The True Story of the Louisiana Purchase Is One of Shameful Plunder of Native American Lands

Slate logo Sign In Sign Up SlateHistoryThen, again.March 1 2017 5:45 AM The United States didn’t buy a huge tract of land from France. It bought the right to displace Native Americans from that land. By Robert Lee Wikimedia Commons/White House Historical Association It’s a familiar chapter in our history, part of the triumphant narrative of westward expansion: In 1803, the United States bought a massive chunk of North America, and we got it for a song. Spain had ceded the Louisiana Territory to France, and Napoleon, in turn, offloaded it to American diplomats in Paris after the Haitian Revolution ruined his plans for the New World. Vaguely defined at the time as the western watershed of the Mississippi River, and later pegged at about 827,000 square miles, the acquisition nearly doubled the national domain for a mere $15 million, or roughly $309 million in today’s dollars. Divide the area by the price and you get the Louisiana Purchase’s celebrated reputation as one of the greatest rea...