1. Indian Removal

2. Chart on Trail of Tears What happened? When did it occur?
Who was involved?
Where did it occur?
What was the reaction?
What were the results?
Why did it happen?
Human experiences

3. Westward Expansion in US
Beginning of 1800’s
United States was growing west and south
Indian tribes already inhabited the land
Settlers asked government to remove the tribes
Why do you feel that the settlers felt it necessary to ask the government to move the Indian tribes?
How did the settlers feel? How do you think the Indians felt about this?

4. Ideas of Indians and Americans
Land is not for sale, it belongs to everyone
Live on the land they got from a higher Spirit
Americans
Land is to buy and to own.
Buy land to find gold and other resources

5. Indian Removal Act
In 1830 Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, approved by Jackson.
The Act said that the government would:
- negotiate treaties with Indian tribes to buy land
- Indians would be given land west of the
Mississippi
-Indians would receive food and transportation,
would live on their new land under the
government’s protection forever
-Was a chance for Indians to move West if they
wanted to
Is there a limit to what a government or president should be able to do gain land and power?

6. Indian Removal Act Why would they not want to leave?
lived there for a long time
ancestors were buried on their land
would be leaving their heritage and history

7. What the Indian Removal Act Really Meant
Forced all Indians to move west of the Mississippi River
The army used force to enforce the law
The Trail of Tears is an example of military force

8. “The Five Civilized Tribes”
Name given by whites to the Creek, Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole
They called them this because they gave up many of their ways to live peacefully with the whites
Most had given up hunting to become farmers
Many had learned to read and write The Cherokee even had their own written language, a newspaper, and a constitution modeled on the U.S. Constitution

9. Treaties
By the end of Andrew Jackson’s presidency, over 70 treaties had been negotiated
Cherokee refused to negotiate a treaty (Once they found gold the some whites wanted their land)
Went to court against the State of Georgia
Successful but ignored by Jackson.

10. Original Cherokee Claims: NC, SC, Georgia, Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee

11. Cherokee Lands 1791

12. Cherokee nation, East before removal; 1838

13. Trail of tears: Over 100,000 transplanted west of the Mississippi River, 1000’s died on the trip due to lack of food and poor organization by the government.

14. The Trail of Tears
More than 17,000 Cherokee were dragged from their homes in Georgia and herded west by federal troops
4,000
died
during the
long walk
to Indian
Territory

15. Seminole
Seminole Indians in Florida waged guerilla warfare against soldiers
Seminoles lost when their leader, Osceola, was captured, although fighting continued for two more years
Only tribe that did not negotiate with the government.

16. Creeks
Thousands of Creeks were also taken from Alabama in handcuffs, and marched west.
One soldier called it, “The cruelest work I ever knew.”
Many white citizens were ashamed and appalled by the treatment of the Indians and protested in Washington D.C.

17. The Trail where the last Indians cried… and died.
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The Trail where the last Indians cried…
and died.