Not alone. These Television Companies supports cspan2 as a public service. Co hello and welcome to the program. Im with the Georgia Historical Society and we are so glad you joined us today for the special program joined by doctor andrew at western carolina university. The theme of this years festival is about the importance of place in georgia and we are going to be focusing today on the experience of the cherokee people and Georgia History, what happened to them and the way georgians have remembered their history and experience particularly with removal coming all the way up into the present. I want to welcome you to the program thank you so much for being here with us. Its good to talk with you all. Let me give a quick introduction. As i mentioned, professor of history where he teaches courses on native american and United States history. He a participates in a cherokee Study Program as you might expect and is the author of this book published by the university of North Carolina press called cherokee removal and the contest for southern memories. I mentioned the university of North Carolina. The theme, and i will give the official title for 2021 and 22 from the changing landscape the importance of place. Lets start byl talking about te cherokee if you will and fit them into if you can very briefly the history and tell us what happened. The traditional cherokee homeland is in west carolina where i am today and where i work very close to the heart of the traditional cherokee homeland. But that homeland extended into areas that are now particularly important after the American Revolution and theres a bit of aeo geographical shift as cherokees lost land to a little bit of a shift with the center of things moving, still center here in the mountains, but its become quite significant particularly when the National Capital is located and placed near calhoun. So, the land that is kind of claimed by georgia within its state borders includes the cherokeehe territory into the mt famous whim that enters into Georgia History, the state of georgia, the government of georgia is the actor that does the most to create a political crisis that eventually results in the forced migration of cherokees and to indian territory. With Georgia History its like an antagonist i guess you would say to the State Government of georgia. The state of georgia vigorously pursues the disposition of the Cherokee Nations. The removal of many peoples including the cherokees is a central goal of early georgia. We are talking about the importance of place. How long roughly have the cherokeeee people been living right now in western carolina was this a homeland that went back centuries . The center of things tends to be more of North Carolina but in terms of what today the identified as the homeland, this is it. Southeastern tennessee, this is where creation happens from time and memorial if you want to use the western term so this is the center of things. To assume that there are those that remain still in those areas if you were walking on the appalachian trail are you likely in a place where the cherokee would have been for millennia . The settlements like most tend to be clustered in valleys. Sort of looking down upon places that have been inhabited for millennia. Just speaking about the place we know its a nonnative settlement. Its a valley that they have within. These are ancient places and all someones ancestral homelands. The cherokee people would have been living, none of the most popular images in the icculture identify not rooted in the landscape but pretty much everybody here in the southeast is agricultural we are talking about agricultural towns so the most important towns also have other center. You are talking about a farming people and use a wide range of other resources in the landscape but its very much rooted in the specific valleys. At this is a world that is defined by these river valley in the town organizations, agricultural towns centers. What role did the cherokee play in the American Revolution and s american colonial settlement begins to move westward but by the middle of the 18th century it wasnt quite the problem. But they did have by most tribes. Like most of the large recommendations of the eastern part of north america the cherokees whoo participate in te American Revolution do so on the side of the british. They are not doing this. Of those who do participate do so to push back against nonnative settlement so its a gamble but it is used as an opportunity to push back against the encroaching settlement. This works out very badly for cherokee communities in response to cherokee attacks on frontier settlements. North carolina, virginia, georgia sends invasions into the roadll focused on to essentially destroy everything they can find. For the revolution in this part of the world and its coming out of the colonial leaders and the people involved in these invasions its pretty much genocidal language and the need to drive cherokees from the frontier in order to as they see the need to eliminate a threat duringis this crisis. In the colonies and Great Britain the other native peoples who are continuing to fight a war that is rooted in the revolution well into the 1790s and so its of this long period of warfare that takes a terrible toll and something of a tragedy for many groups. To use this alliance with Great Britain as a way of protecting their own autonomy and freedom so theres a need of struggles for liberty and freedom taking place in the backcountry, but these are being fought against the people. Any idea how many people we aree talking about. Talking about the 15 to 20,000 people in the cherokee territory thats a rebound from the revolutionary era thats restored after the low point in the revolution so. During the revolution they continue to struggle against the americans in the time of the removal, the cherokee were a different kind of people than what we traditionally think of and what we see portrayed in Popular Culture as to what americanan indians look like, wt they were doing and what the societye is like. The most famous image in the early 19th century is the civilized tribe supplied. Dealing with the United States in the wake of the revolution to make adjustments essentially in an effort to find a future in which they can coexist. He keeps coming back demanding more and more land and putting more and more pressure on them. So it encourages cultural, social and economic changes and relationships with native americans. They have a reputation as being more receptive. Its the idea that they have adopted elements of the American Culture andnd society and economics but thats clearly an attempt to nullify the United States and to make the case that the United States can leave the Cherokee Nation alone and so in the Public Record rhetoric of course they had always been farmers. We are becoming christian, you get this image of the civilized tribe. A lot of things are changing but its like a selective adaptation but many people through the interior. They could adopt elements of the economic practice and the adaptation without they often is happening which you can see in the Cherokee Nation and other places with sort of selective adaptation especially of economic practices. Beyond that, during this time you see the cherokee officials in some cases welcoming the missionaries to come into the territory. Utthis isnt an effort to abandn the waves but to make sure some people are able to speak english and are able to operate successfully. Its about adaptation to the presence of the United States generally with the hope that by adjusting to the United States and trying to convince the United States about many people are going along with some of its policy agenda that this will help them to hold on to what they have, hold onto their politicalw autonomy remain here in the cherokee homeland. But yes the economy is changing especially you have more people as the century goes on some social changes and then politically the most profound change politically you see the Cherokee Nation and leaders forming a Central Government. The political, traditional political structure of the people is decentralized and tended to be more or less autonomous, different towns and areas connected together, but the towns tended to be able to follow their own policies basically and guide their own affairs. In the early part of the century in response to the United States as a way to try to prevent further loss of land and ultimately to prevent forced deportation to prevent removal you see they are creating a Central Government that ends up briefly taking it as its capital and in creating that government, they areic attempting to createa political voice that will be able to hold the United States and states like georgia at bay so this is an adjustment, and there is a sense among a lot of us that think that while the government is created at the same time you still have a lot of traditional political practices taking place in more traditional communities. And they dont want to emphasize too much this sense of change. Its about adjustment and adjustment with the goal of holding onto land, protecting the autonomy. Were the cherokee participating in slavery during this period . During this part of the century you do see some cherokee familieshe adopting the model of slavery that is prevalent, but then there are other forms of slavery. Theres captive slavery and captives as part of war that has much deeper history that goes back b before. In terms of the institution of slavery that we generally think of, yes you do see africanamerican slaves in the Cherokee Nation in the early part of the century. Is there any discussion or even negotiation during all this time leading up to, for example we now think of as removal. Was there any discussion between the u. S. Authorities and cherokee officials over becoming american citizens . Was that effort on the table or every possibility . So, that is generally in a sense, yes. Theres kind of an expectation that sooner or later native americans are going to kind of blend into the broader american population. Thats an aspect of expectations that the United States always brings in the century to the native people that they are going to go away in one way or another either through dispose meant or some form of assimilation. Soil that early, those early policies that encouraged the cultural, social and economic change they generally have this assumption that sooner or later, sometime in the future youre goingo to see the population jut kind of being absorbed or sort of dwindling individually will become a part of the United States. But coupled with that of course is in the United States where it sounds like theres Public Acceptance so you have this dual image where the deeply seated racism of American Society is at odds with this assumption or assimilation and so the idea of native americans becoming like equal citizens, that sort of a remote possibility at best in practical terms, but as like a policy, you do see this expectation that might happen, so its a strange situation thats held out as a possibility but as like a practical thing. Its not really a promise that the United States comes to fill. The idea that they are going to become white is not ever really on the table. It is andnd it isnt. So in the sense like you will see intellectuals or policymakers say sooner or later their destiny is to become a part of the Great Republic about republic butin practical terms t a society that is deeply fears nonwhites of all kinds and that doesnt offer in any sort of practical way quality. And so its there but not as a promise that the United States can fulfill. On one sort of slight issue to that question, in some of the early treaties inni the century there is an experiment with citizenship so in 1817 and 19 theres this all for that heads of households an individual cherokee can enroll and receive individualin landholding. They can choose family land and part of this is a promise that they will essentially become state citizens of North Carolina or wherever. So theres this experiment in a citizenship in those treaties, but what happens in practical terms is that the United States promiseses this to the cherokee people in those treaties, but the states in which they find themselves living they dont accept that and so here in North Carolina for example, there are thesee individual landholdings including and part of our campus but obviously the state of North Carolina and within my own speculators including many of the people that are like the founders set out to strip those lands from cherokees and so that captures to be this sense that in an intellectual sense of the United States could promise someday equal citizenship but in practical terms, nobody is offering that. In practical terms and its very, very clear i think to native americans but they are not t going to be accepted, even if they want to become part of the United States. So theres a lot ofhe reasons tt you wouldnt in the early 19th century. Even if they want to become part of the United States, the quality isnt something thats going to be offered by the u. S. So in many ways then it sort of fled the experience after the emancipation in the jim crow theory no matter how much education, no matter how much industrial training, and no matter how much they are able to sort of become what white americans think they should be, they are not accepted and they are not going to be. So take us through removal because i did want to get into the memory part of this but despite having lived here for millennia seeing their homeland central to their identity, georgians and the United States president and federal government decided they needed to. Be removed. This happened basically in the late 1830s; is that correct . By the 1820s, 1830s by the 1830s it had become the central goal of americans and thats tied to yointerjections. Jackson was along time advocate when he was elected to make removal as an official policy, one of their primary goals, objectives of his first term. So its an old idea that becomes the focus for policy in the 1830s so removal policy creates a set of mechanisms for deportation. As far as georgia is concerned it has less to do with georgia as the boundaries that were established after the American Revolution which when you look at the map if you look at what georgia looked like in 1790, 1800, a lot of the land georgia claimed as georgia is in fact preterritory cherokee territory. What this does then is it creates this drive to possess those lands. This is encouraged by some of the economic changes of the period. The economic boom as early as the 19th century. Theres this pressure for many decades coming from georgia and many other states as well focused on as they would see it completing the territory that was promised. And this puts them on a collision course with the creek nation and Cherokee Nation because these are lands guaranteed by treaty with the United States so you have a political demand by states like georgia that should become part of the state of georgia should be taken away from me as nations then you have repeated promises from the United States that this land is cherokee land or creek land and you have an obligation to help cherokees defend those lands so what happens in the removal area is after the removal policy you end up with a president ial administration, jackson and to some extent of congress that is willing to basically to ignore those treaty promises and allow states like georgia to create conditions of crisis for native people in bowl native people will then ougive up and agree to accept removal. So its this sort of triangular politics at the very least triangular, probably a few other dimensions but the Cherokee NationState Government often times State Governments pushing the hardest with the United States acting then asked power is going to step in and negotiate removal trees and accomplish the deportation of native americans. What one of the things youve done in your work that is so interesting is after this period where talking about, the americans are removed for all intents and purposes at least in georgia and there is a strong band of the eastern band but here in georgia, i know they come up with this territory that spread africanamerican slavery into this part of the cotton kingdom in some ways it becomes an important part of the history of 18thcentury georgia then one of the interesting things about it is that georgians also eventually tobegan