The Trail of Tears is one of the most infamous episodes in U.S. history. And for many Americans, that is the extent of their familiarity with Native American culture and history. Due to the limited time allotted to studying Native American history, the policy leading to this terrible event is often glossed over or ignored entirely. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 (also known as IRA) is largely responsible for making the United States what it is today. Major research questions include why and how Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren approved the IRA? The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was part of US expansionist policy in the 19th century to appease Southern states and justify Westward expansion, but can be considered inhumane and racist as its consequences led to the forced relocation, significant deaths, and shifts in the perception of Native American claims to land.
The relationship of the US government with the Native Americans began to destabilize in the beginning of the 19th century. For some time, the federal government maintained a policy of respecting legal rights of the Native Americans. However, the rapid growth of the states on the eastern side of the Mississippi River has pushed them towards Native American historical land. Despite peaceful interactions between the Indians and settlers, it was evident that the Native Americans were not willing to give up their land, and peaceful co-existence was challenged (Ehle, 2011). The prospect of Indians exchanging lands was discussed politically as early as Thomas Jefferson’s presidency, but it is only in the 1800s that pressure was increased. In 1814, Andrew Jackson, who was a major general at the time, led an expedition against the Creek Indians in the famous Battle of Horse Shoe band, resulting in tremendous defeat and Indians having to give up over 20 million acres of land. Once entering politics, Jackson began the decade-long push to displace Indians from their territory, culminating the Indian Removal Act of 1930, one year after his election as President.
The Indian Removal Act of 1830 states that it is “an act to provide for an exchange of lands with the Indians residing in any of the states or territories and for their removal west of the river Mississippi” (Digital History, 2021) This act was passed to facilitate the relocation of Native Americans west of the Mississippi River The policy gave the president the authority to ‘negotiate’ treaties with Native Americans and that the Native Americans may trade their territories for land located west of the Mississippi River. A similar scheme was used in the Northern states, along with applied pressure, to great success. However, in the South, the Five Civilized Tribes (Chickasaw, Choctaw, Seminole, Cherokee, and Creek) refused to leave despite promise of title ownership of the Western land, something they lacked before (Ehle, 2011). Rightly, they refused, as they lived on cultivated land, their children went to local schools and learned trades, while it was also their ancestral land.
The IRA affected the tribes that lived in the Southeastern region of the United States. Even though it was well-liked by whites in the south, this measure was only approved by the smallest of margins. Hawks such as Andrew Jackson fully refused to recognize the rights of Indians and continuously called for their removal. Traditionally, Indian lands were seen as autonomous nations, so the federal government would deal with them as they would diplomatically with foreign nations, via treaties. Jackson saw this as a violation of the US Constitution due to the principle of state sovereignty, as was later supported in the Supreme Court case of Johnson v. M’Intosh, which also indicated that Indians could not hold titles to their controlled lands within the US. Therefore, if they were not inherently sovereign, then they must obey the existing laws of the Union and assimilate. Jackson viewed the situation realistically, arguing that the demise of Indians on their territory was inevitable, and the federal government was offering a means of peaceful transition, to what otherwise would like be a bloody war (Ehle, 2011). Initially, the Indians were promised self-rule and titles to their land if having agreed to relocate. Jackson also sought to appease the Southern states, which were already showing some level of criticism for the Union, 30 years prior to the Civil War.
Once implemented, the IRA began the process of Indian removal. Lands to the west of the Mississippi River, at approximately present-day Oklahoma, were designated as Indian Territory. Notably, the IRA was implemented gradually, giving the tribes time to negotiate or voluntarily leave. The Indian removal was enforced largely by the next Martin Van Buren administration. Van Buren was a strong supporter and key advisor to Jackson, serving in his cabinet and later forming the Democratic Party alongside him. Van Buren is attributed to being the force behind the violent implementation of the IRA. The Treaty of New Echota signed during the Jackson presidency in 1835 stated that the Cherokee were to relinquish their land within two years (Ehle, 2011). However, when Van Buren came into power in 1837, the country was engaged in a bitter dispute with the tribe who was refusing to leave. Van Buren ordered the military to begin force removal, justifying the rapid and aggressive action as “If they be removed, they can be protected from those associations and evil practices which exert so pernicious and destructive an influence over their destinies” (Van Buren, 1837). This had profound consequences on the involved tribes and US history.
The most immediate impact of the enforcement of the IRA was the forced removal. Approximately 60,000 members of the Five Tribes were removed from ancestral lands. Many of them were forced to travel on foot or limited transportation, in cold climate and limited resources over 2000 miles, resulting in multiple thousands of deaths from each tribe, with the Cherokee being one of the first and majorly affected tribes (). The Trail of Tears is both a literal pathway but also the figurative description for the event of ethnic cleansing and forced removal that the US government directly sanctioned and executed against Native Americans for nearly two decades in the 19th century.
The IRA had cascading long-term effects on the United States. First, the tribes stopped trusting the US government, and began to actively resist Westward expansion. If prior, the tribes attempted to co-exist and live peacefully alongside the states, after the removal it led to open hostilities. However, the US government openly violated many agreements, including honoring the titles on the lands west of the Mississippi, eventually pushing the Indians further back (Wang, 2015). As a result of freed-up land, the US South became an agricultural center and began massively producing cotton as a cash crop, which also led to the massive growth in slavery and the region’s dependence on it. Historical evidence shows that the US census in 1830 counted approximately 2 million slaves, by 1860 this number had increased by nearly double (Mullen, 2014). As well-known, slavery became a prominent factor to the beginning of the Civil War. Notably, due to the strong mistrust of the federal government. In a letter to the Cherokee nations, the principal chief of the Indian tribes sought to align with the new Confederate government, in hopes of receiving beneficial treatment in exchange for support against the Union (Ross, 2003). The long-lasting effect is that Native American tribes has since faced discrimination, their reservations lacking funding and investment, and the US government has done little to repair the damage, both material and moral that it has done to the natives.
The Indian Removal Act of 1830 is the lesser known policy change behind the infamous Trail of Tears, and further defined US government relations with the Indians going forward. This topic was chosen because while the events are generally known, the underlying policies and motivations, along with the consequences, are often overlooked in history lessons. My view of the historical event changed drastically, as I now understand how ruthless the US government was towards these natives. While I understood the Trail of Tears to be detrimental, I never realized that the Indians were living peacefully on their lands at the time nor did I know about the abhorrent determination of US presidents to commit what essentially accounts as genocide and ethnic cleansing. A historian further pursuing research on the thesis statement would explore the in-depths of expansionist policies at the time, and trace how these policies and general public attitudes led to the passage of such bills such as the IRA despite major opposition.
References
Digital History. (2021). The Indian Removal Act of 1830. Web.
Ehle, J. (2011). Trail of tears: The rise and fall of the Cherokee nation. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.
History.state.gov. (2017). Indian Treaties and the Removal Act of 1830. Web.
Mullen, L. (2014). These maps reveal how slavery expanded across the United States. Smithsonian Magazine.
Ross, John. (2003). Address of John Ross, Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, requesting authority to negotiate with the Confederate States. In DISCovering Multicultural America: African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, Native Americans. Gale.
Van Buren, M. (1937). December 5, 1837: First annual message to Congress. UVA Miller Center.
Wang, H. L. (2015). Broken promises on display at Native American Treaties exhibit. NPR.