Indian Removal Act Research Paper

“The Indian Removal Acts”

Imagine in today’s society, all of a certain minority being sent to Maine against their will while the public was cheering it on. It is incredibly immoral to do such a thing; yet in the early 1800’s this is basically what happened to the Cherokee Nation of Indians. Starting in 1814, Andrew Jackson wanted to move the Cherokee Indians from their ancestral homeland of North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama, to the present day state of Oklahoma. The Indian Nations traveled through the Trail of Tears to get to their forced new territory. They traveled in many different ways of transportation such as foot, horse, and wagon. Though many are informed of the horror of the Indian Removal Acts, the public seemed
to have encourage it and not care about the condition of the Indians that were being moved which was as tragic as any part of American History. The public’s view of the Indian Removal Act was very lenient.
They did not protest or object the cruel things that Andrew Jackson was doing. Some of the cruel things being; treating Indians poorly, destroying the bank, and threatening to kill his vice president. The main reason for their carelessness was that they in fact wanted the Indians to leave. The main reasons for them wanting the Indians to leave was more shelter, more land, and more job opportunities. As they were kicking the Natives out of their homes, just moments later new, white, Americans moved right in as the Native families watch another family move into their house (Corby). Today, we can prove that the public promptly did not care about the Natives because they kept their president, Andrew Jackson, in office as the acts were being passed. In the Election of 1832, Jackson won by a landslide with 219 electoral votes. The second place loser, Henry Clay, received only 49 electoral votes (1832 Presidential Election). Obviously, if anyone wanted to change what was going on, Andrew Jackson would not have stayed in
office. The government had a prominent role in the Indian Removal Acts. The leader of it all was President Andrew Jackson. Out of all of the eleven treaties signed to move the southern tribes, Andrew Jackson signed nine of them(PBS.org). The tribes agreed to the terms so they could avoid problems such as harassment, and hopefully maintain some of their land and also for strategic reasons. Jackson’s attitude toward Native Americans was patronizing, he described the Natives as children in need of guidance; he also believe the removal policy was beneficial to the Indians(PBS.org). Although, the leader, Andrew Jackson was in charge of the government, the entire government did not support everything that was being done. In rage of everything that was being done, the Cherokee Nation took a case to court opposing one of Jackson’s bill to move the Indians out west. After the trial, the Cherokee won the case in favor of nine votes to zero. To show Jackson’s power, a quote used by him was “The Supreme Court has made their decision, now let me see them try to enforce it.”(learnliberty.org). This showed a failure of the checks and balance system. In order to bribe the Indians out of their homeland, the government promised the Indians things such as money, land, and freedom once they got out to their new home in present day Oklahoma. When the Indians got their however, they got nothing in return and were stuck with nothing out west. On top of the government sending them away, the government would indeed give them land to live on. They would be deceitful and put rival tribes close to one another to cause tension between the two. This would make the Native population decrease even more as wars would break out. In the eyes of the Natives, this was terrible as one may assume. Some of the tribes listened to the government and signed treaties with no argument, but others did not go away as easy as the government preferred. Not many tribes took action to stop this, but the ones who did were still unsuccessful. Even though the Cherokee won their court case, nothing was done in their favor. Other southern tribes such as the Creek, Seminole, Chicasaw, and Chictow also were against the acts. The Creek nation was forced out because the Secretary of War said it was a military necessity (pbs.org). This is one of the many nations that did not seem to fight back with the government; no removal treaties were ever signed (pbs.org). By 1837, 15,000 Creek Indians moved out west by order of the government. The Chicasaw group realized that there was no way around the movement, and without any protest, signed a Treaty in 1832. The treaty stated that the federal government would provide them with valuable land they would be able to live easily with (pbs.org). The plan of the Chicasaw of appeasing to the government backfired when the War Department ended up backing down on its promise. Since so many Natives were sent from one place to another, a common trail was traveled to get to the destination of present day Oklahoma. The terrible trail is called the Trail of Tears; nearly 125,000 Natives traveled this path (history.com). This trail covered 2,200 miles of land and sea. The Cherokee were the most known for their view on the Trail of Tears. They had two very different views on leaving their territory however, one side wanted to stay and fight, while the other side wanted to just appease to the government and accept the money and land they were offered for leaving (history.com). A soldier of the name John G. Burnett was acquainted with the Cherokee after he had spent a lot of time hunting and traveling with the tribe. He stated that the day the tribe was forced out was very hard and even quoted that “One can never forget the sadness and solemnity of that morning.” (learnnc.org). During their journey, on the day of March 26th, 1839, a horrific snow and sleet storm hit them hard, and the sufferings of the Cherokee were hard to see. Another thing said by Burnett was that “It was a trail of death”, which really goes to show that so many people lost their life because of the governments cruel enforcement of moving the Native Americans out west. The trail is said to have killed around 4,000 Cherokee. It was said that up to one third of the Cherokee nation was killed (learnliberty.org). As one may know, there are still remaining Cherokee tribes around today. They are scarred from this time of American History. They see it as unconstitutional, unjust, and are very upset on the fact that nothing was done in their favor. Many may not know that the Cherokee has their own government now and lives in areas such as Nevada, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico (cherokee.org)
So as one may see, there were many different views on the Indian Removal Acts and the government was a major cause.
Not many of the citizens in the public seemed to care about how the Indians were treated and nothing was done to stop treating them poorly. The people did not try and get rid of the main person who leads it all, Andrew Jackson, they kept him in office and did not speak out against anything he did over his eight years in office. As most can see, the Indian Removal Acts were completely unconstitutional and were a very bad time in the years of America. The government was corrupt under “King Andrew” and it lead to many innocent deaths. This time is looked down on but can not be forgotten. The government America has today ensures that nothing like this could ever happen again.

Works Cited
"10.8 A Soldier Recalls the Trail of Tears." A Soldier Recalls the Trail of Tears. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May 2013.
"1832 Presidential Election." Presidential Election of 1832. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2013.
Corby, Thomas P. "Chapter 13." Indian Removal Acts. Lecture.
"The Indian Removal Act of 1830." The Indian Removal Act of 1830. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 May 2013.
"Indian Removal." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 10 May 2013.
"Our Government." Our Government. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May 2013.
"The Trail of Tears and the Forced Relocation of the Cherokee Nation." Www.nps.org. N.p., n.d. Web.
"Trail of Tears." History.com. A&E Television Networks, n.d. Web. 12 May 2013.
"The Trail of Tears:
They Knew It Was Wrong | LearnLiberty." The Trail of Tears: They Knew It Was Wrong | LearnLiberty. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May 2013.