Toward Cherokee Removal: Land, Violence, and the White Man’s Chance by Adam J. Pratt

Abstract

Reviewed by: Toward Cherokee Removal: Land, Violence, and the White Man’s Chance by Adam J. Pratt George Justice Toward Cherokee Removal: Land, Violence, and the White Man’s Chance. By Adam J. Pratt. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2020. 240 pp. $59.95. ISBN 9-780-8203-5825-3. The story of Indian Removal from east of the Mississippi River has received renewed focus from scholars who have applied new perspectives. As another chapter of racial violence pursued in the quest for white supremacy, it has long served as a tragic historical marker in the story of the American past. The recent work that has offered fresh insights into the history of removal is exemplified by Claudio Saunt’s award-winning Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession of Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory (New York, NY, 2020), which forces a reconsideration about whether this expulsion was inevitable or merely just an unfortunate confluence of factors such as slaveholding interests, gold fever, and a growing brand of American exceptionalism, Manifest Destiny. William Winn’s epic book on the removal of the Creek from Georgia and Alabama [The Triumph of Ecunnau-Nuxulgee (Macon, GA, 2015)] notably reveals the collaborative interest of land speculators and political leaders to dispose of Indian tribes for white expansion. Their work indicates there remains much to say about the topic politically, economically, and culturally. Adam J. Pratt builds upon this new scholarship and focuses on the themes of politics, republican conceptions about land, and the exceptionalism of white society. He argues political partisanship and the sanctioned and unsanctioned uses of violence were instrumental [End Page 258] in the ways Cherokee Removal was initiated and pursued. While the book’s thesis is not novel, it is fittingly applied to the unique political and social conditions in Georgia. Politicians in Georgia promised to rid the state of the Cherokee as a duty to what Pratt calls the white man’s chance. This was “as a commitment made by the state government to its citizens in which the state would create economic opportunities for some of its citizens by taking away or limiting the prospects of others” (3). The power of this idea motivated Georgia leaders to pursue a systematic but urgent plan to dispose of any uncivilized presence within its boundaries. State and federal policies were sometimes at odds with this program and at other times collaborative, but together they ultimately achieved the task necessary to make land available for the white man’s opportunity for success. Cherokee sovereignty was a detriment to advancing white entitlement to land. Land was the key to the white man’s chance for success and happiness. Because the state government had a duty to fulfill the promise of this opportunity and to impose order where there was disorder, lands that were primitively used or underused by Indians required acquisition and improvement. Georgia began fulfilling this obligation with land lotteries early in the nineteenth century. By 1828, the continuation of the lotteries was threatened by the persistent presence of the Cherokee. Additionally, the federal government had an obligation to remove all Native Americans from Georgia in the Compact of 1802. State leaders, impatient with the federal efforts, determined that they must seize the initiative to preserve the white man’s chance, even if violence was necessary. Extending state sovereignty through the use of violence against the Cherokee was ironically justified as “the creation of order” (5). Violence, then, while not preferred, became an acceptable expediency for ensuring the promise of opportunity for Georgia’s citizens. The discovery of gold in 1828 led whites, many of them poor and of the “undesirable” type, to flood into north Georgia and onto Indian claims. The state faced growing turmoil as it attempted to protect the mines and prevent any conflicts with the Cherokee that would invite federal intervention. Organized criminal elements seeking to [End Page 259] push onto Cherokee land, like the Pony Club, used various forms of violence against them that were contrary to state interests. On the other hand, the Slicks were a locally-formed militia in Carroll County interested in preserving law and order and operating as a counter to the...