Conflict in American History

            Conflict is the epicenter of history. Whether it is ancient times or within the past decade. From right here on the eastern coast of the United States of America all the way to the other side of the globe and everywhere in between. Conflict is what creates and annihilates the different entities that exist in the world throughout history. This course focuses mainly on American history from its' beginnings up until 1877 so for the purpose of this paper I will only discuss conflict from this time period and region, though it should be noted that conflict is a theme that covers much more than just that. I will discuss conflict's role in the original settling of America, the conflict involved in the American Revolution, and finally the conflict that resulted in the civil war. .
             Conflict is what America was really created on if you look at the broad picture. Sure the original settlers came seeking riches and religious freedoms and it is all very glamorized when the story is told, but the underlying conflict is definitely there. It is common knowledge that when the settlers arrived in the Americas it was not a barren land with no inhabitants, there were already people settled there. Native Americans occupied the land in North America as far as 15,000-20,000 years ago, there were even bands of these people living there during the Ice Age. The settlers that would become the first real "American" people did not arrive until 1492, which, in comparison with the Ice Age, is fairly recent. When they arrived and found these people already living off of the land that they intended to claim for themselves, this resulted in what could probably be referred to as the first American conflict. The American Indian Wars were the set of conflicts between the new American settlers and the Native American people from their initial arrival all the way until as late as 1890. Most of these quarrels were local and compact between small groups of colonists and individual tribes of Native Americans; they were usually over some kind of resource or over the expansion of the population onto already claimed territories.