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[FEBRUARY, 1828.

stated, when I first adverted to the report. | done! You have executed, by a single moveThose of Arkansas and Missouri to be moved ment, the great plan of Tecumseh, that carried forward beyond their boundaries; while it is terror and dismay to every cabin beyond the proposed to transfer those of Illinois, Indiana, Alleghanies. It was upon these same Indians Ohio, and the Peninsula of Michigan, into the of the South, that he mainly relied. With country north of Illinois, and west of Lake them he labored to bring about a concentration Michigan. And last of all, as appears from the of Indian power, not for the purpose of civilizaMessage, separate Governments are to be insti- tion, but to resist and arrest the march of your tuted over each tribe, (about forty in number,) population, and then to draw a perpetual line and a General Government, for the regulation of separation between them and us. The savof the whole, is to be established over the vast ages, by this arrangement, rendered formidable extent of country thus to be apportioned among in numbers, and still more so from famine and these various hordes of Indians. These are the geographical position, the frontier inhabitants leading features of the great plan of Indian of Missouri would be subject to constant pillage civilization and Indian colonization, as origi- in peace, and the most horrid atrocities in war. nally recommended by the Executive of the Nor, indeed, would the frontier settlers of country. Let us add to it, the modification Illinois and those of the Peninsula of Michigan, which gentlemen seem now to have in contem- be in a situation much more enviable. If the plation, that of removing the Indians of the name and the prowess of Tecumseh are so far Southwest upon the frontier of the Northwest, forgotten here, as to induce us, voluntarily, to and then, sir, let us pause for a moment to sur- concentrate the whole Indian power on the vey the condition of the western country, and frontier, it is far otherwise in the West-they the incalculable consequences that must result are not forgotten there. I think, Mr. Chairto it, to the Union, and to the Indians. man, I hazard nothing in saying, that, when at war with either England or Mexico, the whole Indian power would raise the tomahawk and scalping knife against us. The history of the past gives almost certain monition of the future. We have ever found them in alliance against us, and we ever shall, at every favorable opportunity, while they have strength to make an effort for their existence. Their policy towards us has been, and will be, in time to come, the policy of nature and feeling. They know full well that we are the cause of all their calamities, and that, from us alone, they have any thing to fear. The past, the present, and the future, are ever open to their view. When they look back to the Atlantic, and, in the language of the gentleman from Indiana, (Mr. SMITH,) recall to mind, "that they have been driven from river to river, and from hill to hill, until they have scarce a standing place left," and still see the rising tide of our population sweeping over them with accumulated force, it is natural they should seize upon every opportunity that promises, even by possibility, to arrest their threatened destiny: they will do it, and we deceive ourselves if we think otherwise. But, sir, the consequences to the West, do not terminate with putting in jeopardy its peace and security. Try this experiment of colonization upon the plan proposed, with the proffered pledges and guarantees, and, of all the boundless regions of the West, the Peninsula of Michigan alone would be left, to increase the number of the Western States.

Such a disposition of the Indians greatly endangers the security of the whole western frontier, and renders the condition of Missouri, in particular, imminently perilous. If you succeed in the plan of civilization, the increase of population and moral power that must necessarily result from the success of the measure, added to their preservation as a distinct race of men, and the great extent of country occupied by them, must, unavoidably, bring about the establishment of a Government independent of our own. Sir, I will not speculate upon the consequences that would follow. Suffice it to say, that no lover of his country would subject it to such imminent peril. If you even incorporated them into this confederacy, from the moment their numbers and moral power had risen up to the point of ability to resist, you could not prevent their separation another hour. Between distinct races of men, passions and interests enough to effect this would ever be found ready at hand. But, suppose the experiment to civilize them should fail-as I shall undertake, before I sit down, to show it must-what then would be the situation of the western frontier? Whenever you might happen to be at war with either England or Mexico, or both together, all of which may occur, at least within the range of possibility, not to say probability, in the progress of our history, the enemy has a cordon of savages, extending from the Canadian to the Mexican line. I say the enemy, because while the savage lives on the frontier, you will always find him the enemy; and for this there is no remedy, but to surround and hem him in by your population. The extent of the shocking atrocities that would follow this state of things, no man can estimate. Place around Missouri on the north and west, in conjunction with the two hundred thousand that would be there besides, the sixty or seventy thousand Indians of the Southwest, and what bave you

But, Mr. Chairman, passing from this topic, let me direct your attention to the appropriation now proposed by the gentleman from South Carolina, and to which the amendment now under consideration applies. The appropriation is asked for, for the avowed purpose of extinguishing the title to the Cherokee lands in Georgia, and to aid in the removal of the Cherokees and other Indians, on this side the Mississippi,

to the country west of that river. Gentlemen | make with them, according to their instructions, have said that this procedure is in accord with such arrangements as shall be best calculated the established policy of the Government, and to carry those objects into effect." that humanity requires, at our hands, the prose- No digest of Government, or fundamental cution of that policy. I shall undertake to show, principles, as here recommended, have been that gentlemen are mistaken in both these adopted by Congress, as the basis of the arpropositions. They appeal to the message of rangements with them in this very important 1825, heretofore spoken of, and profess to act matter to them, as well as to ourselves. In the upon it, as the basis of the policy now proposed. place of it, we are now presented with this I am yet to learn, that, when the Executive appropriation to allure them across the Mississends a communication to Congress, recommend-sippi, as fast as possible; and the Chairman of ing legislation on any subject, it is, therefore, the Committee on Indian Affairs tells us, that to be considered the policy of the Government, a digest of a Government will be brought forantil it is sanctioned here. If we look into the subject, it will be seen, that gentlemen are going directly counter to that message. Mr. Monroe, it is true, recommends the removal of the Indians; but he also recommends, in the most impressive manner that not a single step shall be taken towards its accomplishment, until certain preliminary legislation, of the utmost moment to secure their safety, is adopted by Congress. Let me call the attention of the committee to those passages in the message, which contain a general specification of its object, and recommend the mode of its accomplishment.

ward at some future time; but not at the present session, if I understand him right. It cannot be the intention of gentlemen to send them beyond the Mississippi, and then leave them to their fate. But it requires no spirit of prophecy to foretell, that, if they are first taken there, no Government will ever be provided for them afterwards. To carry such a measure through this House, as the organization of a Colonial Government, founded on new principles, will always be a great and difficult work. The policy we are now asked to adopt, of removing them without any previous governmental arrangement for their future regulation, will, Mr. Monroe says, " the great object to be ac- if pursued, result in carrying them forward, at complished, is the removal of these tribes to a single movement, almost half way to that the territory designated, on conditions which ocean in which there is too much cause to fear shall be satisfactory to themselves, and honora- they are destined, ultimately, to terminate their ble to the United States. This can be done existence and their miseries together. Sir, if only by conveying to each tribe a good title to an we move at all, let us enter upon this business adequate portion of land, to which it may con- at the beginning. Before they are pushed forsent to remove; and by providing for it there, ward into the wilderness, and there left to ana system of internal government, which shall archy and want, let us present them with an protect their property from invasion; and by outline, at least, of the Government we intend the regular progress of improvement and civili- to institute over them. If their consent is to zation, prevent that degeneracy, which has be obtained, or feelings consulted in this matgenerally marked the transition from the one to ter, it is surely of some moment to them, when the other state. The digest of such a Govern- they are about to commit themselves to our ment, with the consent of the Indians, which hands, to know what laws we intend to impose should be endowed with sufficient power to upon them, as well as the country to which meet all the objects contemplated to connect they are to be removed. Within a few years, the several tribes together in a bond of amity; we have removed some Indian tribes in the to preserve order in each: to prevent intrusion mode now proposed, and before we go further, on their property: to teach them, by regular we ought to pause over the miseries and sufferinstructions, the arts of civilized life, and make ings we have already inflicted upon them. It them a civilized people, is an object of very is our bounden duty to make ample provision to high importance. It is the powerful considera- alleviate the distresses of these miserable victims tion which we have to offer to these tribes, as of our cupidity and avarice. Thus far this or an inducement to relinquish the lands on which any other necessary appropriation shall have they now reside; and to move to those which my hearty support. But such have been their are designated. With a view to this important sufferings, that in my opinion, it would dishonor object, I recommend it to Congress to adopt, by this House to go a single step further in this solemn declaration, certain fundamental princi- work of desolation, until ample and certain ples, in accord with those above suggested, as means are first provided to prevent a recurrence the basis of such arrangements as may be enter- of similar calamities. Commissioners were sent ed into with the several tribes, to the strict in the year 1824, to treat with the Florida Inobservance of which, the faith of the nation dians for their country, who were living in the shall be pledged. I recommend it, also, to Con-heart of that Territory in plenty and content. gress, to provide by law for the appointment We proposed to send them into the peninsula of a suitable number of commissioners, who of Florida; they told us they could not live shall, under the direction of the President, be authorized to visit and explain to the several tribes the objects of the Government; and to

there, and intreated us to leave them in the enjoyment of their homes, and declared," that nothing short of force could compel them to

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Indian Appropriations-Emigration of Indians.

[FEBRUARY, 1828. go"-[Ex. Doc. 74, 1st sess. 19 Cong., page 29.] | and removed them into some distant and inhosWe exacted obedience to our demands. With pitable region, where, when we hear of them at tears and with prayers they threw themselves all, it is of the intolerable miseries and famine upon our mercy, and besought us not to drive to which we have subjected them. If other them from their homes. With prophetic de- examples of the fruits of this cruel policy are scription they pointed out to us the fate we wanting, they are ready at hand. We sent the were preparing for them: but all in vain. We Delawares, and, perhaps, some other tribes, told them" they must go." We told them fur- which lived northwest of the Ohio, across the ther, (what we are now told,) that in the Mississippi. Let us devote a moment to their country we had provided for them, they would condition. My colleague over the way, (Mr. be free from the intrusion of the white man, and WOODS,) yesterday read an extract from a there they would be rich and happy. In this letter of General Clark, the Indian Superintendway we drove them from the land of their na-ent beyond the Mississippi, written two years tivity. We took from them their cabins and cul- since, in which he speaks of facts within his tivated fields. Our commissioners, moved by own knowledge, and as such communicated their representations, inserted a stipulation in here in an authentic shape. Speaking of the the treaty that, if the country to which they country where these Indians have been sent, went, did not contain good land enough for (and to which this appropriation is asked to them to live upon, their northern boundary, send more,) he says, "during several seasons in should be extended so as to embrace good land every year, they (the Indians) are distressed by enough for their support. They went, and famine, in which many die for want of food, what followed? It was stated here, two sessions and during which the living child is often ago, that, out of five thousand who emigrated, buried with the dead mother: because none fifteen hundred had perished of famine and dis- can spare it so much food as would sustain it tress, in the miserable swamps and sands of that through its helpless infancy." It is, sir, to inpeninsula. The voice of their sufferings came crease the number of these miserable beings up to this House, and we voted $20,000 for beyond the Mississippi, and thus add new their relief. I then had the honor to move a and increased distress to these regions of famresolution to carry the treaty into effect. And ine, that this appropriation, if granted, is to be a quantity of land, said to be sufficient to se- in part applied. cure them from want, was afterwards assigned To sustain and relieve from suffering those them. But it seems their sufferings were not whom we have reduced to distress, is our solat an end. The gentleman from Florida, but a emn duty, and so far as this appropriation is to day or two since, complained that these Indians be so applied, it will have, as I have already were plundering his constituents. That, forced said, my hearty support. But, sir, the great into the settlements by hunger, "they must live object of this appropriation is the removal of by plundering, or starve." The gentleman says, the Indians. And I appeal to gentlemen to say, it is impossible for them to live where they are, whether they can, in their consciences, go forand is for sending them two thousand miles ward another step in this work of desolation. northwest, into regions beyond Missouri, where A letter from the same gentleman, written a his constituents will be no longer troubled by short time since, was also read yesterday, at them. There, indeed, they might die unheard the request of the Chairman of the Committee and unseen: for, rest assured, sir, the frosts of a on Indian Affairs, for the purpose of showing northern climate would soon cut off the misera- the necessity of making this appropriation. ble remnant that has survived the famine and That letter depicts, in language of much feelpestilence of the sultry swamps they now in-ing, the present sufferings of these unfortunate habit. I will point out to the gentleman a Indians, whom, he says, we have induced to nearer and speedier relief for their sufferings—leave their comfortable homes to go beyond the carry the treaty into full and immediate effect. Mississippi, with assurances of protection and Give them good land enough to live on: for, support. The touching appeal of the writer to surely we have long enough delayed to execute Congress in their behalf, produced a strong the obligations of right, amid the cries of human sensation of sympathy upon the committee. suffering. And I hope, after this information, The letter, though read as an appeal to that that my colleague, the Chairman of the Commit- committee, in favor of the appropriation, contee on Indian Affairs, will consider that the tains, like all the facts I have adverted to, an lives of these perishing men are, in some degree, unanswerable argument, to show, that with in his hands; and I invoke him, as a Christian, this knowledge before us, we cannot, unless we to see that this treaty is carried into effect. are totally insensible to human suffering, exAnd that I myself may not be wanting in the pend another dollar in seducing these miseradischarge of the duties of humanity, I will call ble people from their comfortable homes, and his attention to the subject on some other suita- which, we have volumes of evidence to show, ble occasion. But, sir, the Florida Indians are they are anxious to retain. It also shows, in not the only ones that we have reduced to dis-the same unanswerable manner, the necessity tress by removal. About the same time, we of making ample and speedy provision for those made a treaty with the Quapaw Indians, a whom we have reduced to suffering and want. small tribe living in the Territory of Arkansas, I think, Mr. Chairman, I have now shown, that

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Indian Appropriations—Emigration of Indians.

[H. OF R.

and remove its occupants; induce them to adopt the Government you have provided for them, and put themselves under your control; bring their chiefs to consent to relinquish their power and consequence among their people; remove them through the wilderness, in most cases, several hundred miles; provide supplies of food for them on the way, and, after their arrival in their new country, build their houses,

the manner in which we have taken, and now I ment. Next: What are the processes to be perpropose to take the Indians beyond the Missis- formed, in the execution of this plan? When sippi, is not only contrary to the mode pointed they are examined in detail, it will be found, out and recommended by Mr. Monroe, but that their number and complexity are such as to what we have done is a high-handed outrage render the experiment altogether hopeless. upon humanity, the further progress of which They must be brought to consent to emigrate, we are under solemn obligations to arrest. But and to abolish their laws and usages. You must since gentlemen, during this debate, have as-purchase their country, and pay for their imserted that they are proceeding according to provements-buy another country for them, the recommendation of the Executive, for the purpose of giving them the full benefit of the assertion, I shall grant they are so proceeding, however incorrect the admission may be, in point of fact, as I have already shown. I shall now maintain, that the plan of colonizing the Indians and establishing a Government over them, and thereby bringing about their civilization, is wholly visionary and impracticable. Let us first look into the argument of gentle-open their farms, supply them with agricultural men in its favor, and see what it amounts to. They begin with a moving description of the wretched and degraded condition of the Indians, and assert that they are sinking in intellect, morals, and numbers. All this may be true of some of the tribes; but it is quite the reverse, when asserted of the most populous tribes of the South, as the documents now on our tables, and those that have been sent. here for some sessions past, incontestably prove. But, for the purposes of the argument, I shall give gentlemen the benefit of this admission also. They next assert that the white people corrupt and maltreat them. This I shall also admit to be true. From all which, they come to the conclusion that the Indian cannot be civilized in our neighborhood; but that, if taken into some distant region, beyond the influence of our example, he will change his habits, and grow up into civilization. The inferences I shall not admit. I shall not admit that he cannot be civilized in the midst of civilization, and shall deny that under the circumstances in which this experiment is to be made, he can be civilized in the wilderness. Gentlemen maintain, and constantly assert, with all the confidence of an established fact, that, when brought together in the wilderness, and shut out from the influence of our people, they will be civilized. This assumes the whole matter in controversy, and it cannot have escaped the notice of the committee, that no gentleman has undertaken to explain the process by which it is to be done; or, what is of more importance, to state the facts or experience to sustain the assumption. It is, indeed, admitted, that they have neither facts nor experience to guide them in this great experiment of human reformation. We are then thrown back upon the original ground, and compelled to look into the nature of the operation to be performed. What is the character of the people to be changed? They are ignorant, averse to labor, irregular in their habits, and strongly attached to the laws, usages and customs, of their fathers, which it is admitted, must be abolished, and new regulations substituted, to give success to the experi

implements, and animals of domestic use; cause them to desist from the chase, and devote themselves to agriculture and the nechanic arts; establish schools; institute a Government over them, and subject them to its laws and regulations; and, finally, keep up a standing military force among them. This is a general outline of what is proposed to be done, and the machinery to be created, as the means of effecting the civilization of the Indians. Passing over the many and difficult preliminary processes, most of which cannot be executed without force, we will, now, suppose one hundred thousand savages, composed of thirty or forty distinct tribes, or nations, are taken into the wilderness to the place of their destination: How are you to make them relinquish the chase, in a country possessing the strongest allurements to it? Unless they change their habits in this particular, you have effected nothing of any value. They have neither knowledge nor inclination to set themselves at work. And how are you to overcome these impediments, and make them submit to the fatigues of labor? How, in case of irregular supply of food, are you to prevent them from breaking in upon the frontier settlements, as they now do in Florida? If you exclude the whites from coming among them, how are you to supply them with provisions? Who is to build their houses, and open their farms? All these things it is intended the whites shall perform, as well as to instruct them in the mechanic arts and in agriculture. If you cause these things to be done by the whites, you necessarily multiply their intercourse with the Indians far beyond any thing that now exists. The idea, therefore, so fondly cherished by gentlemen, that they shall shut out all intercourse between our people and them, and thereby remove them from the contagion of our example, is wholly erroneous. The very operations which it is intended the whites shall perform, (and which they must perform, if done at all,) show that gentlemen have not looked into the practical workings of their own plan, when they tell us it is necessary to remove

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them, to get them out of the reach of the con- | transportation alone, be rendered almost as taminating influence of the whites.

To build houses and open farms, is a work of time, and the labor of many hands. You cannot get on with the government, and execute its diversified operations, without great and constant intercourse with the whites-intercourse too with soldiers and other mercenaries. Abuses would spring up, and be practised with impunity, from the utter impossibility of superintending the detailed operations of a distant colonial Government.

costly as silver, before it arrived at the place of consumption. Take the price of the ration for the Creeks, whom we are now supporting in the woods, at twenty cents a day, as appears from a document from the War Department, laid on our tables a few days since, and the cost of this single item will be found to fall not far short of ten millions per annum. How long would we go on at this rate before we left these poor wretches to perish of hunger? The utter impossibility of introducing any system So far from your being able to shut out the of economy or accountability into such a deintercourse of the whites, if it were so much as partment, where the supplies are to be furnishknown to what district the Indians were to re-ed, in such a country, would open a door for move, no matter how distant the country, my fraud and peculation, without any example word for it, Mr. Chairman, the pioneers would among us. be there in advance of them; men of the most abandoned and desperate character, who hang upon the Indians to defraud them. You cannot run away from these men, nor shut them out from access to Indians, scattered over the wilderness; for, with the pioneers, the law is a jest, and the woods their element; the far-will do. I answer, enlarge the means of imther you go with the Indians, with just so much the more impunity will they set your laws at defiance. Indeed, under this plan, the Indians would be nothing more nor less than poor miserable dependents upon those who governed them and supplied them with food.

I come now, Mr. Chairman, to the contemplation of this oppressed people in their present abodes. We all agree the time is come, when something ought to be done to rescue them from extinction. And here, gentlemen turn upon us, who oppose them, and ask what we

provement you are now employing with acknowledged success, and extend your laws over them. Try the experiment where they are. It will cost but little, and if that fail, there is no danger of bringing distress upon them, or making their condition more desperate. It will then be time enough to try the scheme of colonization, which, it is not contended, has any other advantage than that of getting them out of the way of the corrupting influence of the whites, which I have already shown is a mistaken notion. If the colonization plan is tried first, it will be too late to try the other afterwards. When the step is taken, it cannot be retraced. Gentlemen maintain, that, because the tribes in our neighborhood have not become civilized, that, therefore, they cannot be, unless they are removed at a distance from us.

But again, sir, by what means are a hundred thousand Indians, spread over the wilderness, bearing towards each other inbred hatred, and implacable animosities; pressed by hunger, and pressing upon each other's means of subsistence, to be reduced to order, regularity, and obedience to law? If my colleague, the Chairman of the Committee on Indian Affairs, can do this, he will be justly entitled to go down to posterity with a fame, as a law-giver, more immortal than that of Solon or Lycurgus. He will have done that of which history, either sacred or profane, furnishes no example. It is Many of the tribes have made great and flattrue, the children of Israel were led out of the tering advances in improvement. And now, wilderness into a land flowing with milk and we are called upon to undo all that we have honey; but, contrary to the Divine example, done, by breaking them up from their very we propose to lead a whole people, nay, more, foundation. But what is the argument? It the remnants of forty different nations of men, is, that civilization cannot spring up in the out of a land of plenty, into the wilderness. midst of civilization. That civilization is a We cannot make this great and untried experi- plant that cannot grow beneath the shade of ment upon human life and human happiness, the full-grown tree. Sir, we have done nothwithout incurring the most solemn responsibil-ing to civilize them in a form that can touch ity. Let us examine this experiment in another aspect, and it will be found that it is not in the power of the Government to provide for a hundred thousand inhabitants, some five or six hundred miles in the wilderness. Regular supplies, from the very nature of the country over which they must be carried, could not be transported to them.

There can be but little question, that, to support a hundred thousand people in the wilderness, would cost more than twice as much as to feed double that number at home, where supplies are ready at hand. Whatever was transported to them would, from the labor of

the evil to be corrected; nor have the Indians the intelligence and moral power necessary to reach and correct it, without our aid. The great difficulty now in the way of their improvement, may be traced to the nature of their government, and the tenure of their property. With the exception of the Cherokees, who have lately formed for themselves a constitution on Republican principles, which has given some gentlemen here so much alarm, there is not a single tribe that we do not now find under the same government and usages, that existed on the day when the Pilgrims first landed on our shores. It is the government of