American History : The Cherokee Nation

The book "The Trail of Tears: The Rise and fall of the Cherokee Nation," by John Ehle presents the full history of a Native American democratic state, the Cherokee Nation. Like the United States, it was born in bloodshed, but instead of enduring, it grew for only a few years and then was destroyed by President Andrew Jackson and the government of the state of Georgia. Ehle includes a great deal of primary sources, such as letters, journal excerpts, military orders, and the like, that serve to enrich the story.

The Cherokee people were forced out of their land because of the settler’s greed for everything and anything the land had to offer. Many Cherokee even embraced the “civilization program,” abandoning their own beliefs so that they may be accepted by white settlers. Unfortunately for the Cherokee though, the settlers would never accept them as an equal citizen. A quote from historian Richard White says it very well, “The Cherokee are probably the most tragic instance of what could have succeeded in American Indian policy and didn’t. All these things that Americans would proudly see as the hallmarks of civilization are going to the West by Indian people. They do everything they were asked except one thing. What the Cherokees ultimately

The Cherokees had lived in the interior southeast, for hundreds of years in the nineteenth century. But in the early eighteenth century setters from the European ancestry started moving into the

The Cherokee Indians were mainly know for living in the southeastern part of the United States of America. But they had moved around several different areas before they discovered their so thought "forever home." They lived there until they were forced to leave to Oklahoma during the trail of tears. Lots of us have heard of the "Smokey Mountains," and the Smokey Mountains is where the Cherokee Indians were famous for living at. Now the area they

The Cherokee tribe is known as one of the earliest and largest Indian tribe in North America. They are federally recognized even today among several states(museum). While they slowly became Americanized by the Europeans who came over to America, some still practice their typical Indian rituals publicly today. Most converted to Christianity and their government in Oklahoma is based off the American government with three branches. One would believe that the Trail of Tears could have completely vanquished these Indians but many made it through the horrendous trial and kept the Indian bloodline going even present day (Conley).

The Cherokee are a culturally rich and interesting tribe. They write amazing myths, focusing on creation and nature. In its prime, the Cherokee nation spanned over an estimated 100,000 miles. The people in it respected the universe. They only took from the what was needed from the environment. They were a peaceful tribe that knew very well how the land around them worked.

As a member of the Cherokee Nation, I must stand up for the rights of my people and challenge the removal of our nation. I know that we do not have much money and that the rich have most of the control and they can bend rules to their liking, but every man is entitled to be protected by the law. The "evils" do not have to exist in the government, they only exist because the rich allow and want them to. Just because it is profitable for the rich to take over our land, does not mean that they have the right to just take it from us and make us move to the land we know nothing about where we could possibly be unwelcome by other Indian tribes. The rich should not make all of the decisions. The law is the law and just because someone has money, does

The Cherokee role in the American society was an ongoing battle amongst closed minds and sheer ignorance to rights of original land owners. For years the fight over land was the dividing instrument amongst the new citizens of a new, free country and the traditions of the Cherokee people was being pushed back into the west.

die. The Red Chief was also in charge of the lacrosse games which were called

     The Cherokee culture went through some drastic changes. Schools were set up to instruct the Indians. Men farmed instead of hunting. They established some of their own laws. In 1827, the Cherokees wrote a constitution that provided for a bicameral legislature, a chief executive, and a judicial system (Perdue 13). The Americans tried to make the Indians become Christians. They developed their own writing system. They even began to publish their own newspaper called the Cherokee Phoenix (Perdue 14). The Cherokees became more civilized than in the past. The Cherokees tried to become civilized to make their relationship with the Americans better.

The Cherokee was a very large tribe that lived in Georgia and unlike other tribes, they constructed large log cabins to live in. During the American Revolution, they sided with the British and even fought battles alongside them (Cherokee Indians, Indians.org). During the 1800s they began to assimilate to the European culture and took on many European customs and this continued until the 1820s when gold was discovered on Cherokee lands and they were then asked by President Andrew Jackson to vacate the area. This came to a surprise to the Cherokee because years before during the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814, 500 Cherokee Indians assisted Jackson and possibly saved his life (A Brief History of the Trail of Tears, Cherokee. Org).

Most Americans have at least some vague understanding of the Trail of Tears, but not many know about the events that led to that tragic removal of thousands of Indians from their homeland. Indian lands were held hostage by the states and the federal government. The Indians had to agree to removal to maintain their tribe identities. Trail of Tears is an excellent example of a particular situation and will be eye opening to those who are not familiar with the story of the southern tribes and their interactions with the rapidly growing American population. The Trail of Tears has become the symbol in American history that indicates the callousness, insensitivity, and cruelty of American government toward American Indians in 1839 and 1839.

Life before the Trail of Tears but after the arrival of the new Americans was more or less simple for the Cherokees. They spend time hunting and fishing. Some of them even worked on plantations and even own their own slaves, in an effort to accommodate to some of the American ways of living.

Most of us have learnt about the Trail of Tears as an event in American history, but not many of us have ever explored why the removal of the Indians to the West was more than an issue of mere land ownership. Here, the meaning and importance of land to the original Cherokee Nation of the Southeastern United States is investigated. American land was seen as a way for white settlers to profit, but the Cherokee held the land within their hearts. Their removal meant much more to them than just the loss of a material world. Historical events, documentations by the Cherokee, and maps showing the loss of Cherokee land work together to give a true Cherokee

I learned many interesting topics in this class that I didn’t realize just how important some of this catastrophic events that happened in the U.S. History. For example, that interest me that most are the new world of the tribes of Olmec, Aztec, Toltec, Maya, and Inka. Didn’t envision there was such powerful tribes in centuries ago. The Cherokee and the Trail of Tears. The trail of tear was a crazy topic as they were force to go somewhere else for several tribes.