After the lapse of twenty-seven years, Georgia, finding herself precisely in the same condition in which she then stood, has determined on forcibly taking possession of the Cherokee lands, and extending her sovereignty over the Cherokee people. But as this cannot be effected without doing manifest violence to the Indian rights, she brings forward arguments to show, that _she_ never acknowledged the independence of the Cherokee nation; that that nation, from the time of the first settlement made by Europeans in America, stood in the position of a conquered people; that the sovereignty consequently dwelt in the hands of Great Britain; and that, on the Declaration of independence, Georgia, by becoming a free state, became invested with all the powers of sovereignty claimed or exercised by Great Britain over the Georgian territory: and further, that in November, 1785, when the first and only treaty was concluded with the Cherokees by the United States, during the articles of confederation, both she and North Carolina entered their solemn protests against this alleged violation of their legislative rights. The executive government pretends not to argue the case with Georgia, and is left no alternative but either to annul its _conditional_ treaty with that state, or to cancel _thirteen distinct treaties_ entered into with the Indians, despoil them of their lands, and rob them of their independence. Jackson's message says, "It is too late to inquire whether it was just in the United States to include them and their territory within bounds of new states, whose limits they could control. That step cannot be retracted. A state cannot be dismembered by Congress, or restrained in the exercise of her constitutional powers." Here the executive government acknowledges that it made promises to Georgia, which it has been unable to perform--that it guaranteed to that state the possession of lands over which it had no legitimate control, on the mere assumption of being able to make their purchase.