He observed how decisions were actually made — which relationships mattered, which arguments were persuasive, which officials had genuine authority and which were figureheads whose apparent power was exercised by others.

He also observed the specific situation of Native delegations in Washington — the way they were received, the assumptions that officials brought to meetings with tribal leaders, the gap between the formal language of treaty relationships and the practical reality of how those relationships were administered.

The formal language spoke of sovereign-to-sovereign diplomacy between the United States and Native nations.

The practical reality was that Native delegations were supplicants in the capital of the far more powerful party to these relationships, and that the terms of engagement were set by the more powerful party on terms that primarily served the more powerful party’s interests.

Parker took all of this in.