Side 1
The Creek Indians and their neighbors, the Yuchi, once lived in these woods in harmony with nature and in accordance with their beliefs and customs. During the 1700s and early 1800s, they were progressively dispossessed of their lands by Euro-Americans who resorted to various strategies to accomplish their ends, especially the use of treaties which were in reality land cessions in disguise. Groups of speculators then used various tricks to further defraud the Indians of their lands, while politicians justified the results under the veil of state rights.
(Continued on other side)
Side 2
(Continued from other side)
When Congress passed the Indian Removal Bill in 1830, it sent a message to the commercial interests in the country that one of the most cherished doctrines of the American Revolution—that "all men are created equal"— was no longer applicable to the native people of the U.S. The way was cleared for western expansion of the nation. Thereafter Indian removal, including the Creeks and thousands of other Southern Indians, was only a matter of time. By 1840 the long process largely had been completed, allowing cotton and slavery to become increasingly fixed on the Creeks' ancestral
homeland.
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