Native Americans During The 20th Century

Several years ago, America was taught to be a 'melting pot,' a place where immigrants of different cultures or races form an integrated society, but now America is more of a 'salad bowl' where instead of forming an incorporated entity the people who make up the bowl are unwilling to unite as one. America started as an immigrant nation and has continued to be so. People all over the world come to America for several reasons. Most people come to America voluntarily, but very few come unwillingly. For whatever reasons they may have for coming they all have to face exposure to American society. When exposed to this 'new' society they choose whether to assimilate or not. Assimilation

During the end of the nineteenth century, the United States had formed policies which reduced land allotted to Native Americans. By enforcing these laws as well as Anglo-American ideals, the United States compromised indigenous people’s culture and ability to thrive in its society.

Imagine a person bought something that the person valued. The person was the owner of the product and took good care of it.Then, all of a sudden, a stranger comes and takes that product and declares it “discovered”. Now since the stranger “discovered” it, the product now has to be shared among them. This is similar to what happened to Native Americans in North America. Native Americans owned and lived in North America for several thousand years. Then, all of a sudden, European explorers came to North America and claimed the land “discovered”. Europeans started moving into the land and later, started sharing the land. Encounters between Europeans and Native Americans in the colonial era led to the exchange of diseases with Native Americans,

There were three important people that had very different views on how to reconstruct the Union. Reconstruction was, according to The Americans by McDougal Littell, “the period during which the United States began to rebuild after the Civil War” (Page 376). It started in 1865 and ended in 1877. The views on how Reconstruction should happen were very different for each of these people: Abraham Lincoln, the Radical Republicans, and Andrew Johnson.

“The removal of these tribes... would not only shield from impending ruin, but promote their welfare and happiness…”. According to the former president of the United States of America, James Monroe, the removing the Natives will not only benefit

Richard H. Pratt in the article “Kill the Indian, and Save the Man” state that certain

Years of violence, forced removal to Indian Territory and forced religious indoctrination had failed to solve what the federal government referred to as “the Indian problem.”[6] the Native Americans may not have flourished in their new land, but they survived and would not go away. As a result, American policy shifted from

Assimilation is the manner in which people of a cultural group start to lose their individuality that makes them different from the more dominant culture, as they seek to fit in. America has been a melting pot of different cultures for centuries, whether it was by choice, forced or for a better life. History has proven that assimilation in America was not acceptable but that has changed over time.

Growing up in the west, Jackson “fought Indians as a militia officer” (Tindall 331) and considered the removal of Indians his primary presidential priority (Tindall 333). In his statement regarding the Indian Removal Act of 1830, he argues that removal is necessary as it “puts an end to all possible danger of collision” between Indian tribes and the American slaves and reasons that removing Indians could potential lead to Indians “cast[ing] off their savage habits and becom[ing]n interesting, civilized, and Christian community” (Jackson). The basis of this argument relies entirely on whether the Indians were a savage and uncivilized community that posed a direct threat to the American government. Primarily, Dale Van Every, an American writer, argues that the “forces that led to removal did not come ... from the poor white frontiersmen who were the neighbors of the Indians. They came from industrialization … and the greed of businessmen” (Zinn 136). The tribes, therefore, did not pose threats to neighboring Americans but were rather simply an obstacle to the rapidly expanding American. Secondarily, many Native American tribes had actually become increasingly civilized (or increasingly American) by the passing of the act. A good example of a Native American tribe whose advancements were discredited by biased

It wasn’t until 1924 which Native Americans were able to become citizens of the United States. Prior to then, the Natives were underestimated and were not fully granted nor treated the freedom they deserved. The Natives involvement during WWI somehow proved to the federal government that they were capable as being a citizen and thusly, pushed Congress to permit the Meriam Survey. In the report of 1928, it showed the shocking details that the Natives had to live in which became the purpose for reform. In 1934, the Indian Reorganization Act was established which abolished the Dawes Act and granted them the ability to hold administrative positions within the government; however, was still undermined by many of the states and believed that the Act was in some ways ‘unconstitutional’.

The early 1800s was an era of progressive action in regards to the Native populations of the United States - growing populations of western-bound individuals required that the already-present Natives be formally addressed. As Meriwether Lewis among others documented what the far-west was really like, Thomas Jefferson spoke of the ideals he held concerning the junction between Indians and Americans. Upon comparing Lewis’s discoveries and Jefferson’s wishes, we are able to discuss several things: the inconsistencies in Jefferson’s expectations versus reality, the two men’s thoughts on the potential for Native assimilation into American society, and the success (or lack thereof) of such assimilation.

Similar to African Americans and women in 1800’s (and arguably now), these Amerindians were minorities that arguably possessed no value nor contribution the cultivation of the United States. Ideas initially encouraged by Christopher Columbus, where he refers to Native Americans as ignorant savage beasts, has been preserved and acknowledged by the Americans where the belief of inferiority resonates with their perspective of the Native Americans. Immoral as this notion sounds, the Americans would then enfranchise to urbanization, industrialization, and acquisition of abundant resources without pondering on the consequences it has on the Native Americans. In 1830, in order to proceed in territorial aggrandizement, newly-inaugurated President Jackson scribed a congressional message promoting the removal of Indians for the vain benefit of the United States. In the intermediary of his message, he states a rhetorical question: What good man would prefer a country covered with forests and ranged by a few thousand savages to our extensive Republic, studded with cities, towns, and prosperous farms embellished with all the improvements which art can devise or industry execute, occupied by more than 12 million happy people, and filled with all the blessings of liberty, civilization, and religion? (Jackson 1) The inclusion of this rhetorical question is to exclude the care for Native Americans as they are perceived as “savages”, and place more stress on the significant

And also he mentioned was “It will separate the Indians from immediate contact with settlements of whites; free them from the power of the states; enable them to pursue happiness in their own way and under their own rude institutions”. And I think that was true, because the Indians nowadays are very independent. The ones that are left.

Jackson sweetened the removal option by describing the ages old migration of the Europeans in order “to better their condition in an unknown land our forefathers left all that was dear in earthly objects. Our children by thousands yearly leave the land of their birth to seek new homes in distant regions. Does Humanity weep at these painful separations from everything, animate and inanimate, with which the young heart has become entwined? Far from it” (Past, 188). Removing the Indians, in Jackson’s sense, proved “the policy of the General Government toward the red man is not only liberal, but generous” because the red man “is unwilling to submit to the laws of the States and mingle with their population. To save him … [from] utter annihilation, the General Government kindly offers him a new home, and proposes to pay the whole expense of his removal and settlement” (Past, 188-189).

In the early years, George Washington believed that the best way to solve the “Indian Problem” was to simply “civilize” the Native Americans. The Goal was to convert them to Christianity, learn to speak and read English and adopt European-style economic practices like Individual ownership of land and other property. Some of the Tribes embraced these customs and become known as the “Five Civilized Tribes”. (www.history.com)