Indian Removal Act Essay

Indian Removal Act “Like rain, the tears of anguish fell, sad moments locked in time …. Where each tear fell, as some will tell, will be seen a Cherokee rose,” (“A Cherokee Rose” by Rick Brown), tells that thousands of Cherokees were forced out of their homes and start heading west, during the trip to Oklahoma at least 4,000 Cherokee died. Many Cherokees died suffering through cruel and unfair government. In 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed the Indian Removal Act, which was a law that forced Native Americans out of their land. In 1838 to 1839, 16,000 Cherokees were forced to walk 600 miles from Georgia to Oklahoma. The Cherokees did try to rebel against the United States government but it didn’t go as well as planned. President Jackson
When entering a new territory, the Cherokees did not just have a conflict with the Native Americans who already lived there but the Cherokees also had to handle the Old Settlers which is a group of Cherokees who moved west in 1835. To demonstrates, “When John Ross arrived at his new homeland, he found himself struggling with the Old Settlers,” (Elish [Page 28]). This shows that, even after the long and difficult journey walking to Oklahoma, the Cherokees still had a hard time surviving. It is important to realize that after the Treaty of New Echota was signed and the Old Settlers had moved away, the tension between the Cherokees and the Old settlers hasn’t stopped. To illustrate, Elish states, “There was genuine threat of Cherokees civil war,” (Page 86). This is significant because their disagreement was so awful that they had to solve it by having a war. In this shows that, after the war ended many Native Americans certainly did not survive, the population was already reducing but after the war, many lives have lost, even more. Therefore, it was not just the Trail of Tears that killed thousands of Cherokees there were other tough challenges the Cherokees had to face