Assimilation Native Americans

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Tensions with the Native American tribes continued well into the nineteenth century despite efforts on their part of capitulation, assimilation, appeasement and resistance. As the federal government realized that their theory that the Native Americans had been conquered was incorrect they began to establish policy that would assimilate the Indians into white society and culture, but also facilitated the tribes losing their lands to white settlers. (Nash, et al., 2007., p. 255) Assimilation tactics varied and one such way was done through regulation of the fur trade. This regulation helped white traders gain expensive furs in exchange for their relatively inexpensive goods and to reduce fraud and conflict, Congress created trading posts, or …show more content…

The Cherokee brought their villages together under a common government with the idea that it would better protect their freedom and land and in 1827 they created a written constitution that was inspired by the ones nearby states. (Nash, et al., 2007., p. 257) Through their accommodation and attempts to marry their own cultural practices to white culture the Cherokee were moderately successful in holding off annihilation and even prospered by gaining property, but it wasn’t enough and their own success brought about feelings of agitation from whites, which eventually led to conflict. (Nash, et al., 2007., p. 257) While some tribes assimilated as best they could others resisted through conflict. This is best demonstrated by Tecumseh and his efforts to unite the tribes thought cultural pride and land retention through a war against whites. (Nash, et al., 2007., p. 259) However, despite his gathering of more than a thousand men and a series of clashes the effort failed and Tecumseh perished in the Battle of the Thames. (Nash, et al., 2007., p. 259) Resistance may have kept cultural pride and dignity, but it paved the way for not only Jackson’s garish removal of the Indians from their ancestral lands with the Indian Removal Act of 1830. (Nash, et al., 2007., p.