Andrew Jackson Dbq Essay

With the end of John Quincy Adams’ presidency came the end of the Virginia Dynasty of Presidents (meaning that all the previous presidents were originally from the state of Virginia). When the presidential election of 1830 had come around it seemed that another president would come about, but a man of the common man had come who would expand the United States and its borders beyond what they already were. This man was Mr. Andrew Jackson, the hero of the battle at New Orleans during the War of 1812. When Jackson had assumed the presidency he was faced with a momentous challenge. That being the United States was in current need of more land... Jackson had a multitude of options to choose from to accomplish this; he could have done something

Being in the middle of the South, the Creek Indians were surrounded by plantation owners and frontiersmen on all sides along with the Cherokee Indians. Being surrounded on all sides, they were in constant conflict with white protestors and squatters who believed they had a right to settle and obtain Indian land. The squatters did this with no actual approval, but a belief in Georgia is sovereign, and was not. The problem is that Georgia failed to recognize that the Creeks had proclaimed themselves their own sovereign state. But Georgia believed that the United States Constitution made this null and void. The Indians believed that since they were a part of the United States they should be entitled to protection under its laws, but since this was not working they were left with another choice, and decided to take action against the Indian Removal Act and Georgia. Being very cultured and knowledgeable in the ways of the white man and their laws they decided to use Georgia’s strategy of law against in a “fight fire with fire” sort of sense to join the Cherokee Nation in suing the state of Georgia in a case that would eventually go all the way to the Supreme Court. The Indians had also decided to insult to injury by hiring the former attorney general under Adams and Monroe, William Wirt. Jackson had showed his disdain of this action by commenting “The course of Wirt has truly been wicked” (Remini 242). This comment also shows the betrayal Jackson felt knowing that a fellow American was hindering the inevitable expansion of the United States and removal of the Indians. But with Wirt’s law expertise, their knowledge of United States laws, and continued pressure from Georgia’s civilians invading their land, they eventually conceded and signed the Treaty of 1832, relinquishing the rights to their land and moving