in the state of Colorado.

[Contact Us](/contact/)

---

[Built with Eleventy](https://www.11ty.dev/) | Design: [HTML5 UP](https://html5up.net/) | Maintained by [Adam DJ Brett](https://adamdjbrett.com) | [Credits](/credits/)

[Listed at Duotrope](https://duotrope.com/magazine/journal-cultural-religious-theory-20464?ref=lst-7vbKB-7r3u0g8&pc=L-7VBKB)

        JCRT
        The Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory

      JCRT

          The Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory

- [Home](/)

- [Archives](/archives/)

- [25.1](/archives/25.1/)

- Article No. 01

# Federal Anti-indian Law: Why a Challenge to “Christian Discovery” Creates a Metaphysical Crisis for the US

            Peter d'Errico
            University of Massachusetts Amherst

               April 16, 2026

                 |  doi.org/10.17613/ne2n8-jy368

               Download Article

               Download Citation (RIS)

               Download Citation (JSON)

## Table of Contents

The legal doctrine of “Christian Discovery” remains the foundation of United States federal anti-Indian law, yet it is rarely challenged directly in litigation. This essay argues that confronting the doctrine poses not merely a legal challenge but a metaphysical crisis for the United States itself. Through close analysis of the nineteenth-century “Marshall Trilogy”—*Johnson v. McIntosh*, *Cherokee Nation v. Georgia*, and *Worcester v. Georgia*—the essay demonstrates that federal Indian law is grounded in an explicit claim of Christian European land appropriation and a corresponding denial of Indigenous sovereignty.

The essay critiques common misreadings of these cases that treat dicta about Native “occupancy,” “guardianship,” or “trust” as affirmations of Indigenous rights. Instead, it shows how such language functions rhetorically to obscure the doctrine’s central purpose: legitimizing U.S. ownership of Indigenous lands and plenary power over Indigenous peoples. Situating Christian Discovery within a broader jurisprudential framework, the essay argues that land appropriation is the primeval legal act from which U.S. property law, sovereignty, and territorial authority derive.

By comparing *Brown v. Board of Education* with *Tee-Hit-Ton v. United States*, the essay highlights how the Court embraced racial equality while reaffirming colonial domination. It concludes by urging litigators to directly challenge Christian Discovery, arguing that avoidance perpetuates a system of domination sustained by legal formalism and reformist rhetoric.

© the author(s). Free to read; see the [copyright notice](/copyright/) for reuse terms.

          Keywords:

            indigenous-sovereignty

            indigenous-peoples

            colonization

            colonial-domination

            racial-equality

            anti-indian-law

            legal-formalism

            christian-discovery

            us-property-law

            territorial-authority

            indigenous-rights

            Share Openly

[The Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory (JCRT)](https://jcrt.org) is an online, peer-reviewed, academic publication published by [The Whitestone Foundation](http://thewhitestonefoundation.org/), a 501c3 corporation located in Boulder, Colorado. ISSN 1530-5228. Articles are open access under a [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) license; authors retain copyright. Indexed by [EBSCO](https://www.ebsco.com/). Listed with [Duotrope](https://duotrope.com/magazine/journal-cultural-religious-theory-20464?ref=lst-7vbKB-7r3u0g8&pc=L-7VBKB). Website © The Whitestone Foundation dba The Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory 1999-2026.

[JCRT](https://jcrt.org/) | [The New Polis Journal](https://journal.thenewpolis.com/) | [The New Polis](https://thenewpolis.com/) | [Esthesis](https://esthesis.org/) | [Wild Globalization](https://wildglobalization.com/) | [The Whitestone Foundation](https://thewhitestonefoundation.org/)

[The Whitestone Foundation](https://thewhitestonefoundation.org/)