First Explorers, Treaties, and Settlers
 

The first explorers from France and England came to the Americas during the 1500s. Their governments assumed that the parts of North America they claimed became their colonies and that they had sovereignty over the land. 

France and England negotiated and signed treaties in Europe to divide up their claims to North America.  The Wabanaki People were never asked to agree to these treaties and their legal concepts and political objectives were ignored.  

When English and French settlers arrived in North America during the early 1600s, many of them settled land without the permission of the Wabanaki People. This was particularly true of the English. 

The English colonial government in New England made laws requiring people to acquire land by deed or purchase.  Although French law never required deeds or treaties for acquisition of land, French settlers who failed to gain Wabanaki permission violated European principles of international law that acknowledged Native land rights, if not their rights of sovereignty.