" With little delay the
Cherokees, too, were added to this list, although a group of
irreconcilables resisted until 1838, when they were forcibly ejected
by a contingent of United States troops under General Winfield Scott.
All of this was done not without strong protest from other people
besides the Indians. Some who objected did so for political effect.
When Clay and Calhoun, for example, thundered in the Senate against
the removal treaties, they were merely seeking to discredit the
Administration; both held views on Indian policy which were
substantially the same as Jackson's. But there was also objection on
humanitarian grounds; and the Society of Friends and other religious
bodies engaged in converting and educating the southern tribes used
all possible influence to defeat the plan of removal. On the whole,
however, the country approved what was being done. People felt that
the further presence of large, organized bodies of natives in the
midst of a rapidly growing white population, and of tribes setting
themselves up as quasi-independent nations within the bounds of the
States, was an anomaly that could not last; and they considered that,
distressing as were many features of the removals, both white man and
red man would ultimately be better off.
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