Native Americans suffered near extinction as a result of the European “discovery” of their lands. Before European contact in 1492, an estimated 5 million people lived in what is now the continental United States.6 By 1900, 95 percent of the precontact population had been wiped out by European-borne diseases, war, forced relocation, forced labor, dietary changes, and other causes related to European colonialism.7 The Europeans who colonized North America and their descendants also waged cultural genocide against the Native Americans over the next five centuries, attempting to force Native
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