#64 The Trail of Tears Video Notesskip 4-5 lines between each question

1. Describe the Cherokee and their lands:2. Why were the Cherokee moved off of their lands?3. What was the Trail of Tears?

How did the denial of rights affect the Cherokee?

HW: Finish #64 DBQ for WedsThursday Quiz on Unit 5

1. What ideas led to conflict between the US and Native American Tribes?

2. How did the denial of rights affect Native Americans?

As the population grew, the

colonists pushed farther

west into the territories

occupied by the American

Indians.

Inevitably,

this

movement

led to

clashes

over land.

Native American Assimilation in the

US:President

Washington urged Indians to adopt

white culture (farming, English,

Christianity, …)

1. By the time Andrew Jackson became

President in 1829, the native population

east of the Mississippi River had

dwindled to 125,000.

In contrast, the non-Indians population had risen to 13 million.

2. President Jackson’s Indian Policy• Most Americans and their state governments believed that the US should

be settled by US citizens and not Indians/Native Americans.

• President Jackson urged Congress to pass the Indian Removal Act of 1830

• Indians would be granted land west of the Mississippi River (Oklahoma)

• The 5 Civilized Tribes in the southern US, had begun to assimilate, embrace and conform US society. They lived in cabins, farmed cotton, attended school, and many learned the English language.

• They all signed treaties with the US government that gave up some of their lands in exchange for guarantees that they would keep the rest.

• The Cherokee developed their own written language, wrote their own constitution, elected their leaders, and printed a newspaper in both English and Cherokee.

3. 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.”

4. The Supreme Court and Chief Justice John

Marshall ruled in Worcester vs. Georgia that the

Cherokee could keep their lands because of

earlier federal treaties.

Furthermore, the court ruled the treaty was an

agreement between two nations and couldn’t be

overruled by Georgia.

Georgia ignored the court’s ruling. President

Jackson refused to enforce the ruling. He

remarked,

“Well, John Marshall has made his decision,

now let him enforce it”.

5. 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?

6. In 1838, the

Georgia militia was

ordered to force the

Cherokee out of

Georgia.

17,000 Cherokees

were brutally rounded

up and marched to

Indian territory in

Oklahoma.

As many as 4,000

died along the “Trail of Tears”.

National Park Service Presentationon The Trail of Tears

Part 1 (18:35) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiJ5HYEaY48&feature=channel

Part 2 (4:35) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVekk7VTgFA&feature=channel

• The U.S. failed to adopt a consistent policy towards Native American tribes during the early 19th century, but, generally, Americans agreed that Indians in Eastern states needed to be moved west of the Mississippi so that Eastern lands could be developed by whites. The only real issue was how rapidly this should be done and by what means. By the 1830s, the state of Georgia was upset that the federal government had not removed the Cherokee Indians who lived within Georgia, and the state took steps to remove the Cherokee on their own.

• Worcester v. Georgia (1832)

• In 1832, the U.S. Supreme Court led by Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that state laws could not be applied to Indians. This ruling, in essence, denied that the state of Georgia had the power to remove the Cherokee from their land in Georgia. As you read, think about why the court ruled as it did.

• The defendant is a State [Georgia], a member of the Union, which has exercised the powers of government over a people who deny its jurisdiction, and are under the protection of the United States..... We must inquire whether the act of the Legislature of Georgia...be consistent with, or repugnant to the Constitution, laws and treaties of the United States. It has been said at bar that the acts of the Legislature of Georgia seize on the whole Cherokee country, parcel it out among the neighboring counties of the State, extend her [law] to the whole country, abolish its institutions and laws, and annihilate its political existence....The very passage of this act [by Georgia] is an assertion of jurisdiction over the Cherokee Nation....

• From the commencement of our government Congress has passed acts to regulate trade and intercourse with the Indians; which treat them as nations, [and] respect their rights....

The Cherokee nation, then, is a distinct community, occupying its own territory... in which the laws of Georgia have no force.... The Acts of Georgia are repugnant to the Constitution, laws, and treaties of the United States. They interfere forcibly with the relations established between the United States and the Cherokee Nation, the regulation of which according to the settled principles of our Constitution, are committed exclusively to the government of the Union.

• Andrew Jackson, "The Removal of Southern Indians..." (1835)

• President Jackson opposed the Supreme Court’s ruling in Worcester v. Georgia and refused to enforce it, saying, "Mr. Marshall has made his decision now let him enforce it." In the end, the Cherokee were removed by gun point to the Indian Territory of Oklahoma. Thousands of Cherokee died in transit; the event is now known as the Trial of Tears.

• As you read Jackson's statement on Indian Removal, think about why Jackson favored permitting Georgia to remove the Cherokee. In what sense was Jackson’s stance consistent with the ideology of his Democratic Party?

• The condition and ulterior design of the Indian tribes within some of our States have become objects of much interest and importance.... Professing a desire to civilize and settle them we have, at the same time lost no opportunity to purchase their lands and thrust them farther into the wilderness. By this means they have not only been kept in a wandering state, but led to look upon us as unjust and indifferent to their fate. [Thus], government has constantly defeated its own policy... [and the Indians] have retained their savage habits.... [Some] states claiming to be the only sovereigns within their territories, extended their laws over the Indians, which induced the latter to call upon the United States for their protection....

• Georgia became a member of the confederacy which eventuated in our Federal Union as a sovereign State, always asserting her claim to certain limits,... was admitted to the Union on the same footing as the original States. There is no constitutional, conventional or legal provision which allows them less power over the Indians within their borders than is possessed by Maine or New York. Would the people of Maine permit the Penobscot tribe to erect an independent government within their State?.... Could the Indians establish a separate republic [in Ohio]? And if they were so disposed would it be the duty of the [federal] government to protect them in their attempt? If the principle involved in the obvious answer to this question be abandoned, it would follow that the objects of this government are reversed, and it has become part of its duty to aid in destroying the States which it was established to protect....

• Our conduct towards these people is deeply interesting to our national character. Their present condition... makes a most powerful appeal to our sympathies... Surrounded by the whites with their arts of civilization, which by destroying the resources of the savage doom him to weakness and decay.... This fate surely awaits them if they remain within the limits of the States.... Humanity and national honor demand that every effort should be made to avert so great a calamity. A state cannot be dismembered by Congress or restricted in the exercise of her constitutional power.... The people of those States and of every State, actuated by feelings of justice and a regard for our national honor, submit to you the interesting question whether something cannot be done, consistent with the rights of the States, to preserve this much injured race.

• As a means of effecting this end I suggest... setting apart an ample district west of the Mississippi, and without the limits of any State or Territory now formed, to be guaranteed to the Indian tribes as long as they shall occupy it.... There the benevolent may endeavor to teach them the arts of civilization, and by promoting union and harmony among them... attest to the humanity and justice of this government."