Colonial
Expansion Leads to Broken Treaties and Forcible Removal
I.English
colonial policy leads to partial decimation
A.Demographic
hemorrhage: decline from at least 2 million to 250,000 by mid-1800s
1.
Killed by white’s bullets, encroachments, disease
B.
Can’t lump into one ethnic group: 300 tribes, 150 languages
II.The
Legacy of Colonial Power: Forcible Removal onto Reservations
A.Proclamation
of 1763: all land west of the Appalachians declared Indian Territory
1.Anticipating
the future: English government can’t stop settler encroachments
B.
The “Trail of Tears:” fate 60,000 members of5
“civilizes tribes” in southeast U.S.
1.
Cherokee,Choctaw,Chickasaw,Seminole, Creek:settled agriculture,cabin houses
2.Cherokee:written
language,bicameral legislature,appelate judiciary,own slaves
3.gold
discovered on reservation:Georgia nullifies Cherokee council, raffles land
4.Cherokee
Nation v. Georgia (1831); Worcester v. Gorgia (1832):
a.Cherokee
autonomy, juridiction over land, upheld by Supreme Court
b.Preident
Andrew Jackson refuses to enforce
5.Indian
Removal Bill of 1830:1/4 perish, shallow graves mark trail to Oklahoma
6.After
Civil War: treaties broken, 5 tribes get less land; made part of Oklahoma
C.Trail
of Tears for Seminoles of Florida
1.
Treaty of Payne’s Landing: calling for Indian’s to decide if want to exchange
territory
in Oklahoma for land in Florida ignored by Congress and President
2.
Leads to Second Seminole War, 1835-1842: most Seminoles forced out
1.White
lies:Osceola (war chief) tricked by truce: dies in chains
D.
Custer’s last stand and the battle of Little Bighorn (1876)
1.Ideological
legitimation: Indians depicted as savages engaged in massacre
2.Reality:gold
found; asked to leave reservation mid-winter despite 1868 treaty
3.
Defeat after victory: deprived of rations for 2 years, forced onto smaller
lands
4.
Denial of hunting and gathering way of life feeds millenarian movement
a.
Ghost Dance religion: calls for return of buffalo, whites to disappear
b.Indians
massacred at Wounded Knee--compensated century later