Great Famine In Canad Case Study

The Homestead Act of 1862 made surveyed lands obtainable to homesteaders. The act stated that men and women over the age of 21, unmarried women who were head of households and married men under the age of 21, who did not own over 160 acres of land anywhere, were citizens or intended on becoming citizens of the United States, were eligible to homestead. This paper will show how the Homestead Act came to be enacted, who the homesteaders were and the effects of the Homestead Act on the pioneers.

Any American including freed slaves could claim a land up to 160 acres for free if they worked on the land for 5 years (Doc. B). What this meant for the Native Americans was that they now have less land to hunt on so they are resorted to the reservations. Forty-eight million acres were given away. In 1872 there was an advertisement on the Homestead Act showing millions of acres in Iowa and Nebraska (Doc. E). Also in 1862, the Morrill Land-Grant Act was created to allow the creation of land-grant colleges in the US (Doc. C). It was a huge uplift to higher education in

The sociological effects that Aboriginal peoples in Canada face are vast. Residential schools, stripped people of their identity, enforced a cultural genocide, abused (both sexually and physically) children and created an unjust line of intergenerational trauma. Kinship ties, for the majority were lost during the residential school period, sometimes leaving entire communities displaced. The Canadian Government fails to recognize the treatment of Aboriginal peoples during the residential school period and there hasn’t been much done to help those who are affected.

As Document I shows Native Americans were being cheated out of their land, actually most of their land was being sold. In 1887, the Dawes Severalty Act was passed by congress. The Dawes act divided small plots for each family. But the farmers got their fill as well. On the reservation there were another 90 million acres which were fertile and was often sold to white settlers. As Native American lands went down White settlers land increased. As shown in Document B. Land trades and began to pop up all around the country.

Long before Europeans came to North America, The Aboriginal people had a highly developed way of life. This however all changed when the Europeans decided to settle among them. For the Anglophones and the French people of Canada it became more and more evident that something drastic would need to be done in order to fit them into their ideal perception of what it was to be Canadian. With the help of the church the Canadian government implemented the residential school system, which was devoted to providing a disciplined based ideal that promoted rejection of the aboriginal culture in favor of the dominant white population. The residential system would eventually become an official Canadian policy for the education of Indian. Even though

The American Government did their part in encouraging farmers to venture out into the Great Plains. Back during the Civil War, political parties battled with deciding whether to promote the west as proslave or anti-slave; officials would send citizens of their party to claim residence in western territories to populate the newly forming states with enough supporters to strengthen their power in Congress, in this particular debate. Later in the 1800s, regulations and accommodations were passed to make obtaining land cheaper and transportation more efficient. One of these regulations, developed and supported by Abraham Lincoln, was the Homestead Act of 1862. Under this law, any citizen could claim up to 160 acres from the government if they promise to improve the land. Costing close to nothing, many small farm owners saw

Now that thousands of people had claimed their 160 acres, the government had to sustain the land's fertility so it would remain cultivatable for years to come. It would also reduce any chances of the settlers moving again and coming in conflict with the Natives. The government encouraged the development of the area by constantly aiding the frontiers with the Timber Culture Act and the Newland Reclamation Acts. The Timber Culture Act was produced to help the farmers successfully grow crops on their land for long periods of time by keeping the soil fertile and preventing erosion. The Timber Culture Act gave away free land to people who would plant forty acres of trees on it. They believed planting more trees would increase humidity and increase rainfall, which was beneficial for farmers. The Newland Reclamation Act of 1902 funded irrigation projects for the dry land of the west. Congress passed many laws to protect the west from harm.

In the 19th century, The Canadian government believed that it was their job to educate the Aboriginal people in Canada. European settlers felt that the aboriginal people were savage, ignorant, and like children needed guidance, and needed to be “civilized”. Ultimately, they wanted to assimilate the Aboriginal people into Canadian and Christian ways of living life in Canada. The Canadian government came up with a policy called “aggressive assimilation” to be taught at industrial schools that would be run by the churches and government funded. They chose children to go to these schools because they are easier to manipulate and mold than the adults and felt that school was the best way to do so. With the hopes of the assimilated children will teach their children their new way of life and that their traditions and culture will diminish or be completely gone in a few generations. In the 1880’s, the government began to construct the residential schools across Canada. Authorities often would take kids from their home, to isolate them from their family and familiar communities. In 1920 is when the Indian Act came in effect where every Aboriginal child was obligated to attend a residential school and it was illegal for them to go to any other institution.

Since the first pilgrims and puritans crossed the Atlantic, there were disputes between white settlers and the Native Americans. Consequently, there were resentments and death on both sides. The Relocation Act (1830), signed by Andrew Jackson, resulted in the mass migration of Native Americans to the west and government confiscation of their lands. Banished to the west, Native Americans’ lives were relatively peaceful until white settlers started to infringe once again lands promised to them. White settlers felt they had a divine entitlement to the western lands and felt no remorse taking it from Native Americans.

This act served to encourage the citizens of the United States to pursue the course of westward expansion and permanently settle the land on the other side of the Mississippi River basin, the land that was “acquired” by the government from the Native Americans. In accepting the government's offer to make way into the western frontier, each man would receive 160 acres of “public land” to farm and eventually make profitable in the long run. This newly accessible “public land” was the result of the Indian Removal Act and caused the development of new problem for the United States government. After eradicating the Natives,the government came to the realization that their success was limited due to the mass population of Indians that were now without some sort of residence and facing certain starvation from the lack of buffalo. In order to “keep the promises” that were made to the Natives, the government devised the Reservation System which would allow them to facilitate the needs of the Indians without posing a threat to any of the settlers. These reservations are still in use today, although they do not serve the same purpose as they once did and are now scared places that many house the remaining culture and traditions of several

During the 1800's there was much speculation of geographic and demographic opportunity out in the west. Much of the east coast was crowded and overpopulated with lack of opportunity. The land east of the Mississippi River appealed to these due to the discovery of gold and spacious fertile land to build ranches and grow crops. The Homestead Act of 1862 entitled these new settlers one hundred and sixty acres of land for a small fee with the agreement the land would be improved and maintained to occupy crops and raise cattle within the 5 years. Once the 5 years were up and these challenges were met, the land would be given to them by the government. Homesteading

Before the Act was passed there was a period of time where the US decided to split the communal native land and give it to household of natives, instead of it being there for the benefit of the entire community. However many new households had no means to pay local

This cause the Westward expansion. During the Westward expansion, white settlers thought they they were entitled to land. “...Washington only had a few thousand residents… The United States Congress understood this fact and in 1850 passed the Land Donation Claim Act”

In the early 19th century aboriginals were systematically discriminated by Canada. From 1880 to 1996 Canada forced 150,000 aboriginal children into residential schools (J.R. Miller, Tabitha Marshall, 2012,). The main goal of the residential schools was to strip the natives off their culture and beliefs, replacing it with western beliefs and ideals. The last residential school closed in 1996 however, the effects of it still lingers on in the aboriginal community. As stated by the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples (RCAP) “Residential schools had the single greatest impact on the Indian (First Nations) people in Canada and continues to have inter-generational impacts” (Kubik, Bourassa, & Hampton, 2009, p. 23). Today aboriginals receives millions of dollars through social assistance programs. However, they are still lagging behind in

As they planned this idea with the churches across Canada, it became an unforgettable event for the native people. “The implementation of the Indian Act (1876), the government was required to provide Aboriginal youth with an education and to integrate them into Canadian society” (Miller). These schools changed the way native people lived in Canada. The children in these schools were abused and neglected everyday as a punishment. The reason for this is that the students would talk to other students in their native languages and this caused mayhem for teachers to abuse them in terrible ways. They were hit by sticks and they would use anything else as a weapon to teach them a lesson (Hanson). The treatment in these schools were awful that some were physically changed in appearance. The teachers would give them verbal abuse as well if they continue to do small mistakes. The treatments the children were given resulted in really high death toll rates (Hanson). As this continued the Canadian government wanted to “kill the Indian in the child” (Hanson) to modernize the native children. It was a rule of the government so they can have no native cultures left in the future and remove the unwanted languages of the past.