The Americans during the early 1800's were very manipulative and were willing to do anything in order to accomplish their goals. Westward expansion was very important to the United States, claiming more land to the west was a symbol of power and the more power the United States had the more intimidating they were to neighboring countries. The only thing standing in the way of the Americans westward expansion were the natives that called that land home. In the beginning of westward expansion the Americans wanted to create a friendship with the native Americans and establish trust. So they decided to discreetly take advantage of the Indians by creating treaties that claimed to offer amazing opportunities as long as the Indians aggreged to relinquish their land to the Americans. For example in the document entitled, A Treaty between the United States of America, and the Kaskaskia Tribe of Indians. (August 13, 1803) it states, "The annuity …show more content…
A perfect example of this is found in General Winfield Scott's Address to the Cherokee Nation which states, "May his entreaties be kindly received and may the God of both prosper the Americans and Cherokees and preserve them long in peace and friendship with each other." The Americans are very settle in their transition of attitude toward the Indians. In the beginning of westward expansion it was clear America really did want to develop a friendship between them and the Natives. But when the expansion wasn't progressing as fast as first intended America began to grow impatient and removing the Indians off the land began the top priority. America should have given the Indians more time to get off their land or should've created another solution for the removal of the Indians. If we would've shown more curtesy back in the early 1800's, maybe we could have an even closer relationship with the Native Americans
America had a newfound fervor for land already occupied by the Indians. Although the Treaty of Paris ended the war, in the west, war continued. In the treaty the British gave up all claims to the lands, but declared the Indians still owned their lands. America thought the Indians had no real claims to the land so they made treaties to legitimize American expansion.
From the years 1800-1850 the nation was full of battles and prosperity. Territorial expansion was a cause in most of the battles, but also gained prosperity for the nation. There were many impacts on national unity between those time periods, but the main impact was territorial expansion. This is true because of the Louisiana Purchase, the purchase of Oregon territory, and the Mexican War.
The years 1840 to 1890 were a period of great growth for the United States. It was during this time period that the United states came to the conclusion that it had a manifest destiny, that is, it was commanded by god to someday occupy the entire North American continent. One of the most ardent followers of this belief was President James K. Polk. He felt that the United States had the right to whatever amount of territory it chose to, and in doing this the United States was actually doing a favor for the land it seized, by introducing it to the highly advanced culture and way of life of Americans. Shortly after his election he annexed Texas. This added a great amount of land to the United States, but more was to follow. The Oregon Territory became a part of the United States is 1846, followed by the Mexican Cession in 1848 and the Gadsden Purchase in 1853. At this point the United States had accomplished its manifest destiny, it reached from east to west, from sea to shining sea. Now that the lands it so desired were finally there, the United States faced a new problem- how to get its people to settle these lands so they would actually be worth having. Realistically, it is great to have a lot of land, but if the land is unpopulated and undeveloped, it really isn't worth much. And the government of the United States knew this. One of the reasons that many did not choose to settle there immediately was that the lands were quite simply in the middle of nowhere. They were surrounded by mountains, inhabited by hostile Indians, and poor for farming. Because of these geographical conditions, the government was forced to intervene to coax its citizens into settling the new lands. Basically the lands were not settled because they were available, they were settled because of various schemes the government concocted to make them seem desirable.
Throughout history, the United States had come off as a stubborn nation that would take what they wanted at any cost. This was prevalent in both cases of expansion as the Americans risked war and national safety for the sake of gaining land, or even merely for proving a point. During the early years of expansion, the Americans had pushed aside the Native Americans and whoever else inhabited the land they wanted. They believed that the land was rightfully theirs and that everyone else was merely squatting on their territory. This idea continued into the early twentieth century as the Americans looked to the oceans for new territories to their kingdom.
The Manifest Destiny was a progressive movement starting in the 1840's. John O'Sullivan, a democratic leader, named the movement in 1845. Manifest Destiny meant that westward expansion was America's destiny. The land that was added to the U.S. after 1840 (the start of Manifest Destiny) includes The Texas Annexation (1845), The Oregon Country (1846), The Mexican Cession (1848), The Gadsden Purchase (1853), Alaska (1867), and Hawaii (1898). Although this movement would take several years to accomplish fully, things started changing before we knew it. New technology took off right away!
How do you see progress, as a process that is beneficial or in contrast, that it´s a hurtful process that everyone at one point of their lives has to pass through it? At the time, progress was beneficial for the United States, but those benefits came with a cost, such cost that instead of advancements and developments being advantageous factors for humanity, it also became a harmful process in which numerous people were affected in many facets of life. This all means that progress is awsome to achieve, but when achieved, people have to realize the process they had to do to achieve it, which was stepping on other people to get there.
At the time Andrew Jackson was president, there was a fast growing population and a desire for more land. Because of this, expansion was inevitable. To the west, many native Indian tribes were settled. Andrew Jackson spent a good deal of his presidency dealing with the removal of the Indians in western land. Throughout the 1800’s, westward expansion harmed the natives, was an invasion of their land, which led to war and tension between the natives and America, specifically the Cherokee Nation.
American had changed rapidly in during the nineteenth century. Between 1848 – 1861, the Congress had changed a lot in politics due to the slavery’s impact. The south had large population of slave and mainly agricultural economy with cotton. The nation gradually created many small parties and form of ideology of liberty and progressive. The market evolution brought economy boost for the nation, but it also brought a warning for division of nation by slavery. After the Louisiana Purchase, America doubled the size and seized the lands from Mexico. The concept of manifest destiny fueled the controversy theories about slavery expansion. This essay will explain and analyze the impact of slavery throughout the debate on westward expansion. Additionally, the raise of Republican Party and other radical voices, which helped to abolish slave, contribute to sectional divide of the nation.
In 1850, Native Americans inhabited areas from Kansas to some parts of Oregon, and almost all the land between. Once the Americans were swayed with the philosophy of Manifest Destiny, they rushed to the West seeking land, money, or salvation. Land issues arose when the Americans and Indians met. Whether it was solved with conflict or compromise, it still ended up in hostility. Battles such as The Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 had no sign of negotiation at all, just warfare. When treaties were “passed”, or forced, they would be insignificant because it always tended to be one-sided by the Americans, and it was common for them to not uphold the treaty. After enraging the Indians, more fights would break out. Americans showed no mercy for the Natives at all. They force Indians to give away land and then restrict them into small reservations, where they would have to give up all their customs and traditions and follow the lifesty...
Many tribes had reigning governments and tribal counsels as a way of life. With westward expansion brought changes. Many Americans were killing their livestock, the food they ate, and Americans were settling more and more on the Indian lands. In time, Indians began to fight back and take what had been theirs. Once this happened, the Americans decided to make the Indians like Americans, so we took their land and tried to make them Americans.
Despite the fact that these agreements were a clear violation of existing British law, they were used later to justify the American takeover of the region. The Shawnee also claimed these lands but, of course, were never consulted. With the Iroquois selling the Shawnee lands north of the Ohio, and the Cherokee selling the Shawnee lands south, where could they go? Not surprisingly, the Shawnee stayed and fought the Americans for 40 years. Both the Cherokee and Iroquois were fully aware of the problem they were creating. After he had signed, a Cherokee chief reputedly took Daniel Boone aside to say, "We have sold you much fine land, but I am afraid you will have trouble if you try to live there."
There were many people responsible for the westward expansion of the US. Meriwether Lewis and William Clark were one of the first Americans to precisely explore and map the western Territories. During their expeditions they were aided by a Shoshone woman named Sacagawea and her French-Canadian husband Toussaint Charbonneau, during which they served as translators. Their expedition helped path a way for thousands of settlers to move west.
The colonist didn't respect the fact that the Natives had already claimed that land. By claiming the land that the natives had, we worsened relations with them. In document G, it states, "These soldiers cut down our timber; they kill my buffalo"(page 5). This shows that the American colonist are taking away from the natives. They were taking their food and cutting down buffaloes. In document F, it states that “a couple of years before it was nothing to see 5,000, 10,000 buff (shortened word for buffalo) in a day’s ride. Now if I saw 50 I was lucky"(page 5). This proves that the colonist were taking away from the natives and were killing their food. The colonist were killing too many buffaloes which was taking away from natives and ruined any relations with
It is possible to argue that the 1840s represented a quite challenging period of America’s political and socio-economic development. With James K. Polk’s political progress in terms of the Democratic Party, Manifest Destiny was proclaimed to officially set America’s deep expansion to the West. However, this expansion was a quite radical and categorical political decision; which is why the opposition of the Whig party was arranged, bringing an ideological and political split within the rows of Democrats. Indeed, expansion was the main political controversy within the United States’ political system: on the one hand, Democrats sought mainly positive aspects from expanding country’s borders; on the other hand, Whigs and other oppositionists of
It was not very easy for the United States to expand like they had in mind. The division of land had been a rising problem since the Revolutionary war. Two of the main issues during the time of the Articles of Confederation were the pricing and land measurement (Potter and Schamel 1). Throughout the course of over fifty years, the government had tried many different attempts to get people to want to expand to the west. They just didn’t really know the right way of how to go about it. Trying to sell the acres did not go over well, considering the price seemed outrageous for what they were getting. Untouched soil was very hard to start on and be successful from the beginning, which caused some problems with people not wanting to buy the land (Weiser 1). So again, a different political group tried a different approach.