It's up to you now

Pictured is the treaty with the Delaware Indians

Chief Seattle gives his address shortly before the purchase of his tribe’s lands and territory by the United States of America.  He reminds his people of the overwhelming tide of the ‘palefaces’ sweeping over their lands with powerful imagery.  His most commonly used tool in his rhetoric is imagery and simile.  He connects the powerful struggles in nature with his own people’s trial as they are overcome by the invading white men.  With these natural and even elemental comparisons, it is easy to relate with the native tribe as they are overpowered by these forces. 

At first, it was difficult to identify who his chief audience was because in the beginning he talks as though he is speaking to the tribe itself and it alone.   However, as the speech progresses it becomes apparent that perhaps his main audience is not his own tribe but the white man.  Throughout the dialog, he makes a terrifying case for the white man’s future as he supposes that the same fateful Nemesis that has stalked the red man will soon overtake the white man.  Justice he says will be served to the white man for their treatment of the red. 

His greatest argument was made in the allusion that the degree to which red men and white men are brothers under God depends on the degree to which the treat each other like such.  Essentially he says, “The test of your belief in our brotherhood is how you treat my people.”  All his rhetoric is designed to appeal to both the white man’s reverence and moral sense in order to insure his people’s fair treatment and protection.