The Trail of Tears

The Trail of Tears: They Knew It Was Wrong

Part One

What was the justification used by the government to move Native Americans off their land?

The Indian Removal Act was signed in 1830 and gave power to the federal government to exchange land held by the natives. The land east of the Mississippi was cotton-rich, which was exchanged for land in the West. As part of the Louisiana Purchase, the US acquired the Indian Colonization Zone. The law required fair negotiation of treaties. The natives were not to be coerced into ceding their land. However, President Jackson defied this requirement and forcefully vacated the Natives. Manifest Destiny was a driving force where the Americans believed it was their God-given mandate to take as much territory as possible from the Indians.

What were the ways that the tribes affected attempted to fight removal?

When Major Ridge signed away land that belonged to the Cherokees, the Cherokee chief Ross gathered approximately 16,000 tribesmen. The tribesmen signed against the treaty, which was a move that proved that most of the tribesmen were against the treaty. The Cherokee government protested against the treaty’s legality. This protest went on up until 1838 when the US army, under the orders of President Martin van Buren, invaded Cherokee land. The Cherokees were held captive along with Ross and matched down the Trail of Tears.

How did individuals at the time respond to the movement of Native Americans off their land?

The early treaties between the Indian tribes and representative American agents offered a guarantee to the Indians, peace as well as preservation of the integrity of their land. This was done specifically to ensure that there was no interruption as regards the fur trade that had been very lucrative. However, because of the settlers’ greed for more land, violence and conflict erupted, and the proceeding treaties that were crafted compelled the Indians to give up their land to the government of the US.

The white settlers’ rationale for the forceful taking of Indian land was that the natives were majorly migratory hunters. As migratory hunters, they had no attachment to the land; their goal was only to follow game hunting. This reasoning ignored the fact that the tribes that lived on the southeastern side were farmers and had built their villages there. The settlers had already bought into the stereotype that Indians were wandering, savage, and hostile people.

Part Two

Which major U.S. cities are located within the areas that are described as “Ceded Lands”?

The major cities currently possessing ceded lands include Orlando in Florida, Memphis in Tennessee, and Atlanta in Georgia.

Is there a relationship between the ceded areas and major cities? If not, why might these areas have been determined to be desirable?

Yes, there is a relationship. These cities were once the territory referred to as the five civilized territories. These areas were deemed desirable for several reasons. For example, the Treaty of Saginaw was incentivized after some individuals had taken a tour of the Saginaw Valley. These individuals believed that the valley had a bright future, thus the need to secure land for speculation or settlement. In Georgia, tobacco and cotton were the main crops grown in the area, with cotton eventually becoming the main cash crop. Memphis also developed very fast because of the cotton farming in the area. In the early 1830s, nearly 125,000 native Indians lived in Florida, North Carolina, Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia. This was land that their ancestors had occupied for centuries. By the end of the century, there were only a few of these Indians who remained in the ancestral lands as the Americans vacated them to do cotton farming.

What problems can you think of that might have arisen due to the manner in which the Indian Reservation land were set up?

According to Surgis (2007), the daily living for the relocated native Indians was very difficult. It became nearly impossible for these displaced Indians to maintain their traditions and culture within a confined area. Tribes that had a history of feuds with each other were bundled together in the same area. Tribes that had long been hunters were now forced to do farming. The tribes were plagued with starvation. Also, living close to each other facilitated the easy spread of diseases that the white settlers had brought to the land. Further, native Indians were forced or encouraged to wear white settlers’ clothing and were taught how to read and write the English language. Lastly, Missionaries attempted to convert the Indians to become Christians and encouraged them to abandon their traditional spiritual beliefs.

Part Three

What is the relationship between the production of cash crops and the designation of certain tribes as “civilized?”

The Five Civilized Tribes referred to the Seminole Indians, Creek, Chickasaws, Choctaw, and Cherokee Native Indians. The US Department of Interior, through the Bureau of Indian Affairs, dealt with the five tribes as a unitary body (Zissu, 2014). Since the five tribes arrived, Oklahoma has had cotton as its main cash crop. The Choctaw first planted it in 1825 on both large and subsistence farms.

Other favorable areas for cotton farming were Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee, where the Creeks and the Cherokee grew the crop. Frank (2016) notes that the 19^th century made these lands accessible; the Indians had already created a life for themselves with cotton farming.

What tools did the Cherokee use to combat the State of Georgia’s attempts to rule over them and push them off their land?

The Cherokee government, led by John Ross, took steps to ensure that the Indian land was protected. Ross collaborated with Major Ridge and Charles Hicks to form the Cherokee Triumvirate. He later received recognition for playing a pivotal role in the 1819 treaty negotiations. As the constitutional convention president, Ross continued to take legal action against the forceful removal of Native Indians. The New Echota was in 1825, established as the capital and was located near the present-day city of Georgia-Calhoun. The Cherokee National Council advised the US that it would decline any requests for cession in the future. The council went ahead and enacted a law that prohibited the selling of national land. A contravention of this law would attract the death penalty. Hicks (2011) also adds that in 1827, a written constitution was adopted by the Cherokees, which antagonized those that were pro-removal of Natives from their land.

What was the result of the Cherokee’s efforts?

John Ross, on behalf of the Cherokees, petitioned the Supreme Court against the removal policy put in place by the US. Ross wanted the Supreme Court to protect the Cherokee land from trespasses from Georgia. In the 1831 case of Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, the Chief Justice ruled that the Natives were under the US tutelage and protection as they were a “domestic dependent nation.” The court failed to redress the grievances set by the Cherokees. In 1832, the Supreme Court declared, in its ruling of the Worcester v. Georgia case, the Cherokee Nation’s status of sovereignty. The court also ruled that the US had intruded wrongfully into the special relationship that the treaty created (Sturgis, 2007).

What was the functional relationship between Seminoles and Black Seminoles? Provide a detailed explanation of how this relationship can be described as symbiotic?

White visitors often referred to the Black Seminoles as enslaved people who worked for the Indian Natives. However, this was not a true depiction of the Black Seminoles’ relationship with the Seminoles. Although some of the rich Native Indians did own enslaved Black people, these were mainly the chiefs (Mulroy, 2007). Most times, the black Seminoles lived in their own designated land and would often interact with the Seminoles. The Black Seminoles sought protection from the Whites from the Native Indians (Porter, 1996). In exchange, the Black Seminoles would share some of their harvests. The tribute payment was minimal and could be as little as 10 bushels of harvest or a piece of meat from the hunted game (Katz, 2012). The relationship between the two was thus symbiotic.

References

Frank, A. K. (2016). Five Civilized Tribes. The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, 21.

Hicks, B. (2011). Toward the setting sun: John Ross, the Cherokees, and the Trail of Tears. Grove/Atlantic, Inc..

Katz, W. L. (2012). Black Indians: A hidden heritage. Simon and Schuster.

Mulroy, K. (2007). The Seminole Freedmen: A History (Vol. 2). University of Oklahoma Press.

Porter, K. W. (1996). The Black Seminoles: History of a Freedom-Seeking People, revised and edited by Alcione M. Amos and Thomas P. Senter (Gainesville: The University Press of Florida, 1996), 6.

Sturgis, A. H. (2007). The trail of tears and Indian removal. Greenwood Publishing Group.

Zissu, E. M. (2014). Blood matters: Five civilized tribes and the search of unity in the 20th century. Routledge.

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