I would say the Trail of Tears isn't bad in comparison to the treatment of the time; at least they were offered a reservation. The massacre of Native and takeover of America as a whole is what was bad.
Americans would be seen as massive hypocrites by the Natives. The Americans came into their land, slaughtered the people there, and made a mess of nature that the Natives took care of delicately. At the same time though, America was preaching freedom against its mother Empire and tried to end European presence in American land by taking all of the lands away from them one way or another (Monroe Doctrine).
In short, they shouldn't have held such a negative attitude against Natives in the first place.
Now using Trivialis handle.
I'd like you to say that to Judge Marshall and not get slapped in the face by the man. He ruled in the Indian's favor, and Jackson just outright ignored him. So no, not everyone agreed with Jackson. (It's rather shortsighted to assume that everyone would, because not everyone is the same.)
He basically ignored a Supreme Justice. No one could get away with that kind of shit today.
The Indians Jackson removed were Five Civilised tribes, they are not raiding party from the prairie. They have farm, slave, christianity, some even intermarried with whites.
Tension between Indians and Whites is caused by white squatters who want Indian land, not Indian raiding party.
> He couldn't order citizens within the state to not invade indian territory.
it is within the power of federal government to deal with Indian tribes, he could enforce supreme court decision by protecting their rights. beside its not nice way of protecting when a lot of Indians die on Journey.
> Another reason would be Jackson's devotion to the Constitution. He firmly believed in it.
sovereign Indian territory are not states. the Constitution allow federal government to make treaty with them. beside it ridiculous that claim he believe in constitution while ignoring Supreme Court.
plus its not only Indians, Jackson reign also disastrous to free blacks. his reign contribute to White Supremacy in America.
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/08/andrew-jacksons-america/61667/
But it didn't matter. White farmers in Georgia did not want to assimilate the Cherokee, they wanted to rob them. In due course, they extended the reach of Georgia law over Cherokee lands. Here is what that meant:
Submission to the laws of Georgia for a Creek or Cherokee meant not being able to vote, sue, own property, tesitfy against a white person, or obtain credit.
What stands out about this bigotry is that it was not merely the result of the diabolical machinations of the planter class, or the devilish handiwork of politicians, but of the desires of the common man. Jackson was elected, and while his piracy may well have magnified the bigotry of those who elected him, it also, very much, reflected it.
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My girlfriend is part-Cherokee, descended from those who did not leave and became the latter Eastern Cherokee, so I've heard a lot of that before, and it's a depressing tale.
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For one, Jackson had spent his whole life having to deal with the native americans. They were well know and hated in the frontier area. People lived in fear of a group of indians storming their camp and slaughtering all the inhabitants.
This bread an intense hatred between the Native Americans and the settlers.
Jackson knew about the brutal attacks. As a matter of fact, he spent a good portion of his military career fighting the tribes.
Judging an entire race on the basis of negative experiences involving individuals of that race is very often how racism starts, though. I mean, I would not be surprised if many people in Nazi Germany felt similarly justified in their own prejudices; the claim was that Jews were in some way harming Germany's future, after all.
What you have there is a reason, but it isn't an excuse.
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The Trail of Tears: Realpolitik of the 1800s.
Don't know what to say, otherwise...
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Unfortunately, the Cherokee were in a sort of "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. They were very keen on assimilating different aspects of white culture, but it backfired in making them seem to be a much more credible threat than some of the more disorganized groups.
They pretty much abandoned most of their traditional mores, adopted "white" methods of slavery* , abandoned the traditional matriliniar system of naming and inheritance, published dual-language newspapers, built the capital city of New Echota, and wrote a constitution heavily inspired by the US constitution.
The fact that the majority of them could actually read and understand English meant that slimy deals were much more difficult to pass off, and by the time they showed their spiffy new constitution to the US government, a lot of them were probably starting to break a sweat. The Dahlonega gold rush finally put the nails in the coffin and sent a huge number of people screaming for their land.
Most of the leadership staunchly opposed anyone taking violent action against the whites* . It's always a very contentious point between the different factions within the Cherokee Nation even today, but many can agree that it seems that they thought complying with the forced migration would be better than staging a rebellion and facing the subsequent massacre. The remaining easterners survived as a cohesive group largely thanks to the actions of William Thomas, who was a bit of a Magnificent Bastard when it came to politics.
I'm not too familiar with the situations with the other tribes involved unfortunately, perhaps someone moreso could add in things there.
Was Aliroz the Confused
For one, the Native Americans were not a singular entity. They were very diverse, and to say that all their groups and tribes and all of the people of Native ancestry on the continent all acted as one is wrong. Second, said "Indian Attacks" were largely a myth to justify the removal of Natives, though there were a few notably violent tribes.
The Federal Government may not have had the power that it does now, but as this was before the idea of protests had become widely accepted and after the French Revolution had essentially ended the ideal of rebellion, the Federal Government had more respect and people obeyed it much more than they did now. Additionally, the Supreme Court had declared it illegal to invade Indian territory and had declared that the natives had a legal right to their land above any law other than the constitution. Also, if Jackson had wanted to preserve the Tribes in the trail of tears, he would have at least waited until winter had ended.
Also, John Marshall and the rest of the supreme court was on the side of the Five Civilized Tribes, and they certainly would have protected them from being screwed over by whites. Jackson violated the Constitution, overstepped his authority as President, and went against the ruling of the Supreme Court and Congress in doing the Trail of Tears.
Now, if you had made this thread on Thomas Jefferson's rather imperialist views of the natives as Noble Savages who should be acculturated to white culture and abandon all their culture, you'd have a more interesting thread and a more valid argument.
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Since this came up in another topic, I think I would like to discuss it here.
The trail of tears was the march of native americans out of town, so to speak.
However, all too many people look at the event itself and never examine the context. From hindsight, yes it looks very bad.
You must remember that things weren't like it is today. Study history like you would read a book, from begining to end.
To understand it, we need to look at the surrounding events and the people involved. Andrew Jackson was the President at the time.
This event has led people to believe he was some kind of Hitler. Jackson thought he was doing justice.
For one, Jackson had spent his whole life having to deal with the native americans. They were well know and hated in the frontier area. People lived in fear of a group of indians storming their camp and slaughtering all the inhabitants.
This bread an intense hatred between the Native Americans and the settlers.
Jackson knew about the brutal attacks. As a matter of fact, he spent a good portion of his military career fighting the tribes.
When he became President, the conflicts were escalating. The federal government in his day did not have the power it does now. He couldn't order citizens within the state to not invade indian territory. It is possible that his moving the indian tribes out of the states was an attempt to protect them, as they certainly would have been slaughtered if they remained.
Another reason would be Jackson's devotion to the Constitution. He firmly believed in it. This raised problems with the Indians because the Constitution states that you cannot create a new state inside an existing one, which would be necessary to stop further bloodshed.
In either case, in his eyes the only solution was to move the tribes out of the existing territory.
In retrospect we see this as a horrible atrocity, but I think if you were in Jackson's situation at the time you would agree.