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Show MoowEY] TREATY OF N EW ECHOTA 1836 125 country by permission, according to the laws and regulations established by the government of the same. . . . ART. 6. Perpetual peace and friendship shall exist between the citizens of the United States and the Cherokee Indians. The United States agree to protect the Cherokee nation from domestic strife and foreign enemies and against intestine wars between the several tribes. The Cherokees shall endeavor to preserve and maintain the peace of the country, and not make war upon their neighbors; they shall also be protected against interruption and intrusion from citizens of the United States who may attempt to settle in the country without their consent; and all such persons shall be removed from the same by order of the President of the United States. But this is not intended to prevent the residence among them of useful farmers, mechanics, and teachers for the instruction of the Indians according to treaty stipulations. ARTICLE 7. The Cherokee nation having already made great progress in civilization, and deeming it important that every proper and laudable inducement should be offered to their people to improve their condition, as well as to guard and secure in the most effectual manner the rights guaranteed to them in this treaty, and with a view to illustrate the liberal and enlarged policy of the government of the United States toward the Indians in their removal beyond the territorial limits of the states, it is stipulated that they shall be entitled to a Delegate in the House of Representatives of the United States whenever Congress shall make provision for the same. The instrument was signed by ( Governor) William Carroll of Tennessee and ( Reverend) J. F. Schermerhorn as commissioners- the former, however, having been unable to attend by reason of illness- and by twenty Cherokee, among whom the most prominent were Major Ridge and Elias Boudinot, former editor of the Phoenix. Neither John Ross nor any one of the officers of the Cherokee Nation was present or represented. After some changes by the Senate, it was ratified May 23, 1836. l Upon the treaty of New Echota and the treaty previously made with the western Cherokee at Fort Gibson in 1833, the united Cherokee Nation based its claim to the present territory held by the tribe in Indian Territory and to the Cherokee outlet, and to national self- government, with protection from outside intrusion. An official census taken in 1835 showed the whole number of Cherokee in Georgia, North Carolina, Alabama, and Tennessee to be 16,542, exclusive of 1,592 negrp slaves and 201 whites intermarried with Cherokee. The Cherokee were distributed as follows: Georgia, 8,946; North Carolina, 3,644; Tennessee, 2,528; Alabama, 1,424.* Despite the efforts of Ross and the national delegates, who presented protests with signatures representing nearly 16,000 Cherokee, the treaty i See New Echota treaty, 1886, and Fort Gibson treaty, 1833, Indian Treaties, pp. 633- 648 and 561- 665, 1837; also, for full discussion of both treaties, Royce, Cherokee Nation, Fifth Ann* Rep. Bureau of Ethnology, pp. 249- 298. For a summary of all the measures of pressure brought to bear upon the Cherokee up to the final removal see also Everett, speech in the House of Representatives, May 31,1838; the chapters on " Expatriation of the Cherokees," Drake, Indians, 1880; and the chapter on " State Rights- Nullification," in Greeley, American Conflict, 1,1864. The Georgia side of the controversy is presented in E. J. Harden' 8 Life of ( Governor) George M. Troup, 1849. * Royce, op. cit, p. 289. The Indian total is also given in the Report of the Indian Commissioner, p. 869,1836. |
