Indian Removal Act
The Indian Removal Act (an Act to provide for an exchange of lands with the Indians residing in any of the states or territories, and for their removal west of the river Mississippi) is part of the United States government policy known as the Indian Removal, which was signed into law by the President Andrew Jackson on May, 26th, 1830.
In his State of the Union speech in 1829, President Andrew Jackson had spoken of the necessity for an Indian Removal Act. This Act was strongly supported in the South where the states were eager to gain access to the lands inhabited by the Indian tribes. The state of Georgia was actually in legal dispute with the Cherokee Indians over land possession. President Jackson aimed to put a stop to the tension in Georgia by means of the Indian Removal Act.
The Indian Removal Act had its share of controversy since although it was supposed to be voluntary, many of the tribe leaders were pressured to sign the removal papers. The signing of the Indian Removal Act inevitably implied a relocation of the tribes from their native lands, and this aspect was known to all observers of the event. Most white Americans were in favor of the Indian Removal Act.
Nevertheless opposition did exist such as the one put up by Christian missionaries, like Jeremiah Evarts, who openly spoke against the Act. Congress voices also opposed the Indian Removal Act, congressman Davis Crockett of Tennessee and New Jersey senator Theodore Frelinghuysen fired very intense debates in support of the Indian cause.
The Indian Removal Act opened the door for the sad emigration of tens of thousands of native Americans to the West. President Jackson insisted that the enactment of his wise and humane Indian Removal Act should be applied only with the negotiated agreement of afflicted tribes. The dramatic consequences of the agreement that never stipulated the voluntary removal in its written form, were to become more obvious in the death march known as the Cherokee Trail of Tears.
By the year 1837, 46,000 native Americans had been removed by the Jackson administration from the east of Mississippi lands. The great majority of the members of the five great southeastern tribes were relocated west, leaving 25 million acres of land free to white people.
