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White Americans Vs Cherokee Indians

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White Americans Vs Cherokee Indians
It is speculated that the Cherokee tribe migrated to the Southeast between the years 600 and 1000; centuries before the first regular contact with Europeans. In the years before the 1500’s, when the Europeans started settling in America, the Cherokee lived an exceptionally sedentary lifestyle with the women doing mostly farm work while the men hunted. However, as contact with the white Europeans grew more common, the Cherokee developed a sense of dependence on them for goods and a more “civilized” personality. By the 1800’s, as the Southeast states, such as Georgia, started to expand a particularly important debate came into play. This controversial dispute was over the removal of the Cherokee Indians out of the limits of the states and moved …show more content…
America had many treaties with the Cherokee and other Native Americans, and many people, Americans and Cherokee, believed that by ignoring those treaties would be immoral and unconstitutional. Jeremiah Evarts who was a strongly opposed to removal states how all attempts to force the Cherokee out of their land, “are acts of oppression” and “the United States are firmly bound by treaty to protect the Indians from force and encroachments on the part of a State”. Americans were deeply concerned about the stain it would put on America and by forcing the Cherokee out of their land, America is ignoring Indian rights. Similarly, a majority of the Cherokee were gravely opposed to removal and firmly stood their ground and stayed where they were until they were dragged out. Their reasons for this are very simple; their ancestors had been living on the land long before any white settlers and they believed that God had given them that land, and along with the treaties between them and America, clearly give them the rights to the land. In an address to the Cherokee Council in 1830, it is expressed to, “remain on the land of our fathers. We have a perfect and original right to claim this,...The treaties with us, and the laws of the United States,...guaranty our residence, and our privileges, and secure us against intruders”. To the Cherokee people and many Americans, it seemed unfathomable that America created a constitution based on freedom and rights, but now they are taking the rights away from the people who occupied the lands before them. To these people it was immoral and unconstitutional to ignore the treaties that had been made and force the Cherokee out of their

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