A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of AmericaFerrall, S. A. (Simon Ansley)
History
A Ramble of Six Thousand Miles through the United States of America
Ferrall, S. A. (Simon Ansley)
United States -- Description and travel
The policy of the United States government is evidently to get the Indians
to exterminate each other. Its whole proceedings from the time this
question was first agitated to the present, but too clearly indicate this
intention; and if we wanted proof, that the executive government of the
United States _would act_ on so barbarous and inhuman a policy, we need
only refer to the allocation of the Cherokees, who exchanged lands in
Tennessee for lands west of the Mississippi, pursuant to the treaty of
1819. It was well known that a deadly enmity existed between the Osages
and Cherokees, and that any proximity of the two people, would inevitably
lead to fatal results; yet, with this knowledge, the executive government
placed those Cherokees in the country lying between the Arkansaw and Red
rivers, _immediately joining the territory of the Osages._ It is
unnecessary to state that the result was _as anticipated_--they daily
committed outrages upon the persons and properties of each other, and the
death of many warriors, on both sides, ensued.
The sympathy expressed in that part of the Message relating to the
Indians, if expressed with sincerity, would do much honour to the feelings
that dictated it; but when we come to examine the facts, and investigate
the implied allegations, we shall find that they are most gratuitous; and,
consequently, that the regret of the president at the probable fate of the
Indian, should he remain east of the Mississippi, is grossly hypocritical.
He says, "surrounded by the whites, with their arts of civilization,
which, by destroying the resources of the savage, doom him to weakness and
decay:[17] the fate of the Mohegan, the Narragansett, and the Delaware, is
fast overtaking the Choctaw, the Cherokee, and the Creek. That this fate
surely awaits them, if they remain within the limits of the States, does
not admit of a doubt. Humanity and national honour demand that every
effort should be made to avert so great a calamity." From what facts the
president has drawn these conclusions does not appear. Neither the
statements of the Cherokees, nor of the Indian agents, nor the report of
the secretary of war, furnish any such information; on the contrary, with
the exception of one or two agents _at Washington_, all give the most
flattering accounts of advancement in civilization. The Rev. Samuel A.
Worcester, in his letter to the Rev. E.S. Ely, editor of the
"Philadelphian," completely refutes all the unfavourable statements that
have been got up to cover the base conduct of Jackson and the slavites.
This gentleman has resided for the last four years among the Cherokees,
and has surely had abundant means of observing their condition.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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