INDIAN REMOVAL IN THE UNITED STATES

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INDIAN REMOVAL IN THE UNITED STATES
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As the population grew, the colonists pushed
farther west into the territories occupied by the
American Indians.
3
Inevitably, this movement led to clashes over
land.
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Summary Indian Wars (Prior 1763)

• Warfare between Europeans and Native Americans
  was common in 17th century
• Powhatan Confederacy attack on Jamestown 1622
• Pequot War 1636 37
• King Philips War 1675 1676
• Native Americans were also involved in imperial
  rivalries of the 18th century
• French and Indian War 1754 1763
• American Revolution 1776 1783
• During 18th century, European colonists were
  pushing west and causing conflicts (English,
  French and Spanish)
• Most tribes/nations saw the colonists as bigger
  threat than the government, which were often
  unable to control their colonists

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How did the Proclamation of 1763 attempt to solve
this problem? Was it successful?
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Native American/Settler Conflicts after 1783

• Little Turtle 1790
• Tecumseh Battle of Tippecanoe 1811
• Great Britain encouraged Native raids on white
  settlements
• Battle at Horseshoe Bend 1814 (Andrew Jackson)
• First Seminole War
• New direction in policy REMOVAL
• Began with Seminole Indians to lands west of
  Mississippi River
• Leads to additional wars with the Seminole Nation
  (1835 42 and 1855 58)
• Black Hawks War (1831 1832) Illinois and Wis.
  removal west of Mississippi River

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By the time Andrew Jackson became President in
1829, the native population east of the
Mississippi River had dwindled to 125,000.
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In contrast, the non-Indians population had risen
to 13 million.
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Jackson saw Indian Removal as an opportunity to
provide for the needs of the white farmers and
businessmen. He also claimed that removal was
also in the best interest of the Indians. Why?
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Jackson to the Indians Where you now are, you
and my white children are too near to each other
to live in harmony and peace. Your game is gone,
and many of your people will not work and till
the earth. . . The land beyond the Mississippi
belongs to the President and no one else, and he
will give it to you forever.
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Many members of the Five Civilized Tribes
(including the Cherokee, Creeks, Choctaws,
Chickasaws, and Seminoles) wanted to stay in
their lands east of the Mississippi River.
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How did the Five Civilized Tribes try to avoid
removal?
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1. Adopted farming life style 2. Began to
receive formal education 3. Had own written
language 4. Established their own newspaper
(Cherokee Phoenix)  5.  Adopted white mans
idea of black slavery established plantations
14
How did Georgia begin the removal process of the
Cherokee and the other members of the Five
Civilized tribes within its border?
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In an agreement with the federal government, the
State of Georgia gave up claims to large tracts
of western land in exchange for the federal
government negotiating treaties for Indian
removal.
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Throughout the late 1820s, legal conflict over
ownership of Cherokee lands led the issue to the
halls of the U.S. Supreme Court.
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How do you think the Supreme Court decided?
Why?
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The Supreme Court and Chief Justice John Marshall
ruled the Cherokee could keep their lands because
of earlier federal treaties.
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Furthermore, the court ruled the treaty was an
agreement between two nations and couldnt be
overruled by Georgia.
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What do you think President Jackson and the
Georgia did next?
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Georgia ignored the courts ruling. President
Jackson refused to enforce the ruling. He
remarked, Well, John Marshall has made his
decision, now let him enforce it.
22
As part of the Indian Removal Act of 1830,
federal agents misled tribal leaders into signing
removal treaties with the government.
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In 1838, the Georgia militia was ordered to force
the Cherokee out of Georgia.
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17,000 Cherokees were brutally rounded up and
marched to Indian territory in Oklahoma.
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When I past the last detachment of those
suffering exiles and thought that my native
countrymen had thus expelled them from their
native soil and their much loved homes, and that
too in this harsh season of the year in all
their suffering, I turned from the sight with
feelings which language cannot express and wept
like childhood then. Adopted from A Native of
Maine, traveling in the Western Country in New
York Observer, Jan. 26, 1839 as found in Indian
Removal The Emigration of the Five Civilized
Tribes of Indians by Grant Foreman
(NormanUniversity of Oklahoma Press, 1972).
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As many as 4,000 died along the Trail of Tears.
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I fought through the Civil War and have seen men
shot to pieces and slaughtered by the thousands,
but the Cherokee removal was the cruelest work I
ever knew. Georgia Soldier involved in
removal process
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The Indian Wars 1860s 1890s

• Conflicts continued between Native American
  groups and non-Natives, often with the US
  Government taking on the role of enforcer.
• The new policy was assimilation which meant
  that Native Americans were given land
  (reservations) on which to farm in the American
  fashion (individual, not communal) and expected
  to dress and behave as Americans (religion,
  art, food, etc.)
• Example Treaty of Laramie (1851)
• Impact of the railroads Buffalo were killed by
  shooters sponsored by RR to clear the plains so
  that tracks could be laid. Severely impacted the
  livelihood of most Plains Indians.
• Mining companies also wanted access to Indian
  lands.
• Increasing demand for land as immigration rates
  increase after Civil War.

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Readings

• Images from Deadwood
• Read Chapter 13, sec 1 pgs 408 414
• Look for
• Impact of the Gold Rush
• Massacre at Sand Creek
• Sitting Bull
• George Custer and Buffalo Bill Cody
• Battle of Little Big Horn (1876)
• Dawes Act 1887
• Battle of Wounded Knee 1890