Texas was a likely candidate for annexation. Its geographical location seemed too close for any thing but membership into the United States. At first we didn’t want Texas. What would it do to our relations with Mexico if we were to acquire Texas? Some feared that it would be too risky a move for our peace-seeking nation. But here again our rampant desire, to move west and capitalize on its resources, came in to play. With James K. Polk as president we were moving full force into a Nation that would occupy the entire continent. Sometimes you don’t know how good something is that you have until you lose it. Well that is how the congress decided Texas was a good territory to annex. Billington says (59-60)
As France was posturing in 1844 to sign a treaty with Texas, Mexico, and England we began to get jealous and realize what a gem Texas could be as part of the union.
Oregon too was gained during Polk’s administration. Gained easily, in fact, as Britain moved its Hudson Bay operation into Vancouver British Columbia to stave off any tension between them and us. Also they realized that the key to their power in the region wasn’t holding onto a Columbia River outpost; the fact that it was an easy target for violent frontiersmen to raid, made their decision to move easier.
California was a harder piece of property to acquire but eventually we got her too. The Mexican war ended quickly after we got our forces underway and eventually moved into Mexico City. We then convinced Mexico she was defeated, had them sign the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in February of 1848, and gave the a ‘token 15 million’ (Billington 64) for the California property.
The lands we gained access to, started to make their natural resource capability know to the eastern United States. Artists began to depict how and why the western frontier was so valuable. The artists, according to Faragher (537), used various mediums like paintings, newspapers and eventually photos to relay the majesty and even excitement of the west. For many people in the east their only exposure to the west was from these various media releases.
Characters were developed, like Annie Oakley and Wild Bill, and introduced to those east of the Mississippi so they could gain ideas and begin to speculate about the lifestyles of those west of the River. Of course capitalizing on this trend, The Wild West Show gained popularity and gave the promoter a fist full of dollars, I suspect.
This was how things continued. Discoveries were made, news relayed east, and investors and pioneers determined to cash in on any available resources moved out west to get what they thought was theirs for the taking.
Gold was found as early as the 1840’s in California (Faragher 543). This again was relayed back east and began one of the nations’ largest and fastest migrations west. Gold fever drove people to give up everything and venture out west to find their fortune. Of course many outfitters were there, baked by rich eastern investors to sell the gold miner all of his goods like shovels, picks, and foodstuffs. I think these storeowners were the real victors of the gold rush.
During all of the time we were scheming to move west, there was a great nation we had little thought of. This nation eventually became, in my opinion, the biggest hurdle in the westward expansion effort; and is the focus of the rest of this paper.
From the beginning the plan was to move, isolate, and assimilate the Indians (Abel 22) so they would not hamper our efforts of expansion. Jackson was elected president in 1828 and began a fierce move to remove the Five Tribes of the North Eastern region. With the Indian Removal act of 1830 the nation surged forward with a catastrophic plan to eliminate the Indians sovereignty.
Our Expansion efforts continually brought us into conflict with the original settlers of the land, the Native Americans. The acts that congress had passed to allow Indians to establish their homes, and even attempted to integrate them into the American society during from the 30’s through the early 50’s, were about to be rethought. The surge of railroads being built to access the west ‘forced the American government to change its Indian Policy’. (Billington 75) Its not as though we hadn’t side stepped our treaties with the Indians earlier to proliferate and gain resources on lands we agreed they could control. We have a History even by the 1850’s of backing out of treaties we had made with the Indians. But most thought it our right to over rule even our nations highest court to attain resources for our ‘Nations good’. Hey it was our Manifest Destiny, right?!
In 1851 we gathered the nomadic Indian tribes, of the plains, at Fort Laramie and forced them to sign treaties. These treaties gave the Indian tribes rights to hunt over definite territories ‘that it could be forced to cede under pressure’ (Billington 75). It is a shame. Even as we were working out the treaties we were scheming to retake any land we had promised if our desires or plans changed. How corrupt could we be to shake the hand in promise while we determined we would by no means be held to the agreement.
The Indian tribes that had similar dealings had already determined the white mans had a lying tongue. We continued to change our policies frequently, as we saw fit, to continue unhindered expansion and inhabitation of the west. In Fact in 1871 we completely ended our treaty system that had been developed over decades.
With the Dawes Severalty Act we ‘successfully undermined the tribal sovereignty and offered little compensation’ in return (Faragher 541). With the Dawes Act we continued to put asunder the entirety of Indian culture. No more stories of traditional lore were to be told. No more Indian languages were to be taught. Medicine men were threatened with jail if they continued to practice their traditions. The culture that had taken centuries to build was systematically being destroyed in the wake of our infantile conquest.
The Indians didn’t lye down and take this abuse. They continually rode in war parties and raided communities and forts on the edges of the frontiers. These attacks held off the settlers for a little while but proved ineffective over the long run. Once Indians were seen as a threat to life and home, the government sent troops in to the areas. The established forts, the troops’ patrols, along with the overwhelming fire power they yielded made it hard for the Indians to keep any ground and made it even more difficult for them to expand their territory.
The Indians even tried to plead peaceably with us, to no avail. They attempted to invoke the federal governments agreements to land acquisitions but continually found us to be double minded and unable to keep our promises. We were in it for the profit the west promised, not to protect the interests of these savages. We would gain at any cost the vast resources of the west. Damn the Red Man!
‘Thousands of tragedies and experiences of absorbing interest marked this, one of the most dramatic chapters in our history’. (Foreman 13) Now we see Indians as a lost civilization. Some storybooks remain scattered about in our libraries. We pass by there desolate reservations, and scarcely think of them as able individuals. There existence as inhabitants of vile and fertile lands filled with buffalo and other game is far removed. Now they are exiled to the forbidding plots of unwanted land. Few Native Americans aspire to live the American Dream. Schools offer hope of an education but not there education, ours. How would you feel if you legacy was thought of as subordinate and uncivilized? The plight of the Indian Nation has yet to be fully played out but their sad state is very discouraging. I hope we will learn from our countries mistakes and make our nation a better place for all of us to live out our dreams.
Bibliography
Abel, Annie Heloise. The American Indian as slaveholder and secessionist. Nebraska, University of Nebraska Press: 1992
Billington, Ray Allen. Westward Expansion, a history of the American Frontier. New York, Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.,: 1974
Clark, Thomas D. Frontier America, The story of the Westward Movement. New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons: 1969
Faragher, John Mack., et al. Out of many, A history of the American people. New Jersey, Prentice Hall Inc.: 2000
Forman, Grant. The emigration of the five civilized tribes of Indians. University of Oklahoma press: 1932
Otis, Delos Sacket. The Dawes Act and the allotment of Indian land. Oklahoma, University of Oklahoma Press: 1973
Remini, Robert Vincent. Andrew Jackson and the course of American history. New York, Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc.: 1984
