Davy Crockett and Andrew Jackson on Cherokee Nation

Racial Capitalism and the Indian Removal Act

Introduction

Andrew Jackson’s Second Annual Message was delivered in 1830 and served as justification, in his eyes, for the removal of the Indians from white settlements in the South.[footnoteRef:2] The idea behind the Indian Removal Act was that it would establish peace by giving the Native Americans their own territory; the problem was that territory was well on the side of the continent. Essentially, it was an act of racial capitalism, in which the US government justified its actions by arguing that it was for the victims’ own good. The Native Americans were simply in the way of developments that the states and federal government wanted to push through—which means they were in the way of capitalistic enterprise. The result of the Indian Removal Act was the Trail of Tears. And while Jackson was responsible for justifying the removal, the idea was not really his originally. In fact, idea went back to George Washington, who first proposed it. Indeed, the Choctaw and Cherokee had been removed their land over the course of the 1700s and 1800s leading up to the Act.[footnoteRef:3] The difference between Washington and Jackson, however, was that Washington did entertain the notion of entering into a treaty with the Native Americans. For Jackson, this was not an option. He fully advocated using the military to push the Native Americans off their land. Of course, his stated intention was for them to occupy the land west of the Mississippi. It was not his stated intention to force them on a death march—but what happened cannot be disputed. Jackson stole their land and forced them to relocate under brutal conditions; after all, it was America’s “manifest destiny” to take the land it wanted, according to the doctrine of the times.[footnoteRef:4] [2: Andrew Jackson, “Second Annual Message,” 1830. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4h3437t.html] [3: Theda Perdue, "Both White and Red". Mixed Blood Indians: Racial Construction in the Early South (The University of Georgia Press, 2003), 45.] [4: O’Sullivan, John. “Annexation.” United States Magazine and Democratic Review, vol. 17, no. 1 (July-August 1845), 5.]

Jackson’s Second Annual Message in Context

The main point of contention was whether the state of Georgia had the right to take the land belonging to and occupied by the Cherokee Nation. The Cherokee actually took the matter to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court ruled that the Cherokee were neither a recognized nation nor subject to the state. Instead, the Court essentially described the Cherokee as orphans who subsisted on the charity of the US government. It was not a flattering depiction and the Cherokee resented it, to be sure. Essentially, the Court confirmed that the Cherokee were a conquered people who had no right to their land. The Speeches on the Indian Bill in the House of Representatives in 1830 essentially explored this topic in detail, even touching upon the rights of the Native Americans with respect to the “discoverers of America,” who were judged to have the right to take the land and lay claim to it.[footnoteRef:5] [5: ART. VI.--Speeches on the Indian Bill; viz.--Of Messrs. The North American Review (1821-1940); Oct 1830; VOL. XXXI., No. LXIX.; American Periodicals Series Online pg. 396]

Some, such as Davy Crockett, sympathized with the plight of the Cherokee Nation.[footnoteRef:6] Others saw them us stubborn and unwilling to integrate and accept American values, mores and culture. The governor of Tennessee, John Sevier, had been one of these latter: he had requested permission from the Cherokee to establish a road through their territory in 1803. Sevier made condescending reference to the promotion of then-President Jefferson for interstate travel and improved transportation infrastructure in his letter to the Cherokee. He talked down to the Cherokee as though they were both hard of hearing and hard of understanding, but also as though they were a conquered people. In his letter he attempted to explain the benefits of these roads, but of course he completely left out the (negative) consequences for the Cherokee: [6: Davy Crockett, On the removal of the Cherokees, 1834, https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-now/spotlight-primary-source/davy-crockett-removal-cherokees-1834]

You have just now heard your Father’s the President talk, sent to you and delivered by your brother Colonel Meigs. It is a request from your great Father that a road be opened for the good and benefit of all his children both red and white, and will be more so for our red brothers, as the road will be through their own land and they will have the benefit of the ferries, houses of entertainment and all oppertunities of selling and disposing of their corn meat and provisions of every kind. The road will be of the same use to yourselves to travel on, to market, and for every other advantage that it can be of to your Brothers the white people…[footnoteRef:7] [7: John Sevier, Letter to the Cherokee. https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/cherokee-removal-and-the-trail-of-tears/sources/1500]

The negative consequences of course would be more eminent domain from the US government, more land seizure, less room for the Cherokee overtime, and ultimately total displacement. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was merely the final, inevitable conclusion from the standpoint of the US government. These actions had been set in motion years prior. It was now just a matter of dotting the I’s and crossing the T’s. Jackson was the man to see to that.

His Second Annual Meeting speech laid it all out to Congress. Jackson made no illusions about what the Act would do:

By opening the whole territory between Tennessee on the north and Louisiana on the south to the settlement of the whites it will incalculably strengthen the southwestern frontier and render the adjacent States strong enough to repel future invasions without remote aid. It will relieve the whole State of Mississippi and the western part of Alabama of Indian occupancy, and enable those States to advance rapidly in population, wealth, and power.[footnoteRef:8] [8: Andrew Jackson, “Second Annual Message,” 1830. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4h3437t.html]

The aim of the US government was to open up the territory to investment, secure the realm against intruders, and to make the US stronger than ever before. It was the same narrative that would be promoted time and time again throughout the nation’s history, whether it was with respect to taking the land of the Cherokee, or taking Texas and the southwest from Mexico, or taking the island nation of Hawaii, or taking the Philippines during the Spanish-American War, or taking oil from Syria as it is currently attempting to do today.

Those Who Objected

Those who objected were not heard—at least not in any way, shape or form that made any difference to the determined course of action on the part of the US government. Davy Crockett lamented the fact and stated that “our happy days of Republican principles are near at an end when a few is to transfer the many.”[footnoteRef:9] Black Hawk was another who found the loss of his land and rights abominable. Black Hawk was a leader of the Sauk and had seen his land in Illinois taken and his removal to west of the Mississippi accepted by many of the Native Americans. Black Hawk fought back against the US for years afterwards but ultimately was obliged to surrender. In his autobiography, he would recount upon his surrender: [9: Davy Crockett, On the removal of the Cherokees, 1834, https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-now/spotlight-primary-source/davy-crockett-removal-cherokees-1834]

On our way down I surveyed the country that had cost us so much trouble, anxiety and blood, and that now caused me to be a prisoner of war. I reflected upon the ingratitude of the whites when I saw their fine houses, rich harvests and everything desirable around them? and recollected that all this land had been ours, for which I and my people had never received a dollar, and that the whites were not satisfied until they took our village and our graveyards from us and removed us across the Mississippi.[footnoteRef:10] [10: Black Hawk, Autobiography, 113. http://asp6new.alexanderstreet.com.ezpprod1.hul.harvard.edu/ibio/ibio.result.epages.aspx?code=S10018026D000002.htm]

None of that mattered to Jackson in 1830, nor to the House that heard his address. None of it mattered to the US government that had long been intent upon taking the land—all the land—as far as the eye could see—all the way to the Pacific and then beyond. None of it mattered, because as O’Sullivan would state it was the “manifest destiny” of the US to dominate as though the Americans were the chosen people of God and had a divine right to lay claim to whatever it wanted.[footnoteRef:11] Black Hawk’s words in his autobiography recount his life, his connection to the land, and his efforts to retain some dignity and honor in the face of the US government’s transgressions against the Native Americans. Crockett too found the whole ordeal distasteful and lamented the direction that his own people were taking. He had made peace with the natives; why should the US government be so intent upon now removing them as though there were not room enough for all? The answer cannot be found in anything other than the racial capitalism of the time. It was the manifest destiny of the White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) rulers of the US government to take what they wanted. Jackson in 1830 was merely their spokesman for a moment. He was not the only one who would advocate such measures. [11: O’Sullivan, John. “Annexation.” United States Magazine and Democratic Review, vol. 17, no. 1 (July-August 1845), 5.]

A fourth of Cherokee Nation was killed as a result of the Indian Removal Act of 1830.[footnoteRef:12] Yet there were some—a few hundred Cherokee—who remained behind and established themselves on land owned by one charitable man named William Holland Thomas, who set aside land of his own in the Smoky Mountain ranges just for them.[footnoteRef:13] This small band of Cherokee would remain in the South for generations up to the modern era of today. Tourists now go to the ranges to have an authentic “Indian” experience—but, of course, the world has changed so much that the Cherokee who still live would hardly be recognizable to their ancestors. Today they are but a sign of the fact that the American people were conquerors, uninterested in sharing the great wealth and land of the continent. [12: John Ehle, Trail of tears: The rise and fall of the Cherokee Nation (Anchor, 2011), 240.] [13: Kutsche, Paul. "The Tsali legend: culture heroes and historiography." Ethnohistory 10, no. 4 (1963), 329.]