Cherokee Nation v. Georgia

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Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (The Cherokee Nation versus the State of Georgia), 30 US 1 (1831) was a case rejected by the United States Supreme Court in January 1831 . With this lawsuit against the state of Georgia, the Cherokee nation sought to forbid the government of Georgia from interfering with the individual rights of the nation and interfering with the settlement area.

The Cherokee were supported by a number of prominent politicians, including Davy Crockett , Daniel Webster and Theodore Frelinghuysen . The interests of the nation were represented by the lawyer William Wirt . Wirt moved for the annulment of all Georgia laws that restricted the law of the sovereign nation of the Cherokee. The Supreme Court rejected the lawsuit, however, on the grounds that the Indians were not an independent state, but a "domestic dependent nation", which as such could not enforce any rights .

This rejection, together with the civil case in Worcester v. Georgia instrumental in the American Indian policy . It applies, among other legal basis to justify under the Indian Removal Act (Engl. For Indians Resettlement Act ) carried out under duress Indian resettlement of the five civilized nations from the south-east of the United States in the so-called Indian Territory in what is now Oklahoma , as path of tears are called.

literature

  • Theda Perdue, Michael D. Green: The Cherokee Nation and the Trail of Tears . Viking, 2007, ISBN 0-670-03150-X (English).
  • Francis Paul Prucha: The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians . University of Nebraska Press, 1986, ISBN 0-8032-8712-7 (English).

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