Trail of Tears Essay Examples

c. 1830 - 1840

Southeastern United States and Indian Territory

The Trail of Tears was the forced relocation during the 1830s of Indigenous peoples of the Southeast region of the United States (including the Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole, among others) to the so-called Indian Territory west of the Mississippi River.

In 1830, Andrew JAckson signed the Indian Removal Act, which gave the federal government the power to exchange Native-held land in the cotton kingdom east of the Mississippi for land to the west, in the “Indian colonization zone” that the United States had acquired as part of the Louisiana Purchase. As a result Indian lands were held hostage by the states and the federal government, and Indians had to agree to removal to preserve their identity as tribes.