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Andrew Jackson's Second State of the Union Address
Written in 1830
It gives me pleasure to announce to Congress that the benevolent policy of the
Government, steadily pursued for nearly 30 years, in relation to the removal of the
Indians beyond the white settlements is approaching to a happy consumation. Two
important tribes have accepted the provision made for their removal at the last session of
Congress, and it is believed that their example will induce the remaining tribes also to
seek the same obvious advantage...
It will separate the Indians from immediate contact with settlements of
whites;... under the protection of the Government and through the influence of good
counsels, to cast off their savage habits and become an interesting, civilized, and
Christian community...
Toward the aborigines of the country no one can indulge a more friendly feeling
than myself, or would go furthur in attempting to reclaim them from their wandering
habits and make them a happy, prosperous people...
The present policy of the government is but a continuation of the same
progressive change by a milder process. The tribes which occupied the countries now
constituting the Eastern States were annihilated or have melted away to make room for
the whites. The waves of population and civilization are rolling westward, and we now
propose to acquire the countries occupied by the red man of the South and West by a fair
exchange, and, at the expense of the United States, to send them to a land where their
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existence may be prolonged and perhaps made perpetual....
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Doubtless it will be painful to leave the graves of their fathers; but what do they
more than our ancestors did or than our children are now doing? To better their condition
in an unknown land our forefathers left all that was dear in earthly objects... Does
Humanity weep at these painful separations from every thing, animate and inanimate,
with which the young heart has become entwined? Far from it. It is rather a source of joy
that our country affords scope where our young population may range unconstrained in
body or in mind, developing the power and faculties of man in their highest
perfection....Can it be cruel in this Government when, by events which it can not control,
the Indian is made discontented in his ancient home to purchase his lands, to give him a
new and extensive territory, to pay the expense of his removal, and support him a year in
his new abode? How many thousands of our own people would gladly embrace the
opportunity of removing to the West on such conditions! If the offers made to the Indians
were extended to them, they would be hailed with gratitude and joy...
Rightly considered, the policy of the General Government toward the red man is
not only liberal, but generous... Government kindly offers him a new home, and proposes
to pay the whole expense of his removal and settlement...
It is, therefore, a duty which this government owes to the new States to extinguish
as soon as possible the Indian title to all lands which Congress themselves have included
within their limits. When this is done the duties of General Government in relation to the
States and the Indians within their limits are at an end...
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Treaty of New Echota
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The Treaty of New Echota (1835) was a removal agreement between the federal government and a small group of the
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herokee Nation signed on December 29, 1835, in the town of New Echota, Georgia. According to the terms of the
treaty, the Cherokee Nation exchanged all their land east of Mississippi for a large tract of land in Indian Territory and
$5 million.
In 1830, Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, which provided funds for the president to conduct land-exchange
treaties with Natives living east of the Mississippi. Initially, federal negotiators tried to convince Cherokee chief John
Ross and members of the Cherokee National Council to move to the West. When federal negotiators were unable to
convince the elected Cherokee leadership to sign a removal treaty, President Andrew Jackson sent Gen. William
Carroll and Rev. John Schermerhorn to draw up a treaty with a few prominent Cherokees who favored removal.
Members of this faction, later called the Treaty Party, included Major Ridge, John Ridge, Stand Watie, and Elias
Boudinot.
Major Ridge was a former acting chief of the Cherokee Nation and a wealthy, slave-owning planter. He was familiar
with the laws of the Nation and knew he was in violation of the Blood Law, which made the sale or cession of
Cherokee land a crime punishable by death. However, he and other members of the faction were greatly disturbed by
the constant harassment they and other Natives received from white settlers. In 1829 and 1830, the Georgia
passed a series of laws that outlawed the Cherokee government and authorized a survey of Cherokee land
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and a lottery to distribute the land to the white residents of Georgia. The legislature also passed the Indian Code,
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which prohibited Cherokee from testifying in court against white persons, mining gold on their own land, speaking
against removal, and meeting in council.
After several trips to Washington to talk to federal officials and a survey of the countryside, Ridge believed that it was
in the best interest of the Cherokee Nation as a whole to relocate in the West. He thought that further resistance to
federal removal demands would be futile, that the Cherokee should get the best terms possible from the government
and depart before there was more bloodshed.
Immediately after signing the document and receiving their payment from the government, the members of the
Treaty Party moved west. They selected the best land in the new Cherokee Nation and made alliances with the three
thousand "Old Settler" Cherokee, who had left the main body of the Cherokee Nation in the late 18th and early 19th
centuries for various reasons. While the Treaty Party adjusted to their homes in the West, principal chief John Ross,
members of the Cherokee National Council, and the vast majority of the Cherokees living in the East refused to accept
the treaty and refused to move.
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Letter by Elias Boudinot
Source: The letter below was written in 1837 by Elias Boudinot, a Cherokee
who supported Indian Removal (and who signed the Treaty of New Echota
that gave away Cherokee land). The letter is to Chief John Ross, leader of the
Cherokees who opposed Indian Removal.
...I consider my countrymen, not as mere animals, and to judge of their
happiness by their condition as such, which to be sure is bad enough, but as
moral beings, to be affected for better or for worse, by moral circumstances, I
say their condition is wretched. Look, my dear sir, around you, and see the
progress that vice and immorality have already made!...
If the dark picture which I have drawn here is a true one, and no candid person
will say it is an exaggerated one, can we see a brighter prospect ahead? In
another country, and under other circumstances, there is a better prospect.
Removal, then, is the only remedy--the only practicable remedy. By it
there may be finally a renovation--our people may rise from their very ashes to
become prosperous and happy, and a credit to our race....I would say to my
countrymen, you among the rest, fly from the moral pestilence (disease) that
will finally destroy our nation.
What is the prospect in reference to your [John Ross's] plan of relief, if you are
understood at all to have any plan? It is dark and gloomy beyond description.
Subject the Cherokees to the laws of the States in their present condition? It
matters not how favorable those laws may be, instead of remedying the evil
you would only rivet the chains and fasten the manacles of their servitude and
degradation. The final destiny of our race, under such circumstances, is too
revolting to think of. Its course must be downward, until it finally becomes
extinct or is merged in another race, more ignoble and more detested. Take
my word for it, it is the sure consummation, if you succeed in preventing the
removal of your people. The time will come when there will be only here and
there those who can be called upon to sign a protest, or to vote against a
treaty for their removal--when the few remnants of our once happy and
improving nation will be viewed by posterity with curious and gazing interest,
as relics of a brave and noble race. Are our people destined to such a
catastrophe? Are we to run the race of all our brethren who have gone before
us, and of whom hardly any thing is known but their name and perhaps only
here and there a solitary being, walking, "as a ghost over the ashes of his
fathers," to remind a stranger that such a race once existed? May God
preserve us from such a destiny.
I have the honor to be, Sir,
Your obedient and humble servant,
E. BOUDINOT.
Indian Removal
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John Burnett's Story of the Trail of Tears
Written by a private who served during the Cherokee removal in 1890
Children:
This is my birthday, December 11, 1890, I am eighty years old today... Often
spending weeks at a time in the solitary wilderness with no companions but my rifle,
hunting knife,...
On these long hunting trips I met and became acquainted with many of the
Cherokee Indians, hunting with them by day and sleeping around their camp fires by
night. I learned to speak their language, and they taught me the arts of trailing and
building traps and snares...
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The removal of Cherokee Indians from their life long homes in the year of 1838
found me a young man in the prime of life and a Private soldier in the American
Army... (I) witnessed the execution of the most brutal order in the History of American
Warfare. I saw the helpless Cherokees arrested and dragged from their homes, and driven
at the bayonet point... I saw them loaded like cattle or sheep into six hundred and fortyfive wagons and started toward the west.
One can never forget the sadness and solemnity of that morning... Many of these
helpless people did not have blankets and many of them had been driven from home
barefooted.
On the morning of November the 17th we encountered a terrific sleet and snow
storm with freezing temperatures and from that day until we reached the end of the
fateful journey on March the 26th, 1839, the sufferings of the Cherokees were awful. The
trail of the exiles was a trail of death. They had to sleep in the wagons and on the ground
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without fire. And I have known as many as twenty-two of them to die in one night of
pneumonia due to ill treatment, cold, and exposure. Among this number was the beautiful
Christian wife of Chief John Ross. This noble hearted woman died a martyr to childhood,
giving her only blanket for the protection of a sick child. She rode thinly clad through a
blinding sleet and snow storm, developed pneumonia and died in the still hours of a bleak
winter night, with her head resting on Lieutenant Greggs saddle blanket...
The long painful journey to the west ended March 26th, 1839, with four-thousand
silent graves reaching from the foothills of the Smoky Mountains to what is known as
Indian territory in the West. And covetousness on the part of the white race was the cause
of all that the Cherokees had to suffer....
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Chief Junaluska was personally acquainted with President Andrew Jackson...
Chief John Ross sent Junaluska as an envoy to plead with President Jackson for
protection for his people, but Jackson's manner was cold and indifferent toward the
rugged son of the forest who had saved his life... The doom of the Cherokee was sealed.
Washington, D.C., had decreed that they must be driven West and their lands given to the
white man,...
However, murder is murder whether committed by the villain skulking in the dark
or by uniformed men stepping to the strains of martial music....
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Document:
Describe 2 benefits of Indian removal that Andrew
Jackson describes in his State of the Union.
Is this document in support of
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Who is going to benefit from this
evidence? The Prosecution or Defense
team? Why?
or against Indian removal?
Andrew Jackson's Second State of the
Union
Document:
What agreement was reached by the Federal Gov't and
Who is going to benefit from this
Cherokee Indians in this treaty?
evidence? The Prosecution or Defense
team? Why?
Treaty of New Echota
Is this document in support of
or against Indian Removal?
Why do some claim the treaty was invalid?
Who is Elias Boudinot?
Document:
Who is going to benefit from this
evidence? The Prosecution or Defense
team? Why?
Letter by Elias Boudinot
Is this document in support of
What are some reasons he is favor Cherokee removal?
or against Indian Removal?
Who is John Burnett?
Document:
Who is going to benefit from this
evidence? The Prosecution or Defense
team? Why?
John Burnett's Story of the Trail of Tears
Is this document in support of
What does John Burnett see while marching west?
or against Indian Removal?
How does John Burnett feel about Andrew Jackson?
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Court Case:
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Who is going to benefit from this evidence? The
Prosecution or Defense team? Why?
Worcester v Georgia (1832):
Samuel Worcester, a white settler, was arrested for living on Indian lands.
Is this court ruling in support of or
Current law made it illegal for whites to live on Indian land. Worcester
against Indian Removal?
appealed to the Supreme Court for his right to live on Indian lands and
lost. The Supreme Court ruled that whites did not have a right to displace
Native Americans on lands that were reserved for them. Controversially,
Andrew Jackson ignored this court ruling and used the U.S. military to
remove Native Americans to lands west of the Mississippi. In regards to
the court ruling, Andrew Jackson commented that "John Marshall has
made his decision, now let him enforce it." This forced migration is
known as the Trail of Tears. It resulted in the death of at least 4,000
In your opinion, did Andrew Jackson
have legal authority to remove the
natives?
natives.
In your opinion, who has a stronger case? Who do think is going to win this court case? WHY?
What is the most important piece of evidence for the prosecution (trying to find Jackson guilty)?
What is the most important piece of evidence for the prosecution (trying to find Jackson innocent)?