America’s current glory. The power and dollar heat it holds. Behind its intimidation and arrogance is a history of 250 years of continuous bloody conflict and confrontation. Otherwise, in the United States, the president once had a slave family as his personal property. Don’t be surprised if we tell you that when America’s first president, George Washington, died, he had 300 slaves on his estate. These people are born human and have never been treated humanely. Many of their descendants died as slaves in the United States.
Americans engaged in similar barbaric behavior against America’s native peoples, known as “Indians.” Don’t be surprised to hear Hindi. In fact, in 1492, Christopher Columbus set out from Spain in search of a sea route to India. But arrived in the United States. But at that time, Columbus believed he had reached India, so he started calling the indigenous people there Indians. The word Indian spread to Europe, and the primitive tribes in America were also called Indians in the world.
The United States delivered human rights lectures in the past
The history of the United States as a nation is filled with the ethnic cleansing of these Indians. America is going through the election process today. Now is the time to review American historical documents. Just look at America’s past, with its institutions preaching human rights around the world and enforcing bans on institutions and countries in the name of cultural freedom while ignoring the soot on their clothes. “Trail of Tears” tells the story of American hypocrisy.
In 1830, the United States Congress passed a law. It was the project of then-President Andrew Jackson. This was the Indian Removal Act. As the name suggests, the Indian Removal Act. With the help of this repressive law, the United States drove out thousands of Native Americans who had lived for generations on millions of acres in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, and Florida. West of the Mississippi River. Thousands died on the journey, and centuries of identity, memory, culture and customs were plundered by the United States in broad daylight. This disastrous journey of displacement for Native Americans is known in history as the “Trail of Tears.”
What you did amounts to genocide.
But at the time, there were no human rights groups, no international courts, no diligent watchdogs that could accuse the United States of saying that what you were doing to these natives fell into the category of genocide.
The story goes like this: On July 4, 1776, the United States gained independence from Britain. At this point, the British became the masters of the American country stretching millions of miles. But Native Americans, known as Indians, had been living on this land for hundreds of years before their arrival.
When white settlers began to establish settlements in the United States and began to grow cotton, they discovered gold mines under the lands of the Native settlements, and then they began to compete with the Indians for ownership of these gold mines. Europeans would seize these natives’ livestock, plunder their crops, and occupy their lands. The locals also began to attack white people with traditional tools. This question quickly became an issue. The U.S. government named it the “Indian Problem.”
When he took office, he promised to eliminate the “India problem”
Andrew Jackson was a “gentleman.” The seventh President of the United States. He campaigned on a promise to liberate Americans from the “Indian problem.” As soon as he became president, the United States Congress passed a law. It’s called the Indian Removal Act. Andrew Jackson believed the Indians were people in name only. He often said: “They have neither wisdom nor the ability to work hard, nor moral integrity, nor the desire to make progress.”
Here, the Indians are immersed in a world of their own, with unique customs, food, and clothing. They need neither European knowledge nor values. But the white settlers who arrived in the light of the Renaissance and Enlightenment viewed them with inferiority. In fact, they had their sights set on the land where the Indians wanted to grow cotton. There is gold in this land, and to get it the locals must be driven out. According to natural justice, these lands should belong to these tribes, whose ancestors have lived there for centuries. But who then bears the responsibility for justice?
There were 5 main tribes in America at that time. These tribes were the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek and Seminole. These tribes lived in Georgia, Alabama, North Carolina, Florida, and Tennessee for centuries. Once the Indian Removal Act was passed, the U.S. government began to fulfill its mission. The U.S. government decided to settle the tribes in a new location near present-day Oklahoma. It was named “Indian Territory.”
The winter of 1831 and the displacement of that period of history
In the winter of 1831, the Choctaw were the first tribe to be displaced by U.S. gunfire. Needless to say, how attached these tribes were to their water, forests and land, they initially did not want to go, but American soldiers forcibly drove them from their homes. Those who rebelled were put in shackles.
Imagine the time of 1831. A 500-mile journey. winter night. Traveling on foot, children and women also traveled together. Then the whole family world is on the forehead. What will that journey be like? Thousands of people died along the way. Some died of disease, some died of hunger, some died of exhaustion, some died of crying, and some died of tragedy.
Boil corn, one radish, and two cups of hot water
Then the food they got was within the quota. Boil two or three handfuls of corn, one radish, and two or three cups of hot water. The journey to Oklahoma was made on this food ration.
History records that 17,000 Choctaws embarked on this journey and 5,000 to 6,000 died along the way. The journey was ridiculed by a helpless Choctaw chief who called it a road of tears and death.
This is the story of the Choctaw Nation. Other Indian tribes had to suffer the same fate. In 1836, the government evicted the Creeks from their land. Of the 15,000 Creeks who made the trip to Oklahoma, 3,500 died.
The Seminole and Creek tribes have similar stories. Thousands were killed. This sequence continued for many years.
1,600 kilometers long journey
The story of the displacement of the Cherokee Indians is the pinnacle of the shamelessness of U.S. imperialism. The Cherokees did not want to give up their land. The time is about 1838. Jackson’s term was over. Now Martin Van Buren was the head of state. He sent 7,000 soldiers under General Winfield Scott to drive out the Cherokees. Scott and his soldiers imprisoned 16,000 Cherokee Indians at bayonet in stockades and internment camps while his men looted their homes and belongings.
Then they started to cry. This is a long journey of 1,000 miles (approximately 1,600 kilometers). The same journey story happens here. Whooping cough, typhoid, dysentery, cholera and starvation became epidemics. Historians estimate that more than 5,000 Cherokees died on this journey.
life is part of the earth
For the Cherokee Nation, life is part of the land. They cannot imagine life without the land. A writer named William M. wrote: “Their spirit is present in every rock, every tree, and every place in the forest. This spirit is central to the tribe’s way of life. The loss of this place The idea is the feeling of losing yourself.”
During this time, missionary Eleazer Butler worked with the Cherokee tribe as their doctor. His wife, Lucy Ames Balter, described the tragedy in a letter to a friend: “Those who have it in their power to redress the injustices done to the Indians will realize that their Responsibility? Would they have thought of those who had been swept away by the greed of the white men who had enjoyed the wealth and freedom of these suffering Indians? “
In terms of death toll, a total of 150,000 to 20,000 Native Americans lost their lives on the Trail of Tears 200 years ago.
Americans bear the burden of the “civilized” world
Ironically, not only the U.S. government but their entire system believed that this treatment of tribes was consistent with Christian values.
President George Washington believed that the best way to solve the “Indian problem” was to “civilize” the tribes. The basic goal of this so-called civilizing movement was to convert them to Christianity and make them as much like white Americans as possible.
In 1872, John Gast’s work “American Progress” became very popular. In this photo, white settler women descend from the sky like angels onto American soil. White settlers were with him, too. These white people brought new and progressive inventions such as railroads, telegraphs, ships, and modern agricultural equipment. But the local seemingly uncivilized and barbaric Indians ran ahead of them. This American propaganda tool was very popular at the time.
India’s territory is shrinking
By 1840, thousands of Native Americans were driven from their lands in the southeastern states and forced to resettle across the Mississippi River. But American greed doesn’t end there. In fact, the U.S. government had promised that their new location would be permanent forever and the U.S. government would never give it a second glance. But when will the United States, which has made rapid progress by depriving indigenous peoples of their rights, be full?
But as white settlement expanded westward, “Indian Territory” continued to shrink. Forgot all the promises made in American law. In 1907, Oklahoma became a state and the Indian Territory ceased to exist. In fact, this region has been plagued by the ugly face of US imperialism.
