Indian Removal Act Dbq Essay

"It will be my sincere and constant desire to observe toward the Indian tribes within our limits a just and liberal policy, and to give that humane and considerate attention to their rights and their wants which is consistent with the habits of our Government and the feelings of our people." -- Andrew Jackson’s speech about the Indian Removal Act of 1830 in 1830. The Cherokee are a Native American Tribe that live in Oklahoma and North Carolina, and have lived there for decades. In 1830, Andrew Jackson (the president during this time) was mad because the Cherokee Indians had been hurting and scalping people in Georgia. Because of this, Jackson put up the idea of a removal act, a way to get the Cherokee to either move out of Georgia or abide by state law. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was justified because the Cherokee scalped many Americans during the 1700s and 1800s, their leaders already agreed to move, and we gave them even more land than

The leaders signed the Treaty of New Echota, which says, “The Cherokee nation hereby cede relinquish and convey to the United States all the lands owned claimed or possessed by them east of the Mississippi river, and hereby release all their claims upon the United States for spoliations of every kind for and in consideration of the sum of five millions of dollars to be expended paid and invested in the manner stipulated and agreed upon in the following articles”. This basically means that the Cherokee have to give all previously-owned land to the U.S. and move further west to receive five million dollars for their troubles. One argument against this may be that “The Cherokee lived there over a hundred years beforehand, so you have no right”, but that’s how the world works; exploration and invasion. That’s how it has worked, and how it will always work. Get used to