ARGUING IN AN AGE OF UNREASON: ELIAS BOUDINOT, CHEROKEE FACTIONALISM, AND THE TREATY OF NEW ECHOTA Jonathan Filler A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS August: 2010 Committee: Dr. Edmund Danziger, Advisor Dr. Ruth Wallis Herndon ii ABSTRACT Dr. Edmund Danziger, Advisor Elias Boudinot (1804 – 1839), editor of the Cherokee Phoenix and a Cherokee leader during his people’s political fight to remain a sovereign nation during the first third of the nineteenth century, remains a controversial figure in American history. Throughout most of his life, Boudinot, a Christian who was educated by Eastern missionaries, was a staunch opponent of the Indian removal movement. In 1835, however, Boudinot and a group of unauthorized “Treaty Party” men signed the Treaty of New Echota against the wishes of the majority of Cherokees - a treaty that sold the Cherokees’ land to the United States and obligated them to emigrate from their homeland. For his part in the treaty, Boudinot was assassinated by a group of Cherokees. He has been remembered variously as a patriot and a traitor, but even some historians sympathetic to his position share common ground with his detractors in implying that Boudinot suffered from poor or corrupt judgment. This thesis makes the case for Boudinot’s “rational mind.” It draws on his published writings – a speech from 1826, personal letters, Cherokee Phoenix editorials, and an 1837 “apologia” – to trace the evolution of Boudinot’s ideas concerning removal. It focuses on three distinct periods in Boudinot’s life: early life, his tenure as editor of the Cherokee Phoenix, and the years following his shift to treaty advocacy. From his early letters as a student at the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut, through his Cherokee Phoenix editorials to his final published work, Boudinot’s writings demonstrate iii his very rational mind. In 1832, convinced that Andrew Jackson would not uphold a decision by the Supreme Court that recognized Cherokee sovereignty, Boudinot determined that the Cherokees safety and progress in “civilization” lay in making the best deal possible with the United States and emigrating from their ancient homeland. This thesis shows that, like his earlier actions as an opponent of the removal movement, Boudinot’s decision to sign the Treaty of New Echota was based on sound reasoning and a desire to “benefit the Cherokees.” iv Figure 1. Elias Boudinot. Source: Bernd C. Peyer, The Tutor’d Mind: Indian Missionary-Writers In Antebellum America (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1997), 168. v “The time will come when there will be only here and there those who can be called upon to sign a protest, or to vote against a treaty for their removal – when the few remnants of our once happy and improving nation will be viewed by posterity with curious and gazing interests, as relics of a brave and noble race. Are our people destined for such a catastrophe? . May God preserve us from such a destiny.” - Elias Boudinot1 1 Elias Boudinot, “Letters and Other Papers Relating to Cherokee Affairs: Being a Reply to Sundry Publications Authorized by John Ross” in Theda Perdue, ed., Cherokee Editor: The Writings of Elias Boudinot (Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 1983), 225. vi To my mother, Sheila Filler vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to thank the members of my committee, Dr. Edmund Danziger and Dr. Ruth Wallis Herndon, whose direction and careful reading of preliminary drafts have made this thesis stronger and myself a better historian. There is still so much to learn, but the venture now appears more pleasurable. Thank you also to those who have, in one way or another, helped me find the road to writing this thesis: Dr. Jim Buss, Dr. Walter Grunden, Dr. Don Rowney, DeeDee Wentland, Carol Singer, Barbara Toth, Dustin McLochlin, Helena Riha, Sheila Filler, Jude Filler and Stephen Filler. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER I. TRANSITIONS ...................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER II. BOUDINOT THE CHEROKEE (1804 – 1828) ................................... 21 CHAPTER III. THE CHEROKEES, GEORGIA, AND THE UNITED STATES (1828 – 1832) ............................................................................................................................. 50 CHAPTER IV. ALONG THE ROAD TO NEW ECHOTA (1833 – 1835) ................. 81 CHAPTER V. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................... 113 BIBLIOGRAPHY ......................................................................................................... 140 APPENDIX A. EXCERPT OF A LETTER FROM ELIAS BOUDINOT. .................. 146 APPENDIX B. EXCERPTS FROM “AN ADDRESS TO THE WHITES” ................ 148 APPENDIX C. SELECTED CHEROKEE PHOENIX EDITORIALS......................... 151 APPENDIX D. EXCERPTS FROM “LETTERS AND OTHER PAPERS RELATING TO CHEROKEE AFFAIRS: BEING A REPLY TO SUNDRY PUBLICATIONS AUTHORIZED BY JOHN ROSS” .............................................................................. 160 ix LIST OF FIGURES/ ILLUSTRATIONS Figures/Illustrations Page 1 Elias Boudinot ................................................................................................... iv 2 Major Ridge ...................................................................................................... 13 3 Map of Cherokee Land Cessions: 1785 – 1835 ................................................ 17 4 The Foreign Mission School ............................................................................. 24 5 Harriet Gold Boudinot ...................................................................................... 29 6 Page from the Cherokee Phoenix, February 21, 1828 ...................................... 37 7 Map of the Cherokee Nation (East) After 1820 ................................................ 54 8 Andrew Jackson ................................................................................................ 58 9 Wilson Lumpkin ............................................................................................... 62 10 Chief John Ross ................................................................................................ 84 11 John Ridge ........................................................................................................ 96 12 First Signature Page, Treaty of New Echota ..................................................... 108 13 Stand Watie ....................................................................................................... 115 14 Map of the Southern Indian Nations Before and After Removal ..................... 120 15 Samson Occom and William Apess .................................................................. 123 16 Interior of the Print Shop at New Echota .......................................................... 139 1 I. Transitions Elias Boudinot, influential Cherokee leader during his people‟s political struggle to remain a sovereign Nation throughout the 1820s and 1830s, saw his efforts reach their culmination at two events in New Echota, Georgia, in December, 1835. That winter, several hundred Cherokees gathered at the Nation‟s capital. The children laughed and talked together as if attending a festival while their parents smoked in silence, waiting for the proceedings to begin. The mood of the adults reflected the seriousness of the occasion: they had come to New Echota to make a treaty that would sell their homeland in Georgia and move their people to a new country west of the Mississippi River. The leaders of the assembled Cherokees were self-appointed; they met at the capital city without authorization from the elected leadership or the blessings of the majority of their people, who boycotted the meeting. On December 24, 1835, Major Benjamin F. Currey read the proposed treaty before a crowd gathered in the council house. As the Cherokees considered the words of the United States agent, shouts of “fire, fire!” filled the air, and the Indians poured outside to see the roof in flames. This ill omen did not stop the business at hand. The fire was soon put out and the proceedings carried on.1 If Boudinot, former editor of the Cherokee Phoenix and “Treaty Party” member, was unsettled by the incident, it is not recorded. He was determined that a treaty would be made. Five days later, a committee of twenty met in Boudinot‟s house along with United States treaty commissioner John F. Schermerhorn. None of the Indians looked on the task 1 Bernd C. Peyer, “Elias Boudinot and the Cherokee Betrayal” in The Tutor’d Mind, 210; Thurman Wilkins, Cherokee Tragedy: The Story of the Ridge Family and the Decimation of a People (London: The Macmillan Company, 1970), 286. 2 at hand with any enthusiasm; they asked questions, smoked, and sat in silence well into the evening, but no one rose to take pen in hand. Finally, a Cherokee named John Gunter stood. He announced that he was not afraid, that he was ready to sell the whole country, and signed his name to the treaty. One after another the rest of the committee followed suit. Elias Boudinot was the fifth to sign. Shortly before midnight the business was completed. A Cherokee Nation still stood west of Arkansas – its citizens had emigrated there seven years earlier in response to white encroachment onto their lands – but in the eyes of the United States‟ government the eastern Cherokee Nation ceased to exist on December