Why did Andrew Jackson opposed the Second Bank of the United States in 1834 quizlet?

American Corrections

11th EditionMichael D. Reisig, Todd R. Clear

160 solutions

American Government

1st EditionGlen Krutz

412 solutions

Government in America: Elections and Updates Edition

16th EditionGeorge C. Edwards III, Martin P. Wattenberg, Robert L. Lineberry

269 solutions

Criminal Justice in America

9th EditionChristina Dejong, Christopher E. Smith, George F Cole

105 solutions

American Government

1st EditionGlen Krutz

412 solutions

Criminal Justice in America

9th EditionChristina Dejong, Christopher E. Smith, George F Cole

105 solutions

Government in America: Elections and Updates Edition

16th EditionGeorge C. Edwards III, Martin P. Wattenberg, Robert L. Lineberry

269 solutions

American Corrections

11th EditionMichael D. Reisig, Todd R. Clear

160 solutions

Passed by Congress on May 28, 1830, during the presidency of Andrew Jackson. It authorized the president to negotiate with Indigenous Peoples tribes in the Southern U.S. for their removal to federal territory west of the Mississippi River in exchange for their homelands. The act was strongly supported by non-Native people of the South, who were eager to gain access to lands inhabited by the Five Civilized Tribes. The Removal Act paved the way for the reluctant migration of tens of thousands of American Indigenous Peoples to the West, an event widely known as the "Trail of Tears".

In his first message to Congress, Jackson had proclaimed that Indian groups living independently within states, as sovereign entities, presented a major problem for state sovereignty. This message referred directly to the situation in Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama, where the Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, and Cherokee peoples stood as obstacles to white settlement. These groups were known as the Five Civilized Tribes, because they had largely adopted Anglo-American culture, speaking English and practicing Christianity. Some held slaves like their white counterparts. Whites especially resented the Cherokee in Georgia, coveting the tribe's rich agricultural lands in the northern part of the state. The impulse to remove the Cherokee only increased when gold was discovered on their lands. Ironically, while whites insisted the Cherokee and other native peoples could never be good citizens because of their savage ways, the Cherokee had arguably gone farther than any other indigenous group in adopting white culture. This proved of little consequence in an era when whites perceived all Indians as incapable of becoming full citizens of the republic.

The 1830 Indian Removal Act called for the removal of the Five Civilized Tribes from their home in the southeastern United States to land in the West, in present-day Oklahoma. Two tribes signed it, and Jackson hoped this would sway the others to join them. The Cherokee decided to fight the federal law, however, and took their case to the Supreme Court. Their legal fight had the support of anti-Jackson members of Congress, including Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, and they retained the legal services of former attorney general William Wirt. In Cherokee Nation v. Georgia, Wirt argued that the Cherokee constituted an independent foreign nation, and that an injunction [a stop] should be placed on Georgia laws aimed at eradicating them. In 1831, the Supreme Court found the Cherokee did not meet the criteria for being a foreign nation. Another case involving the Cherokee also found its way to the highest court in the land. This legal struggle—Worcester v. Georgia—asserted the rights of non-natives to live on Indian lands. Samuel Worcester was a Christian missionary and federal postmaster of New Echota, the capital of the Cherokee nation. A Congregationalist, he had gone to live among the Cherokee in Georgia to further the spread of Christianity, and he strongly opposed Indigenous removal. By living among the Cherokee, Worcester had violated a Georgia law forbidding whites, unless they were agents of the federal government, to live in Indigenous territory. Worcester was arrested, but because his federal job as postmaster gave him the right to live there, he was released. Jackson supporters then succeeded in taking away Worcester's job, and he was re-arrested. This time, a court sentenced him and nine others for violating the Georgia state law banning whites from living on Indian land. Worcester was sentenced to four years of hard labor. When the case of Worcester v. Georgia came before the Supreme Court in 1832, Chief Justice John Marshall ruled in favor of Worcester, finding that the Cherokee constituted "distinct political communities" with sovereign rights to their own territory. In doing so, he established the principle of tribal sovereignty.

The Supreme Court did not have the power to enforce its ruling in Worcester v. Georgia, however, and it became clear that the Cherokee would be compelled to move. Those who understood that the only option was removal traveled west, but the majority stayed on their land. In order to remove them, the President relied on the U.S. military. In a series of forced marches, some 15,000 Cherokee were finally relocated to Oklahoma. This forced migration, known as the Trail of Tears, caused the deaths of as many as 4,000 Cherokee. The Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole peoples were also compelled to go. The removal of the Five Civilized Tribes provides an example of the power of majority opinion in a democracy.