The Native Indians

Anglos continued to encroach upon the Natives’ lands and settle there. This caused conflict between Anglos and Natives, which usually did not end well for the latter. Natives would often, “ ... fall under the assault of our [American] troops” (Pratt 1). American troops would often kill the Native people whenever there was a conflict. America showed its power and dominance over Natives by bullying and hurting them. Anglos did not respect the Native people and continued to assert their dominance. Many people of the time thought that, “... the only good Indian is [was] a dead one...” (Pratt 1). Anglos did not believe that Natives deserved to live here; Anglos thought they were of the past and did not belong in America. The oppression of the Natives caused them to lose the will to fight

During westward expansion, the Native Americans got kicked to the side. The settlers coming west often saw the Indians as a threat to them and their families. However, this was not the main reason the Indians were pushed aside. The settlers saw the Indians had fertile land and wanted it for themselves. The Indians were the opposite of what the settlers thought they were. The Indians often helped the people moving west across the plains; giving them food, supplies, and acting as guides. However, the U.S. Government did not see this side of the Indians, instead they forced the Indians onto reservations. During the time of the expansion of the United States to the present, the Native Americans went through many things so that the United States could expand; they were pushed onto reservations, and forced to give up their culture through the Ideas of Manifest Destiny and Social Darwinism.

As Western Expansion picked up, it became clear that just as before, the goals of American expansionists conflicted with the needs of the Natives in the area of expansion

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).

Historically, the people of the United States and the Native tribes couldn’t live together, they fought because the two sides competed for superiority. The United States Government sought to put an end to the violent clashes with the American people and the Natives tribes. A resolution was the Indian Removal Act, with this, the United States became safer, wealthier, and stronger; And the Natives, which they saw as inferior, would leave. This Act wasn’t easy for the Native tribes, they left the land their ancestors had built them, and experienced a long road ahead of them to rebuild again.

Native Americans were affected negatively in the United States Western Expansion. The Americans stripped the Natives from their culture, land, and the buffalo. From all that Native Americans onced lived all over the West were now living on reservations. The Natives suffered at the Sand Creek massacre, which killed over 200 Native Americans. Also another battle that affected the Native Americans negatively was the Battle of Little Bighorn. The battle was over the Sioux’s right to Sioux land with Sitting Bull as the Sioux war chief and spiritual leader and George A. Cluster as the commander of U.S troops. It wasn’t just land that affected the Natives it was also their culture. Natives boys had their culture stripped away. There clothes,

Most of the American population believed that the "Indian" people are inferior, treat them as the barbarians, and often as foolish children. The Indians could not claim equal status with other nations, because initially, by their nature they are not equal to the white people.Forcible relocation to Mississippi rivers was a clearing the land for white occupancy and national police didn’t have any changes from 1790s only expansion and reformulation of the law.Since the English settlers arrived in the New World they have continually driven the Native Americans out of their native lands.

“The U.S. government’s policies towards Native Americans in the second half of the nineteenth century were influenced by the desire to expand westward into territories occupied by these Native American tribes”(Victoria magazine). The U.S. Government just wanted land and they didn't realize that they are hurting the Native Americans. In fact, by the 1850’s nearly all Native American tribes, roughly 360,000 in number, lived to the west of the Mississippi River. In other words, the U.S. government was so hungery for land they didn't realize what they have done. They basically took away the land of where 360,000 Native Americans lived. The settlement of lands west of the Mississppi from Native Americans was not justified at all because after this

Settlers would form organized groups called Pony Clubs to ride into the Cherokee territory and start fires and destroy their homes. The settlers brought with them many diseases that proved deadly to the Indians. Fearing that if they fought back, the American government would interfere and force the Cherokee people out west. The Cherokee nation had no choice but to endure the persecution they received from the white man.

The U.S. thought selfishly of the removal of the Natives. Though the Natives agreed, they agreed upon a movement that was to benefit them, but instead this movement dwindled both their numbers and hopes. Meanwhile, the States expanded and prospered on the Natives previously

The Southeastern Native Americans lived in the area of the United States imperfectly defined by being below Kentucky and Virginia and east of Arkansas’s and Louisiana’s border with Texas. This is imperfect because the Caddo, Atakapans, and the Tutelo crossed these borders. The environment was composed of Coastal Plain, Piedmont, and the South Appalachian Mountains. The coastal plains were comprised of pine forests, rivers, bayous, swamps, and floodplains. Piedmont had rolling hills, hardwood forest, many rivers, and fertile valleys. Lastly, at the South Appalachian Mountains there existed narrow, silty valleys, forests, and many deposits of stone (Sutton, 2012). The Southeast provides a decidedly beneficial climate and environment to sustain

There were many reasons for the outrageous ways the settlers in the west treated the Native Americans. The federal government declared an open extermination policy to eliminate Native Americans and "rid the west of these heathens," (Daniels 14). Natives had just been resettled into reserved spaces of land that stretched from the plains to the Black Hills of South Dakota. (Champagne and Trafzer 44) Many of the men traveling west had already dealt with hostile Indian tribes on the Plains and wanted nothing to get in their way of prosperity and gold. With them came mining tools, destructive mining techniques, civilization, and whiskey to perpetually ruin the lives and environment of the Indians. Although Native Americans were viewed as savage

The United States perspective on the Native people has drastically changed from President to President. “George Washington originally started the ‘Indian Civilization Campaign’, which encouraged the Native people to adopt Western-European culture along with Christianity.” (Sturgis, pg 5) The United States was to recognize the Native groups as the owners of the land they inhabit, with the rights to sell or retain them. This ideology was later adopted and implemented by Thomas Jefferson who believed that it was, “established by Jus gentium for America, that a white nation settling down and declaring that such and such are their limits, makes an invasion of those limits by any other white nation an act of war, but gives no right of soil against the native possessors.” (Sturgis, pg 5)

Part of the reason the U.S. forced Indians off reservations was a means of individualizing them, as opposed to seeing them as a tribe, and this in turn was a way that was thought to "civilize" them as well. This also provided relief to the government of their prior obligations of providing annuities. The reason to expand to the west was there was much more agricultural opportunities as well as the mineral wealth that had begun the western expansion.

For hundreds of years Native Americans inhabited North America. When Europeans came to the New World they did not understand these indigenous people. For a long time these natives were seen as “savages” who had backwards traditions. After the American Revolution, Americans were pushing to try to expand their territory. They wanted to expand westward towards the Pacific Ocean, to get closer to China. Native Americans we victims of changing times in America. With Europeans and then Americans aggressively pushing west the Natives could not keep up with technologies of the whites, they were also a victim to the white mans epidemics, horse and the environment. All of these factors caused the natives to be victims of westward expansion in America. Native Americans play a large role in Western history of the United States but the power struggle that they faced with white people forever changed their destiny.