Classroom Worksheet
Congressman: Indian Removal, 1830
Andrew Jackson
David Crockett
Cherokee Nation
Read the following primary documents about President Andrew Jackson's Indian Removal policy. Underline the key argument in each document with regard to the Indian Resettlement Act of 1830.
Annual message to Congress, Dec. 6, 1830
It gives me great pleasure to announce to Congress that the benevolent policy of Government...in relation to the removal of the Indians beyond the white settlements is approaching to a happy consummationąToward the aborigines of the country no one can indulge a more friendly feeling than myself, or would go further in attempting to reclaim them from their wandering habits and make them a happy, prosperous people. Humanity has often wept over the fate of the aborigines of this country and Philanthropy has long been busily employed in devising means to avert it, but its progress has never for a moment been arrested, and one by one have many powerful tribes disappeared from the earth. Philanthropy could not wish to see this continent restored to the condition in which it was found by our forefathers. What good man would prefer a country covered with forests and ranged by a few thousand savages to our extensive Republic, studded with cities, towns, and prosperous farms...?
A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, 1834
His famous, or rather I should say infamous, Indian bill was brought forward, and I opposed it from the purest motives in the world. Several of my colleagues got around me, and told me how well they loved me, and that I was ruining myself. They said this was a favourite measure of the president, and I ought to go for it. I told them I believed it was a wicked, unjust measure, and that I should go against it, let the cost to myself be what it might; that I was willing to go with General Jackson in everything that I believed was honest and right; but further than this I wouldn't go for him, or any other man in the whole creation. I voted against this Indian bill, and my conscience yet tells me that I gave a good honest vote, and that I believe will not make me ashamed in the day of judgment.
Memorial and Protest, June 22, 1836
The Cherokees were happy and prosperous under a scrupulous observance of treaty stipulations by the government of the United States, and from the fostering hand extended over them, they made rapid advances in civilization, morals, and in the arts and sciences. Little did they anticipate, that when taught to think and feel as the American citizen, and to have with him a common interest, they were to be despoiled by their guardian, to become strangers and wanderers in the land of their fathers, forced to return to the savage life, and to seek a new home in the wilds of the far west, and without their consent. This [legislation] is fraudulent, false upon its face, made by unauthorized individuals, without the sanction, and against the wishes, of the great body of the Cherokee people.