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Online Texts
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Craig White's
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The Cherokee Memorials
(1820s-30s) |
Sequoyah (c. 1767-1843), inventor of the Cherokee syllabary or alphabet |
Instructor's Notes:
The Cherokee, now most famous for the "Trail of Tears" that brought them and
other tribes from the southeastern United States to Oklahoma, were
included by whites among the "Five Civilized Tribes"—Indian peoples who
assimilated European ways (e.g. writing, farming, slavery). The other Five
Civilized Tribes were Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, & Seminole.
In the American Revolution, the Cherokee and many other tribes supported the
British on account of the Empire's nominal respect for Indian treaties and land rights.
During the Revolutionary War, the Cherokees lost much land; after the war,
tribal boundaries conflicted with state boundaries in
the new USA.
The Cherokee attempted to use the new nation's political
processes to resist white encroachment. In the 1820s
the Cherokee . . .
-
developed their own constitution
based on the U.S.
Constitution with checks and balances involving executive, legislative,
and judicial branches
-
established a printing press (donated and installed by a
Vermont missionary)
-
and began a bilingual newspaper,
the Cherokee Phoenix, still in
publication.
In the 1830s President Andrew Jackson, a hero of the War of 1812 who rose as an
Indian fighter, flouted the U.S. Supreme Court by enforcing the Indian Removal
Act that would result in the Trail of Tears.
In response to these threats and to white encroachments on the territory
guaranteed by their treaties, the Cherokee appealed
to the U.S. Congress with a number of "Memorials" or petitions asserting their
rights.
As literature, these documents demonstrate
inter-textuality and hybridity in that
they absorb American political or ideological rhetoric
while maintaining some spoken traditions even in writing.
Memorial of the Cherokee Nation, Dec. 1829
[1]
To the honorable the senate and house of
representatives of the United States of America, in congress
assembled:
[2] The undersigned memorialists, humbly make
known to your honorable bodies, that they are free citizens of the
Cherokee nation. Circumstances of late occurrence have troubled our
hearts, and induced us at this time to appeal to you, knowing that
you are generous and just . . . .
[3] By the will of our Father in heaven, the
governor of the whole world, the red man of America has become
small, and the white man great and renowned. When the ancestors of
the people of these United States first came to the shores of
America, they found the red man strong—though he was ignorant and
savage, yet he received them kindly, and gave them dry land to rest
their weary feet. They met in peace, and shook hands in token of
friendship. Whatever the white man wanted and asked of the Indian,
the latter willingly gave. At that time the Indian was the lord, and
the white man the suppliant. But now the scene has changed. The
strength of the red man has become weakness.
As his neighbors
increased in numbers, his power became less, and now, of the many
and powerful tribes who once covered these United States, only a few
are to be seen—a few whom a sweeping pestilence has left. The
northern tribes, who were once so numerous and powerful, are now
nearly extinct. Thus it has happened to the red man of America.
Shall we, who are remnants, share the same fate?
[4] Brothers—we address you according to usage
adopted by our forefathers, and the great and good men who have
successfully directed the councils of the nation you represent—we
now make known to you our grievances.
We are troubled by some of
your own people. Our neighbor, the state of Georgia, is pressing
hard upon us, and urging us to relinquish our possessions for her
benefit. We are told, if we do
not leave the country, which we dearly love, and betake ourselves to
the western wilds, the laws of the state will be extended over us,
and the time, 1st of June, 1830, is appointed for the execution of
the edict. When we first heard of this we were grieved and appealed
to our father, the president, and begged that protection might be
extended over us. But we were doubly grieved when we understood,
from a letter of the secretary of war to our delegation, dated March
of the present year [1829],
that our father the president had refused us protection, and that he
had decided in favor of the extension of the laws of the state over
us.—This decision induces us to appeal to the immediate
representatives of the American people. We love, we dearly love our
country, and it is due to your honorable bodies, as well as to us,
to make known why we think the country is ours, and why we wish to
remain in peace where we are.
[5] The land on which we stand, we have received
as an inheritance from our fathers, who possessed it from time
immemorial, as a gift from our common father in heaven. We have
already said, that when the white man came to the shores of America,
our ancestors were found in peaceable possession of this very land.
They bequeathed it to us as their children, and we have sacredly
kept it as containing the remains of our beloved men.
This right of
inheritance we have
never ceded,
nor ever
forfeited.
Permit us to ask, what better right can a people have to a
country, than the right of
inheritance
and
immemorial
peaceable possession? We know it is said of late by the state
of Georgia, and by the executive of the United States, that we have
forfeited this right—but we think this is said gratuitously. At what
time have we made the forfeit? What crime have we committed, whereby
we must forever be divested of our country and rights? Was it when
we were hostile to the United States, and took part with the king of
Great Britain, during the struggle for independence? If so, why was
not this forfeiture declared in the first treaty of peace between
the United States and our beloved men?...
[6] In addition to that first of all rights, the
right of inheritance and peaceable possession, we have
the faith and
pledge of the U. States, repeated over and over again, in treaties
made at various times. By these treaties our rights as a separate
people are distinctly acknowledged, and guarantees given that they
shall be secured and protected. So we have always understood the
treaties. The conduct of the government towards us, from this
organization until very lately, the talks given to our beloved men
by the presidents of the United States, and the speeches of the
agents and commissioners, all concur to show that we are not mistake
in our interpretation.—Some of our beloved men who signed the
treaties are still leaving [ sic,
living], and their
testimony tends to the same conclusion. We have always supposed that
this understanding of the treaties was in accordance with the views
of the government; nor have we ever imagined that any body would
interpret them otherwise. In what light shall we view the conduct of
the United States and Georgia, in their intercourse with us, in
urging us to enter into treaties, and cede lands? If we were but
tenants at will, why was it necessary that our consent must be
obtained before these governments could take lawful possession of
our lands? The answer is obvious.
These governments perfectly
understood our rights—our right to the country, and our right to
self government. Our understanding of the treaties is further
supported by the intercourse law of the United States, which
prohibits all encroachments upon our territory. The undersigned
memoirists humbly represent, that if their interpretation of the
treaties has been different from that of the government, then they
have ever been deceived as to how the government regarded them, and
what she asked and promised. Moreover, they have uniformly
misunderstood their own acts.
[7] In view of the strong ground upon which their
rights are founded, your memorialists solemnly protest against being
considered as tenants at will, or as mere occupants of the soil,
without possessing the sovereignty. We have already stated to your
honorable bodies, that our forefathers were found in possession of
this soil in full sovereignty, by the first European settlers; and
as we have never ceded nor forfeited the occupancy of the soil and
the sovereignty over it, we do solemnly protest against being forced
to leave it, either [by] direct or by indirect measures.
To the land
of which we are now in possession we are attached—it is our father’s
gift—it contains their ashes—it is the land of our nativity, and the
land of our intellectual birth. We cannot consent to abandon it, for
another far inferior,
and which holds out to us no
inducements. We do moreover protest against the arbitrary measures
of our neighbor, the state of Georgia, in her attempt to extend her
laws over us, in surveying our lands without our consent and in
direct opposition to treaties and the intercourse law of the United
States, and interfering with our municipal regulations in such a
manner as to derange the regular operations of our own laws. To
deliver and protect them from all these and every encroachment upon
their rights, the undersigned memorialists do most earnestly pray
your honorable bodies. Their existence and future happiness are at
stake—divest them of their liberty and country, and you sink them in
degradation, and put a check, if not a final stop, to their present
porgress in the arts of civilized life, and in the knowledge of the
Christian religion. Your memorialists humbly conceive, that such an
act would be in the highest degree oppressive. From the people of
these United States, who perhaps, of all men under heaven, are the
most religious and free, it cannot be expected.—Your memorialists,
therefore, cannot anticipate such a result. You represent a
virtuous, intelligent and Christian nation. To you they
[memorialists] willingly
submit their cause for your righteous decision.
Cherokee Nation, Dec.
1829.
Cherokee Phoenix and Indians' Advocate
Wednesday, April 14, 1830
Vol. II, no. 52
Page 1, col. 1b-5b - Page 3, col. 1a
INDIANS MEMORIAL
of the Cherokee Legislature
(1830)
[8]
Some time ago when we published the "Cherokee Memorial"
we stated to our readers that the members of the General Council, during their
last session, had signed another memorial to Congress. We now make this
document public.
[9]
To the Honorable, Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America, in Congress Assembled:
[10] We the representatives of the people of the Cherokee
Nation in General Council convened, compelled by a sense of duty, we owe to
ourselves and Nation, and confiding in the justice of your honorable bodies,
address and make known to you the grievances which disturb the quiet repose and
harmony of our citizens, and the dangers by which we are surrounded.
Extraordinary as this course may appear to you, the circumstances that have
imposed upon us this duty we deem sufficient to justify the measure; and our
safety as individuals as well as a Nation requires that we should be heard by
the immediate representatives of the people of the United States, whose
humanity, and magnanimity, by permission and will of Heaven, may yet
preserve us
from ruin and extinction.
[11]
The authorities of Georgia have recently and unexpectedly
assumed a doctrine, horrid in its aspect; and fatal in its consequences to us,
and utterly at variance with the laws of Nations of the United States, and the
subsisting Treaties between us, and the known history of said state, of this
Nation and of the United States. She claims the exercise of Sovereignty over
this Nation, and has threatened and decreed the extension of her jurisdictional
limits over our people. The Executive of the United States through the
Secretary of War, in a letter to our Delegation of the 18th April last, has
recognized this right to be abiding in, and possessed by the State of Georgia,
by the Declaration of Independence and the Treaty of Peace concluded between the
U. States and Great Britain in 1783, and which it is urged vested in her all the
rights of sovereignty pertaining to Great Britain, which in time previously she
claimed and exercised within the limits of what constituted the "thirteen United
States."
[12]
It is a subject of vast importance to know
whether the power of self
Government abided in the Cherokee Nation at the discovery of America, three
hundred and thirty seven years ago, and whether it was in any manner effected or
destroyed by the Charters of European Potentates? It is evident from the facts
deducible from known history, that the Indians were found here by the white man
in the enjoyment of plenty and peace and all rights of soil and domain,
inherited from their ancestors from time immemorial well furnished with Kings,
Chiefs, and Warriors, and bulwarks of liberty and the pride of their race.
Great Britain established with them relationships of friendship and alliance,
and at no time did she treat them as subjects and as tenants at will to her
power. In war she fought them as a separate people, and they resisted her as a
Nation--In peace she spoke the language of friendship, and they replied in the
voice of independence, and frequently assisted her as allies, at their choice,
to fight her enemies in their own way and discipline subject to the control of
their own chiefs and unaccountable to European officers and military law.
[13]
Such
was the connexion of their nation to Great Britain, to wit, that of
friendship and not allegiance, to the period of the Declaration of Independence
by the United States, and during the revolutionary contest down to the Treaty of
peace between the United States and Great Britain forty six years ago, when the
latter abandoned all hopes of conquest, and at the same time abandoned her
Cherokee allies to the difficulties in which they had been involved, either to
continue the war or procure peace on the best terms they could, and close the
scenes of carnage and blood, that had so long been witnessed and experienced by
both parties. Peace was at last concluded at Hopewell in '85 by "the
commissioners Plenipotentiary of the United States in Congress assembled." and
the Cherokees were received "into favor and protection of the United States of
America." It remains to be proved, under a view of all these circumstances, and
the knowledge we have of history, how our right to self Government was effected
and destroyed, by the
Declaration of Independence which never noticed the
subject of Cherokee Sovereignty, and the Treaty of Peace in '83, between Britain
and the United States, to which the Cherokees were not a party, but maintained
hostilities on their part to the Treaty of Hopewell afterwards concluded. If,
as it is stated by the Hon. Secretary of War, the Cherokees were tenants at
will, and were only permitted to enjoy possession of the soil to pursue game,
and if the State of North Carolina and Georgia were sovereigns in truth and in
right over us, why did President Washington send "commissioners
Plenipotentiaries" to treat with the subjects of those States? Why did they
permit the Chiefs and warriors to enter into treaty, when if they were subjects,
they had grossly rebelled and revolted from their allegiance and why did not
those sovereigns make their lives pay the forfeit of their guilt, agreeably to
the law of said States. The answer must be plain,- they were not subjects, but
a distinct Nation, and in that light viewed by Washington and by all the people
of the union at that period.
[14]
In the first & second articles of the Hopewell Treaty,
and the third of the Holston Treaty, the United States and the Cherokee Nation
were bound to a mutual exchange of prisoners taken during the wars, which
incontrovertibly proves the possession of sovereignty by both contracting
parties. It ought to be remembered too in conclusions of the Treaties to which
we have referred, and most of the Treaties subsisting between the United States
and this Nation, that the phraseology, composition, &c. were always written by
the commissioners on the part of the United States, for obvious reason, as the
Cherokees were unacquainted with letters. Again, in the Holston Treaty, 11th
article, the following remarkable evidence is contained that our Nation is not
under the jurisdiction of any state. "If any citizen or inhabitant of the
United States, or of either of the territorial districts of the United States
shall go into any town, settlement, or territory belonging to the Cherokees, and
shall there commit any crime upon, or trespass against the persons, or property
of any peaceable and friendly Indian or Indians, which, if committed with the
jurisdiction of any state, or within the jurisdiction of either of the said
Districts against a citizen or any white inhabitant thereof, would be punishable
by the laws of such state of district, such offender or offenders shall be
proceeded against in the same manner as if the offence had been committed within
the jurisdiction of the state or district to which he or they may belong,
against a citizen, or white inhabitant thereof."
[15]
The power of a state may put our national existence under
its feet, and coerce us into her jurisdiction, but it would be contrary to legal
right and plighted faith of the United States' Government. It is said by
Georgia, and the Hon. Secretary of War, that one sovereignty cannot exist within
another, and therefore we must yield to the stronger power; but is not this
doctrine favorable to our Government, which does not interfere with any other.
Our sovereignty and right of enforcing legal enactments extend no farther than
our territorial limits, and that of Georgia is and have always terminated at her
limits. The Constitution of the United States, (article 6) contains these
words; "all Treaties made under the authority of the United States shall be the
supreme law of the land," and the "Judges in every state shall be bound thereby,
any thing in the laws or constitution of any State to the contrary
notwithstanding." The sacredness of Treaties made under the authority of the
United States are paramount and Supreme, stronger than the laws and constitution
of any state. The jurisdiction then of our Nation over its soil is settled by
the laws, Treaties, and Constitution of the United States, and has been
exercised from time out of memory.-- Georgia has objected to the adoption on our
part of a constitutional form of Government, which has in no wise violated
the intercourse and connexion which bind us to the United States, its
constitution and the treaties thereupon founded and in existence between us.
As
a distinct nation, notwithstanding any unpleasant feelings it might have created
to a neighboring state, we had the right to improve our Government suitable to
the moral, civil and intellectual advancement of our people; and had we
anticipated any notice of it, it was the voice of encouragement by an approving
world. We would also, while on this subject, refer your attention in the
memorial and protest submitted before your Honorable bodies during the last
Session of Congress by our Delegation then at Washington.
[16]
Permit us also to make known to you the aggrieved and
unpleasant situation under which we are placed by the claim which Georgia has
set up to a large portion of our territory under the Treaty of the Indian
Springs concluded with the late General McIntosh and his party, and which was
declared void and of no effect by a subsequent Treaty between the Creek Nation
and the United States at Washington City. The President of the United States
through the Secretary of War assured our delegation that so far as he understood
the Cherokees had rights, protection should be afforded, and respecting the
intrusions on our lands he had been advised " and instructions had been
forwarded to the agent of the Cherokees, directing him to cause their removal,
and earnestly hoped, that on this matter all cause for future complaint would
cease, and the order prove effectual." The hope of the President is yet
unrealized, and the order has not "proved effectual." In consequence of the
agents neglecting to comply with the instructions, and suspension of the order
made by the Secretary afterwards, our border citizens are at this time placed
under the most unfortunate circumstances by the intrusions of citizens of the
United States; and which are almost daily increasing in consequence of the
suspension of the once contemplated "effectual order." Many of our people are
experiencing all the evils of personal insult, and in some instances expulsion
from their homes, and loss of property, from the unrestrained intruders let
loose upon us, and the encouragement they are allowed to enjoy under the last
order to the agent for this Nation, which amounts to a suspension of the force
of treaties, and the wholesome operation of the intercourse laws of the United
States. The reason alleged by the War Department for its suspension, is that it
had been requested so to do until the claim the state of Georgia has made to a
portion of the Cherokee Country be determined; and the intruders are to remain
unmolested within the border limits of this Nation. We beg leave to protest
against this unprecedented procedure. If the state of Georgia has a claim to
any portion of our lands and is entitled by law and justice to them, let her
seek through a legal channel to establish it; and we do hope that the United
States will not suffer her to take possession of them forcibly and investigate
her claim afterwards.
[17]
Arguments to effect the emigration of our people
[to move to the Indian Territory of the Southwest, now
Oklahoma], and to
induce us to escape the troubles and disquietudes incident to a residence
contiguous to the whites, have been urged upon us, and the arm of protection
has been withheld that we may experience still deeper and ampler proofs of the
doctrine, but we still adhere to what is right and agreeable to ourselves; and
our attachment to the soil of our ancestors is too strong to be shaken.
We have
been invited to a retrospective view of the past history of Indians, who have
melted away before the light of civilization, and the mountains of difficulties
that have opposed our race in their advancement in civilized life. We have done
so, and while we deplore the fate of thousands of our complexion and kind, we
rejoice that our Nation stands, and grows a lasting monument of God's mercy, and
durable contradiction to the misconceived opinion that the aborigines are
incapable of civilization. The opposing mountains that cast fearful shadows in
the road of Cherokee improvement have dispersed into vernal clouds, and our
people stand adorned with flowers of achievement flourishing around them, and
are encouraged to secure the attainment of all that is useful in science and
Christian knowledge.
[18]
Under the fostering care of the United States we have
thus prospered; and shall we expect approbation, or shall we sink under the
displeasure and rebuke of our enemies?
[19]
We now look with earnest expectation to your Hon. bodies
for redress; and we earnestly pray that our national existence may not be
extinguished before a prompt and effectual interposition is afforded in our
behalf. The faith of your Government is solemnly pledged for our protection
against all oppressions, so long as we remain firm in our Treaties; and that we
have for a long series of years proved to be true & loyal friends,the known
history of past events abundantly proves. Your chief magistrate himself has
borne testimony of our devotedness in supporting the cause of the United States
during their late conflict with a foreign foe.
[20]
It is with reluctant and painful feelings that
circumstances here at length compelled us to seek from you the promised
protection for the preservation of our rights & privileges.
This resort to us
is a last one, and nothing short of the threatening evils and dangers that beset
us could have forced it upon the Nation. But it is a right we surely have, and
in which we cannot be mistaken, that of appealing for justice and humanity to
the United States, under whose kind and fostering care we have been led to the
present degree of civilization and the enjoyment of its consequent blessings.
Having said thus much, with patience we shall await the final issue of your wise
deliberations.
[21]
With sentiments of the highest regard and esteem, we have
the honor to be, very Respectfully, your Ob't Sev'ts.
______________
copied (29 Sept. 2008) from
http://www.wcu.edu/library/cherokeePhoenix/Vol2/no52/pg1col1b-5bpg3col1a.htm
|
Cherokee Syllabary
|
Cherokee Phoenix
(founded 1828, discontinued 1834 during Cherokee Removal) |
|