...hold it represents the reality of Native American history. A stagecoach is traveling through a desolate valley, when the passengers suddenly and without provocation find themselves surrounded, threatened, and eventually attacked for no reason by “injuns” on horses carrying guns and bows and arrows. Movies of Native Americans traveling in large groups circling wagons ready to attack innocent people played a pivotal role in promoting the image of the savage untamed Native American. While at the same time, the white settlers were portrayed as moral humans only trying to protect their land and their family from the brutal and savage Native Americans bent on killing as many white settlers as possible. Of course, there were conflicts and deaths, but very few were the result of hostility between settlers and Native Americans. When Native Americans tried to defend themselves and their land, settlers or troops attacked them. We learned from “Major Problems in the...
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...legally admonished the United States for genocidal acts against Native Americans, yet it is clear that examples of genocidal acts and crimes against humanity are a well-cited page in U.S. history. Notorious incidents, such as the Trail of Tears, the Sand Creek Massacre, and the massacre of the Yuki of northern California are covered in depth in separate entries in this encyclopedia. More controversial, however, is whether the colonies and the United States participated in genocidal acts as an overall policy toward Native Americans. The Native-American population decrease since the arrival of Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus alone signals the toll colonization and U.S. settlement took on the native population. Scholars estimate that approximately 10 million pre-Columbian Native Americans resided in the present-day United States. That number has since fallen to approximately 2.4 million. While this population decrease cannot be attributed solely to the actions of the U.S. government, they certainly played a key role. In addition to population decrease, Native Americans have also experienced significant cultural and proprietary losses as a result of U.S. governmental actions. The total effect has posed a serious threat to the sustainability of the Native-American people and culture. Ideological Motivations Two conflicting yet equally harmful ideologies significantly influenced U.S. dealings with Native Americans. The first sprang from the Enlightenment and, more specifically...
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...Native American Relocation Native American culture and its role in American history have always been a fascinating subject. There have been reading assignments on Native American’s removal and resistance, Black Hawk and his rebellion, and Emerson’s letter to President Van Buren. These pieces gave us a brief overview of America’s goals at the time, the action they took to achieve these goals, the Native Americans’ reaction, and the opinions held by the American people. These readings only scratched the surface of Native Americans and the role they have played in American History. The main cause of the interaction between Americans and the Native Americans was an increase in demand for land by Americans. As they pushed west and south, the frequency of interactions with Native Americans increased and so did hostility. I am aware that land demand issues were normally approached at first with peaceful negations. The American government would meet with the tribes and develop a treaty that resulted in less land for the Native Americans and more land for Americans. This would satisfy the Americans for a period of time but demand for land would just continue to increase. At this point Indians would either get restless and rebellions would ensue or Americans would violate the treaties and make moves on the Native’s land. In either situation the superior force of the American troops would result in them defeating the Indians. The Indians would then be forced to comply with American demands...
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...The United State’s long relationship with the Native Americans has its intricacies to say the least. With the arrival of English settlers at Jamestown in 1607, there were undoubtedly uncertainties amongst the Native people as to whether or not these settlers would resemble the Spanish settlers who had enslaved and “converted” many people in their quest for colonization. Yet, the Natives soon began to offer food and hospitality to the newcomers, hoping to create unity between the two groups, led by Powhatan and John Smith. The English, knowing nothing of the land, knowing not how to yield its gifts, and blinded by their passion for riches, relied greatly upon the aid of Powhatan. The colonists’ luck dwindled, suffering catastrophic losses to...
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...February 6, 2013 I am going to explain the compare and contrasting treatments of Native Americans by European Powers by many different types of cultures. We will descuss how badly the Native Americans was treated and how they had to overcome so much. I will also explain which methods was effective and which ones was not effective. The story of the Native American has been marked mainly by betrayal and sorrow towards them. Ever since the white men from across the ocean set foot onto this land, the Native American has lost almost everything including ancestral lands, dignity, and even their culture have fallen by the wayside. How interesting it is that the people who came to this land first are the ones who have been short changed. Native Americans have been ridiculed. The stereotype of the dirty dealin' Injun" is just one of numerous examples. This has not helped the Native Americans in any way. Slowly, things are getting better, but only slowly. It ended up tearing the Native Americans away from their land that they called Sacred which was not helpful and right by no means. The Cherokee called this land from Georgia to Oklahoma the Trail of Tears. Native American history is nothing but a trail of tears stretching through five centuries of horror and betrayal of the Native American. The Spanish and Native Americans date back to when Christopher Columbus discovered New World on October 14, 1492. He met with the Tainos which led him...
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...her mother, Martha, tried to show us the Great Smoky Mountains on the west side, she mentioned the Cherokee tribes where her ancestors used to live as the Native Americans who inhabited North America before the settlers came from Europe. After we finished that wonderful ride, I scheduled another meeting weeks later to talk more with Layla, my fiancée, about her origins and the Cherokee. Layla Sawyer said, “There are three federally recognized tribes today: the Eastern Band of Cherokees, the Cherokee Nation and the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians. I trace part of my ancestry back to the Eastern Band of Cherokees, although I’m not a member.” The Eastern Band of Cherokees are scattered throughout North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama. However, her family has roots in Cherokee NC. The Cherokee Nation and UKB are located in Oklahoma and Arkansas. They were originally part of the same larger body of Cherokees who were settled in the mountains of southeastern North America but in 1838 the federal government forced the Cherokees to leave their lands in Southeastern US and relocate to Oklahoma. This was known as the ‘Trail of Tears’ in which thousands of Cherokees were forced to walk away from their ancestral homes by the US Army in the middle of winter so that the new foreign settlers could have access to their land and the gold found therein. Thousands of Cherokees died on this long walk.” For this reason, the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma...
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...encompassed the belief that White Americans had a divine mission to colonize the American West and spread Protestant democratic values. This ideology significantly influenced the American Westward Migration, shaping the geographical expansion and the attitudes of White Americans towards other tribes and cultures. Manifest Destiny propagated the idea of White American superiority over Native Americans, promoting the belief that they possessed superior forms of administration and religion. It fueled a sense of destiny and entitlement among the White Americans, leading them to disregard the rights and territories of Native American Indian tribes and Mexicans living in regions such as...
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...government faced an embarrassing issue it was in dire need of resolving: treating the Native American tribes, particularly the Cherokee Nation. The policy of Indian Removal saw the removal of the Cherokee people from their original homelands in the Southeast to areas west of the Mississippi River; this was implemented during the reign of then-President Andrew Jackson. Thus, the basis of this program, of which the Trail of Tears was representative, centers on white settlers' land hunger and their belief that American society could not exist without Native American tribes. Debates over Cherokee removal highlighted a contest between rival notions of land expansion, culture, and self-determination. Whereas Jackson,...
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...So, when President Jackson was finally elected president in 1829, he had one of the largest rally of people at his inauguration. It was a crowd consisting of around twenty thousand people, some who traveled miles and miles to just hear and see their newly elected President speak. After his speech, he arrived to the White House with people already in the house. As the party continued, more people started to arrive and the house was getting over crowded. They could not get the people out of the house, so the party lasted for days, this party nearly destroyed the White House. The house was so packed and no one would leave leading President Jackson having to sneak out of his own residence. They were later able to draw the crowd out of the house successfully with even more...
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...currently, the country may be the most racially and culturally diverse nation on the planet. There may be other facts disputing this assumption but the United States beats other culturally diverse nations in terms of the tolerance and harmony between the resident cultures. All this can been attested to the fact that America is an Immigration Country. The country constitutes people from different parts of the world. The process of people moving into the new world that is the Americas where the United State lies began centuries ago and has been an ongoing process to the current day. This paper examines the origins of their Native Americans. This paper also explores their journey into the Americas as the first Immigrants. Their settlement patterns and ways of life will also be examined. The paper also explores how the Native Americans in the Americas fared during the European conquest of the region that is currently identified as the America. Euro-Indian relations, conflicts and their aftermath is also a focus point of the paper, which culminates into the current state of affairs of the Native American community in the Americas. Origins of the Native Americans There are diverse sources of information on the origins and history of the Native Americans. They include oral history passed down through generations. This oral history is as diverse as the Indian Nations. Different tribes have different folklore to explain their origins. For instance, the Haida who reside in British Columbia...
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...`The election of Andrew Jackson in 1829 and his stubborn support of Indian removal provoked controversy not only in the Indian tribes, but also among the American community. Jackson's refusal to respect the independence of the Cherokee tribe, allowed the state of Georgia to assert its jurisdiction over the Cherokees. With Andrew Jackson's assistance, Indian Removal Act of 1830 was passed which authorized the relocation of eastern Indian tribes to lands west of the Mississippi River. President Andrew Jackson was the main supporter of the removal of Indian tribes in order to give their lands to whites. Cherokee Nation was forced from its land, mainly as a result of the discovery of gold within their territory. Both the white Americans and the Cherokees had various opinions on Indian removal - some opposed and many supported it with a range of different arguments. Insatiable craving for foreign soil remained the primary cause, even though many people believed that the removal of Indians was the only way to save them from the extinction. While the Indians lived in close proximity to whites, they died as a result of...
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...borders throughout the North American continent. This expansion of the country was fueled by the ideology of Manifest Destiny. Yet, as some may argue, this was not a benevolent movement but rather an aggressive form of imperialism; the way in which Americans expanded, annexed territories, and forced the removal of many previous inhabitants was not justifiable. From the very start, the United States could only move in one direction; westward. With the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the country more than doubled in size. The movement of people into the interior of the American continent rapidly increased. This is movement was unorganized...
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...The entirety of the current doctrine of American Indian Law is based on the opinions written by Chief Justice Marshall in the cases of Johnson v. McIntosh, Cherokee Nation v. Georgia and Worcester v. Georgia. These cases, often referred to as the Marshal Trilogy, determined to what extend Native Americans have rights in light of their conquered status. Four principals manifest within the Marshal opinions, (1) congressional plenary power; (2) diminished tribal sovereignty; (3) the trust doctrine; and (4) the canons of construction (Kaldawi, 2016). In 1823, the first of the three cases, Johnson v. McIntosh was heard. The history behind the Johnson v. McIntosh complaint was a dispute over several tracts of land, purchased in the states of Illinois and Indiana, by the Wabash Land Companies on behalf of Johnson and also purchased by the federal government and then later sold by the federal government to the McIntosh family. Unfortunately, there was conflict as both parties, Johnson and McIntosh, said they owned the same parcels of land. Today there is question as to whether or not the purchases themselves were ever even legal (Kades, 2001). Chief...
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... The Old West frontier represents a land filled with opportunity, growth and new beginnings. Although new beginnings seemed like a blessing the opportunity came with harsh vices such as climate change, little resources, and little government influence. The West has been portrayed as frontier filled with violence and anarchy, but many young historians have come to challenge the glamorization of the Wild West stating that it was not as violent as the rest of the country as previously depicted. Though Robert Dykstra clarifies how low body count could skew homicide rates that illustrate high levels of violence in Dodge City, one city alone cannot discard the ferocity created between young transient males, crimes erupted between gangs, conflict and atrocities amongst Native Americans Professor David T. Courtright preserves the idea that the frontier was indeed very violent. Professor Courtright helps define the vague use of the West with the distinctions illustrated by Walter Nugent who defines two forms of frontiers. Type one was a frontier of farming and had a core of nuclear families, and the second focused on the industrial industries, such as mining, with a population almost entirely of young males. He agrees that type one frontiers had little violence due to the fact that they were family-based and elderly community. However, the counterpart type two frontiers where exponentially more volatile and what is read and seen in media developed from...
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...During the War of 1812, the British soldiers set fire to the nation’s capital. They burned nearly the entire city to the ground. This conflict was resolved in December of 1814 when a treaty was signed with the British. Unknowing British troops attacked New Orleans in January of 1815, but were defeated by Andrew Jackson’s forces. The general morale of the American people was very low during this time. They felt as though they had wasted their time, efforts, and lives had been wasted, until the victory at New Orleans which completely flipped their views. January 1, 1818 the White House was finally reopened after its burning four years prior. Throughout Nathan’s life there were many states formed for many different reasons. During his lifespan thirty-five of our now fifty states were made into states rather than just being territories or...
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