In this episode, Peter and Steve take a close look at a document most people assume they already understand: the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Steve traces how he first stumbled onto the question at the 2023 Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago, where a line in the Declaration's preamble caught his eye and was waved off by the panelists. That line says human rights should be protected by the rule of law "if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression." Tyranny and oppression, as Steve points out, are simply two synonyms for domination.

The conversation then turns to what the drafters wrote before they wrote that. The first draft, dated June 4, 1947, had no preamble at all. Its Article 29 was a single sentence: "Everyone has the right, either individually or with others, to resist oppression and tyranny." Eighteen months later, when the Declaration was adopted on December 10, 1948, that sentence was gone. In its place stood three clauses about duties to the community, limitations "determined by law," and a prohibition on exercising rights "contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations." A right to resist became a duty to obey, with rebellion demoted to a last resort after every procedure and tribunal has been exhausted.

Peter and Steve ask what that reversal reveals. The United States and France, whose revolutions were premised on exactly the right the 1947 draft affirmed, were central to producing a final text that folds resistance into a complaint system administered by the state. From there the discussion widens: what is a "right," what is "the state," what is a "person"? These are ideas treated as if they were physical realities, and yet real people in bureaucracies embody them and enforce them. Steve draws on the 1608 Calvin's Case, in which English judges declared allegiance was owed not to England or the crown but to the person of the king, to show how the whole structure rests on a mental world of projected relationships.

The episode closes on the View from the Shore. Steve reconsiders the language of "dehumanization," suggesting that the projection of "heathen," "pagan," and "infidel" onto Native ancestors was the dehumanizing step, while the brutal "humanizing" process, the California missions being one example, was the forcing of those ancestors under the domination system. If "person" comes from the Greek word for mask, then a right to personhood is a right to an identity card issued by the state. As Peter's t-shirt puts it: Land of the Free. Some restrictions apply. Void where prohibited.

Listen for a conversation that reads the fine print on human rights from the vantage point of those who were never asked to sign.

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In this episode, Peter d’Errico interviews Steve Newcomb about a May 2026 Catholic bishops’ symposium on the Doctrine of Discovery in Edmonton, Alberta. Steve reflects on the event, the call to revoke Inter Caetera, and the danger of language that hides domination behind softer terms such as “discovery,” “renunciation,” and “reconciliation.”

In this episode of Domination Chronicles, Steven T. Newcomb and Peter d’Errico explore why “domination” has become a slogan instead of a serious inquiry—and why language, law, history, and power must be carefully unpacked.

In this episode, Steven T. Newcomb and Peter d’Errico return to one of the most repeated phrases in federal Indian law and public advocacy: “tribal sovereignty.” But what does the phrase actually mean within the legal framework of the United States?

Steve and Peter argue that “tribal sovereignty” is an oxymoron when it is defined by federal anti-Indian law as “limited sovereignty” or as sovereignty that the United States has not yet extinguished. Drawing on definitions of sovereignty from Jean Bodin and Sterling Edmonds, they explain that sovereignty means a claim of supreme and unlimited authority. If Native nations are said to be sovereign only to the extent that the United States permits, then the phrase no longer describes free and independent existence. It describes domination.

The conversation turns to Felix Cohen’s Handbook of Federal Indian Law, often treated as the “Bible” of federal Indian law, and examines how its framework converts original Native independence into a legal system of U.S. supremacy. Steve and Peter also discuss treaty rights, land claims, religious freedom, consultation, “federal lands,” and the danger of accepting the opponent’s premise.

The episode concludes with a discussion of the Pe’ Sla / Black Hills drilling controversy and how legal and environmental advocacy can unintentionally reproduce the very domination framework it seeks to resist.

Resources mentioned:

Felix Cohen, Handbook of Federal Indian Law

Pe’ Sla drilling analysis

Complaint filed in the Pe’ Sla case

Today we deep dive into the legal and philosophical foundations of the "federal Indian law trust doctrine." We argue that the term "trust" is a euphemism for a relationship of domination rather than a protective legal obligation.

A deep conversation between hosts Steven Newcomb and Peter d'Errico and guest Loretta Afraid of Bear-Cook, about the preservation of Oglala Lakota traditions, the power of indigenous language, and the resistance against systems of domination and modern convenience.

Attorney Mark Savage joins us in this episode for a provocative discussion of the US claim of “plenary power” over Native nations and peoples. In the early 1990’s (!), Mark authored two seminal law review articles showing that the doctrine of “plenary power” has no basis in the US Constitution. In November 2025, in a dramatic move at the Supreme Court, two justices took the same stance!

Historian and lawyer Bruce McIvor joins us in this episode for a deep dive into how Canada’s colonizing legal system continues to attack First Nations with laws and policies dressed up in the

latest costume of “reconciliation”. Bruce is a member of the Manitoba Métis Federation, descended from the Red River Métis. His law firm, First Peoples Law, represents Indigenous Peoples across the continent.