The Impact Of The Trail Of Tears

Westward expansion was the “God Given” right to the whites that would allow them to expand westward. Many settlers turned their attention to wealth and conquest more than they had before and because of this greed, memorable impacts were left behind. As settlers moved westward, they started to affect the living of the Native Americans. Native Americans did not like how the settlers came to their home to take over and when westward expansion became a trend, conflict and tension occurred. This tension and conflict led to the Trail of Tears, which was part of Andrew Johnson’s Indian removal policy. The Native Americans were forced to give up their land and migrate to another area. During the Trail of Tears most of the Native Americans died all

Tecumseh’s biggest concerns were that his people would not live according to the Prophet which was casting off all elements of the Euro-American society. He believed that his people would turn to alcohol, firearms, and trade goods set out by English ways, which was what the Prophet said, would be detrimental to their ways. No matter what, Tecumseh was going to make sure the Indian way of life would continue forever. He led a revolution of young men who thought the leadership structure needed to be looked over again in order to survive. They fought to make sure The Indians East of the Mississippi to keep control over their home land. Tecumseh tried to visit neighboring tribes to form an alliance to protect the lands held by the Natives. He was successful in the way the Southern tribes would accept the alliance, but unsuccessful with others when some refused to join the reliance, such as the Iroquois tribe.

The trail of tears was a dark period in US history. Fueled by greed and racism but rationalized through what we believed was best for our country, we took even more from people who had already lost so much. We deemed natives as incompatible with society because they did not share our beliefs and culture. Now in modern times, we face issues that are parallel to this era and there are many things that can and should be learned from our mistakes and generalizations from the past.

In the early 1830s, approximately 125,000 Native Americans thrived on millions of acres of land in Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, and Alabama. In the next 10 years, a scarce number of natives lingered anyplace in the Southeastern United States. In 1838 and 1839, the Cherokee nation was brutally forced to give up its rightful land and travel on foot to designated “Indian Territory” in modern-day Oklahoma. Upon this involuntary journey, thousands of Indians faced exhaustion, disease, and famine. This heartbreaking event became known as the Trail of Tears. The Trail of Tears is important to the history of the United States because it is the wickedest human civil rights tragedy to ever fall upon the Native American population, and it was the beginning of the destruction of an entire people.

Thousands of captives trudged through rain on a muddy road. The scent of rain combined with the stench of rotting bodies was unbearable. Children, raggedy and heartbroken, wailing for food and their home, forcefully taken from them. Parents lamenting in anguish for their home-deprived children. The sadness hung in the air like a branch above the hostages’ heads. Bodies, bruised and broken, lying on the side of the road, hurriedly thrown down without a proper burial. Birds mocking the prisoners from their hiding places. Soldiers shrieked at the convicts, the words coming out of their mouths, tasting like eternal bondage to the native people. A death trail stretching toward the unknown west, not telling what it leads to. The Trail of Tears is a cloud over American history. The Cherokee Trail of Tears led to effects in the Nation and was a discouraging time in the history of Native Americans.

The Trail of Tears was a testament to the cruelty and disrespect we showed toward the Native Americans. This paper will show how the United States used its legislative power and brute force to remove the Indian tribes. From the election of Andrew Jackson, and the implementation of the Indian Removal Act. The Creeks, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole and their actions against the removal process. Finally, how the Cherokee used the legal process to fight evacuation of their nation.

Before the Eastern World knew that the America’s were there, natives to the American lands were already here and thriving. As the land was discovered, more and more people from the European side of the Hemisphere traveled across the Atlantic Ocean to stake a claim for land in this newfound world. Throughout these Europeans settling in, and making new homes and lives for themselves these natives stayed to their own ways, and were slowly pushed westward. The problems between the Indians and now Americans were brought to the forefront as the population of the states grew, and there was a need for expansion. When the Louisiana Purchase was struck between the United States and France, the land previously inhabited by the natives were now under the control of the United States government. As the population continued to climb in numbers, individuals along with the United States government decided to take actions for the removal of these natives. Throughout the book, The Long, Bitter Trail, Andrew Jackson and the Indians by: Anthony F.C. Wallace, the events leading up to, during, and the effects of the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Individuals such as Andrew Jackson along with the government used different methods to remove these Indians from the southeastern lands of the United States. Starting in the beginning of the 1800’s,

With the discovery of the New World came a whole lot of new problems. Native American Indians lived in peace and harmony until European explorers interrupted that bliss with the quest for money and power. The European explorers brought with them more people. These people and their descendants starting pushing the natives out of their homes, out of their land, far before the 1800s. However, in the 1800s, the driving force behind the removal of the natives intensified. Thousands of indians during this time were moved along the trail known as Nunna dual Tsung, meaning “The Trail Where They Cried” (“Cherokee Trail of Tears”). The Trail of Tears was not only unjust and unconstitutional, but it also left many indians sick, heartbroken, and dead.

In 1492 native Americans discovered illegal immigrants invading their country. It has been a downhill fight for natives ever since. As more settlers arrived on the East Coast, an attitude became prevalent within the European communities that it was their right to expand cities across America in the name of progress and economic development. The manifest destiny was more of a feeling rather than a written statement which lasted from the War of 1812 to the beginning of the American Civil War. The idea of expansion grew, especially by those who wanted to capitalize on agriculture in the United States. Native Americans occupied land in Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, Florida and Tennessee. These lands became more valuable to the white settlers as the production of cotton became more popular in the South. As the idea of a manifest destiny grew, so did the idea to remove Natives, which led up to the “Trail of Tears” through the Indian Removal Act of 1830, a final solution to the Indian problem. The United States government removed the five civilized Tribes, Cherokee, Muskogee, Seminole, Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations between 1830 and 1838. The Native Americans being relocated suffered from inhuman conditions such as disease and starvation while traveling to their final destination, a designated area west of the Mississippi River. The events leading to this final march into the Indian Territories and the atrocities

Looking throughout the overwhelming events the American Revolution had on everyone involved, allows us to examine how the governments’ policies toward the Indians changed over time. It shows how the policy changes effected the Indians as well as the Americans’, their attitudes toward each other as the American’s pushed westward and the Indians resisted. Then the actions on both sides which lead up to the final removal of all Indians to west of the Mississippi in 1830’s.

Before, Andrew Jackson became the seventh president he was a general. He won many wars other wars not so much. Andrew Jackson became the seventh president of the United States on 1829. He served between the years of 1829 to 1837. He became president when he won against John Quincy Adams in the Electoral College votes and in the popular votes.

urthering, “The Seven Years’ War” notes, “Representatives of seven colonies met in Albany, New York, with representatives of the Iroquois Confederacy. The goal of the Albany Congress was to solidify friendship with the Iroquois in light of the approaching war with France and to discuss the possibility of an inter-colonial union.” Congress made it clear that they wanted the Iroquois tribes to remain loyal to their government. Benjamin Franklin soon developed the Albany Plan in 1754. This plan was approved but was not set in place due to the colonists’ fears of taxation. British officials felt it gave the colonists too much freedom while the colonists believed that it did not give them enough. The plan involved levying taxes, raising troops,

The Trail of Tears was one that some Native American Tribes resisted, others followed the path. One of the tribes who followed the Trail of Tears were the Cherokees of Georgia; abandoning their lives and adopting the American ideals of agriculture. The tribe adopted the notion of private property, going against their normal ideals. Schools were opened by Missionaries for Cherokees, they essentially embraced the American norm of church and education. In 1808 the Cherokee National Council adopted a constitution the three branches of government, the same as the American ideals. Some of the tribe even started a cotton plantations and had slaves; they had a total of 1,300 slaves by the 1820s. The tribes that also adopted the same concepts were the

Out of all the tribes impacted by the Dawes Act, the Choctaw was the very first to travel in a large group across the Mississippi to escape the growing group of hostiles in their homeland. The land that they were looking for would allow them freedom, and they would be able to live simpler lives without having to worry about problems from the white race. The trek was not forgiving and many Choctaw people did not survive the search for a new homeland. About 2,500 Choctaw Indians died due to exposure to the elements, which included heat exhaustion, starvation, and illness. They were often targets of white men who killed them and stole their belongings. The Trail of Tears was a distance of more than 500 miles that three groups

Long ago on the great plains, the buffalo roamed and the Native Americans lived amongst each other. They were able to move freely across the lands until the white men came and concentrated them into certain areas. Today there are more than five-hundred different tribes with different beliefs and history. Native Americans still face problems about the horrific history they went through and today 's discrimination. The removal of American Indian tribes is one of the most tragic events in American history. There are many treaties that have been signed by American representatives and people of Indian tribes that guaranteed peace and the values of the Indian territories. The treaties were to assure that fur trade would continue without interruption. The American people wanting Indian land has led to violent conflict between the two. Succeeding treaties usually forced the tribes to give up their land to the United States government. There were laws made for Native American Displacement that didn’t benefit the Native Americans, these laws still have long lasting effects on them today, and there was a huge number of Native Americans killed for many reasons.