Thomas Jefferson and Native Americans
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Thomas Jefferson Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was previously the natio ...
believed
Native American peoples The Indigenous peoples of the Americas are the inhabitants of the Americas before the arrival of the European settlers in the 15th century, and the ethnic groups who now identify themselves with those peoples. Many Indigenous peoples of the Am ...
to be a noble race Meacham, 2012, p. 111 who were "in body and mind equal to the whiteman"
Thomas Jefferson Foundation The Thomas Jefferson Foundation, originally known as the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, is a private, nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation founded in 1923 to purchase and maintain Monticello, the primary plantation of Thomas Jefferson, the third ...
and were endowed with an innate moral sense and a marked capacity for reason. Nevertheless, he believed that Native Americans were culturally and technologically inferior. Like many contemporaries, he believed that Indian lands should be taken over by white people. Before and during his presidency, Jefferson discussed the need for respect, brotherhood, and trade with the Native Americans, and he initially believed that forcing them to adopt European-style agriculture and modes of living would allow them to quickly "progress" from " savagery" to "
civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). ...
". Beginning in 1803, Jefferson's private letters show increasing support for the idea of removal, and he suggested various ideas for removing tribes from enclaves in the East to their own new lands in lands west of the
Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
. Jefferson maintained that Indians had land "to spare" and, he thought, would willingly exchange it for guaranteed supplies of food and equipment. Starting in 1808, Jefferson initiated a programme of removing various Indian nations from lands east of the
Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
to the newly created
Arkansas Territory The Arkansas Territory was a territory of the United States that existed from July 4, 1819, to June 15, 1836, when the final extent of Arkansas Territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Arkansas. Arkansas Post was the first territo ...
, representing a prelude to the more formal and institutionalised policy of Indian removal to what is now Oklahoma that was passed by
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in 1831 and implemented by
Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was an American lawyer, planter, general, and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, he gained fame as ...
.


Jefferson's view of Native Americans

Jefferson was fascinated with Indian cultures and languages. His home at Monticello was filled with Indian artifacts obtained from the
Lewis and Clark Expedition The Lewis and Clark Expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery Expedition, was the United States expedition to cross the newly acquired western portion of the country after the Louisiana Purchase. The Corps of Discovery was a select gr ...
. He collected information on the vocabulary and grammar of Indian languages.


Acculturation and assimilation

Andrew Jackson Andrew Jackson (March 15, 1767 – June 8, 1845) was an American lawyer, planter, general, and statesman who served as the seventh president of the United States from 1829 to 1837. Before being elected to the presidency, he gained fame as ...
is often credited with initiating Indian Removal, because Congress passed the
Indian Removal Act The Indian Removal Act was signed into law on May 28, 1830, by United States President Andrew Jackson. The law, as described by Congress, provided "for an exchange of lands with the Indians residing in any of the states or territories, and for ...
in 1831, during his presidency, and also because of his personal involvement in the forceful removal of many Eastern Indian tribes. Congress was implementing suggestions laid out by Jefferson in a series of private letters that began in 1804, although Jefferson did not implement the plan during his own presidency.Miller, 2006
p. 90
/ref> The rise of
Napoleon Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...
in Europe, and rumor of a possible transfer of the
Louisiana Territory The Territory of Louisiana or Louisiana Territory was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from July 4, 1805, until June 4, 1812, when it was renamed the Missouri Territory. The territory was formed out of the ...
from the
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to the more aggressive French, was cause for consternation amongst some people in the American republic. Jefferson advocated for the militarization of the Western border, along the
Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
. He felt that the best way to accomplish this was to flood the area with a large population of white settlements. In a letter written to
Benjamin Hawkins Benjamin Hawkins (August 15, 1754June 6, 1816) was an American planter, statesman and a U.S. Indian agent He was a delegate to the Continental Congress and a United States Senator from North Carolina, having grown up among the planter elite ...
on February 18, 1803, Jefferson wrote: Still recovering from the
American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, the U.S. federal government was unable to risk starting a broad conflict with the powerful tribes that surrounded their borders. They were worried that this would cause a broader Indian War, in which the Indians would perhaps be joined by Britain, France or Spain. In his instructions to Meriwether Lewis, Jefferson emphasized the necessity for treating all Indian tribes in the most conciliatory manner. Jefferson wanted to expand his borders into the Indian territories, without causing a full-blown war. Jefferson's original plan was to coerce native peoples to give up their own cultures, religions, and lifestyles in favor of western European culture, Christian religion, and a sedentary agricultural lifestyle.Drinnon, 1997: Jefferson's expectation was that by assimilating the natives into a market-based, agricultural society and stripping them of their self-sufficiency, they would become economically heavily dependent on trade with white Americans, and would thereby be willing to give up land that they would otherwise not part with, in exchange for trade goods or to resolve unpaid debts.Owens, 2007
pp. 76–77
/ref>Rockwell, 2010
p. 88
/ref> In an 1803 private letter to
William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison (February 9, 1773April 4, 1841) was an American military officer and politician who served as the ninth president of the United States. Harrison died just 31 days after his inauguration in 1841, and had the shortest pres ...
, Jefferson wrote: Jefferson believed that this strategy would ''"...get rid of this pest, without giving offence or umbrage to the Indians"''. He stated that Harrison was to keep the contents of the letter ''"sacred"'' and ''"kept within arrison's/nowiki> own breast, and especially how improper for the Indians to understand. For their interests and their tranquility, it is best they should see only the present age of their history."''Drinnon, 1997
pp. 87–88
/ref>


Forced removal

In cases where Native tribes resisted assimilation, Jefferson believed that to avoid war and probable extermination they should be forcefully relocated and sent west. As Jefferson put it in a letter to
Alexander von Humboldt Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von Humboldt (14 September 17696 May 1859) was a German polymath, geographer, naturalist, explorer, and proponent of Romantic philosophy and science. He was the younger brother of the Prussian minister, ...
in 1813: "You know, my friend, the benevolent plan we were pursuing here for the happiness of the aboriginal inhabitants in our vicinities. We spared nothing to keep them at peace with one another. To teach them agriculture and the rudiments of the most necessary arts, and to encourage industry by establishing among them separate property. In this way they would have been enabled to subsist and multiply on a moderate scale of landed possession. They would have mixed their blood with ours, and been amalgamated and identified with us within no distant period of time. On the commencement of our present war, we pressed on them the observance of peace and neutrality, but the interested and unprincipled policy of England has defeated all our labors for the salvation of these unfortunate people. They have seduced the greater part of the tribes within our neighborhood, to take up the hatchet against us, and the cruel massacres they have committed on the women and children of our frontiers taken by surprise, will oblige us now to pursue them to extermination, or drive them to new seats beyond our reach". He told his
Secretary of War The secretary of war was a member of the U.S. president's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War", had been appointed to serve the Congress of the ...
, General
Henry Dearborn Henry Dearborn (February 23, 1751 – June 6, 1829) was an American military officer and politician. In the Revolutionary War, he served under Benedict Arnold in his expedition to Quebec, of which his journal provides an important record ...
(who was the primary government official responsible for Indian affairs): "if we are constrained to lift the hatchet against any tribe, we will never lay it down until that tribe is exterminated, or driven beyond the Mississippi." Jefferson's first promotions of Indian removal were between 1776 and 1779, when he recommended forcing the
Cherokee The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...
and
Shawnee The Shawnee are an Algonquian-speaking indigenous people of the Northeastern Woodlands. In the 17th century they lived in Pennsylvania, and in the 18th century they were in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, with some bands in Kentucky a ...
tribes to be driven out of their ancestral homelands to lands west of the
Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
. Indian removal, said Jefferson, was the only way to ensure the survival of Native American peoples.Jennifer McClinton-Temple, Alan R. Velie (2007). "
Encyclopedia of American Indian literature
'". Infobase Publishing. p.295.
His first such act as president, was to make a deal with the state of
Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...
that if Georgia were to release its legal claims to discovery in lands to the west, then the U.S. military would help forcefully expel the Cherokee people from Georgia. At the time, the Cherokee had a
treaty A treaty is a formal, legally binding written agreement between actors in international law. It is usually made by and between sovereign states, but can include international organizations, individuals, business entities, and other legal pe ...
with the United States government which guaranteed them the right to their lands, which was violated in Jefferson's deal with Georgia.


See also

* Indian removal * Manifest destiny * Population history of Indigenous peoples of the Americas *
Thomas Jefferson and slavery Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States, owned more than 600 slaves during his adult life. Jefferson freed two slaves while he lived, and five others were freed after his death, including two of his children from his relationship ...


References


Notes


Bibliography

* * Keller, Christian B. "Philanthropy betrayed: Thomas Jefferson, the Louisiana Purchase, and the origins of federal Indian removal policy." ''Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society'' 144.1 (2000): 39–66
online
* * * * * * * *


Further reading

* {{Indian Removal Forced migrations of Native Americans in the United States Native American genocide Native Americans United States federal Indian policy