A New America: Political Reform and Indian Removal

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A New AmericaPolitical Reform and Indian Removal

• Chapter 12, Section 2

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Issues to know and understand

• Political Reform
• Voting Rights
• Switch from property ownership to White
  Manhood Suffrage
• Popularly Chosen Electors and the effect on
  voter participation
• Indian Removal policies of President Andrew
  Jackson
• Policies and legal action to remove Native
  Americans
• Supreme Court cases
• Congressional Actions
• Trail of Tears

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Terms to know and people to be aware of

• Terms or themes
• White Manhood Suffrage
• Indian Removal Act
• Trail of Tears
• People
• Andrew Jackson
• Sequoyah
• John Marshall
• Reverend Evan Jones
• Chief Osceola

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The Right to Vote

• Pre-Jackson
• Voting rights was based upon property ownership
• It was felt that property owners had a vested
  interest in the government, therefore the
  property owners were the only ones who needed to
  vote
• In 1828, this changed to WHITE MANHOOD SUFFRAGE
• The goal of this was to allow voting by all
  white males
• Effect was greatest in terms of voter
  participation

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Effects of the new voting rules
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Indian Removal Policies The Trail of Tears
legislation

• What is the Indian Removal policy?
• What was the intended goal?
• Who was the mastermind of this legislation?
• Who would benefit?
• What happened the 5 great nations?

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History of Indian Removal

• Takes place during the presidency of Andrew
  Jackson
• It is a policy that attempts to move Native
  Americans off of their land in the hopes of
  claiming the land for white settlers
• Although the Supreme Court rules for the Native
  Americans, President Jackson scoffs at the
  Supreme Court
• The Indian Removal Act of 1830 is the piece of
  Congressional legislation that gives credence to
  the governmental policy of removal

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Basic Facts
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Steps leading to removal
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Cherokee Nation Constitution of 1828

• The Constitution was an attempt to safeguard the
  Cherokee nations land
• State of Georgia said that the Cherokee
  Constitution was null and void and would not
  recognize the Constitution
• Why? The state said that the Cherokee were
  subject to Georgia law, therefore their
  Constitution was not a legal document
• Cherokee push the issue all the way to the
  Supreme Court

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The Indian Removal Act of 1830

• Congressional Legislation that allowed the
  government to forcibly remove the Native American
  Tribes from their ancestral homes to the western
  plainsessentially Oklahoma
• Sets into motion the governmental policy of
  removing the Native Americans from the land
• This has come to be known as the Trail of Tears

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Legal background

• 1831 Cherokee Nation v. State of Georgia
• John Marshall refused to hear this case at the
  Supreme Court level because
• This did two things
• 1. It ended the governmental practice of
  considering Native American tribes as
  foreign nations and put them under the
  guide of the American government
• 2. It said that Indian tribes were "domestic
  dependent nations" and could not turn to the
  Supreme Court. The cases dismissal allowed
  Georgia to strip the tribe of its
  governmental forms

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Legal Background part 2

• 1832 Worcester v. Georgia
• John Marshall established the doctrine that the
  national government alone could conduct Native
  American affairs, not individual states.
• Marshall said that based on the Indian Commerce
  Clause of the United States of America, the
  national government alone could govern the
  interactions between Native Americans and the
  settlers

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The Native American Trail of Tears

• The Trail of Tears was the name given to the path
  that was taken by the Native American Tribes that
  were removed from their ancestral homelands by
  the American Government
• 46,000 Native Americans were removed by the
  Jackson Administration
• Opened up 25 million acres of land to white
  settlement and to the practice of slavery

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Trail of Tears map
Essentially a 1,200 mile march by foot, boat and
by carriage
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The Trail of tears The Trek Westward

• American Army troops, led by General Winfield
  Scott, leads the march westward
• Trail is long (1200 miles) and grueling
• Natives were given little to no food or clothing
• Many Native Americans die along the way due to
  fatigue and illness
• The Cherokee are nearly all prisoners. They had
  been dragged from the homesthere allowed no time
  to take anything with them except the clothes
  they had onit is a painful sight.
• Reverend Evan Jones

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Destination Oklahoma

• The destination for the removed Natives was the
  Indian Reservation that would later become known
  as Oklahoma
• The land was less than fertile
• The Natives were essentially dumped in the
  western prairie, left to fend for themselves

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Native American Resistance

• Only a few tried physical resistance
• The Sac and the Fox retreated back to Illinois
• Led by Chief Blackhawk, they led a series of
  attacks to reclaim the land they were removed
  from
• This is known as the Blackhawk War
• Ultimately, the United States Army defeated the
  Natives
• The Seminole tribes, led by Chief Osceola,
  resisted the initial removal as well
• The Seminole effort was also put down by the
  American Army with brutal force

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Outcomes

• By 1844, only few Native American tribes existed
  east of the Mississippi
• Almost 25 million acres of arable land is opened
  up to the white settlers
• The contentious relationship between Native
  American tribes and the American government is
  started