11. US history - Indian Removal Act (1830) — Transcript

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1. 0:02Let's talk about the Indian Removal Act
2. 0:04of 1830. In this video, I'll explain
3. 0:07four things about this event. Firstly,
4. 0:09we'll go over some basics about the
5. 0:10Indian Removal Act itself. Secondly,
6. 0:13we'll talk about something called the
7. 0:14Trail of Tears. Thirdly, we'll discuss
8. 0:17the horrifying practice of forced
9. 0:19assimilation. And finally, we'll take a
10. 0:21look at what life is like for Native
11. 0:23Americans today. The first topic is, as
12. 0:26we mentioned, some basics. So, let's set
13. 0:28the scene here. The United States is now
14. 0:30an independent country. It has a
15. 0:32constitution, a president, a bill of
16. 0:34rights, and everything seems to be going
17. 0:36just fine. There's just the one problem,
18. 0:39at least according to the government at
19. 0:41the time, which is that Native Americans
20. 0:43are still living on large areas of land
21. 0:46that Americans really, really want. So,
22. 0:49what do you do about that then? Well,
23. 0:51apparently you just remove them. Um, in
24. 0:54in 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed
25. 0:57the Indian Removal Act. The idea was
26. 0:59simple but cruel. You move Native
27. 1:01American tribes away from their homes in
28. 1:03the east and send them to territories
29. 1:06west of the Mississippi River. Um, if
30. 1:08you take a look at this map,
31. 1:13um, you can kind of see why. And the
32. 1:15land east of the Mississippi, uh, just
33. 1:18for clarity sake, this is a Mississippi.
34. 1:22So the lands east of the Mississippi are
35. 1:24fertile. They're perfect for farming. Um
36. 1:28and everybody wants those lands. Uh the
37. 1:31lands on the other side, so on the
38. 1:32western side, was dry, rocky, and it's
39. 1:34much much harder to live on. Uh for
40. 1:37native people, this was truly
41. 1:38devastating. Their culture, uh their
42. 1:40stories, even their religion is deeply
43. 1:43connected to their ancestral lands. So
44. 1:45being forced off of those lands meant
45. 1:47losing truly losing a part of who they
46. 1:49are. Uh some tribes agreed to move, not
47. 1:53willingly of course, but um without
48. 1:55resisting or fighting, others did resist
49. 1:58and went to war. Uh none of them were
50. 2:01any match for the US Army. However, in
51. 2:03the end, they all had to leave. Uh that
52. 2:06brings me to the second subtopic
53. 2:09um of this video, which is something
54. 2:11called the Trail of Tears.
55. 2:13Uh and you can see that um
56. 2:17written right there. So, what is the
57. 2:20Trail of Tears? Um, it's one of the
58. 2:22darkest chapters in American history.
59. 2:24Uh, so they're making the Native
60. 2:26Americans move from the lands east of
61. 2:29the Mississippi to west of the
62. 2:30Mississippi. Um, about 100,000 of them
63. 2:33are forced to walk hundreds, sometimes
64. 2:35thousands of miles to their new lands.
65. 2:38Um, this is not a small country, so this
66. 2:40is not an easy walk. Also, you have to
67. 2:42carry everything you have. um it's your
68. 2:45entire population meaning that includes
69. 2:47children, older people, sick people, um
70. 2:51unfit people and so on and so on. So in
71. 2:53the end around 17,000 of them died on
72. 2:56the way uh from hunger, cold, disease,
73. 2:59exhaustion. Um many families were torn
74. 3:02apart and a lot of those 100,000 that
75. 3:05left simply never reached their
76. 3:07destination.
77. 3:09Um the thing is though that this native
78. 3:12this uh Indian removal act it did work
79. 3:16really really well for the Americans
80. 3:18that is if you take a look at this
81. 3:20current day map so this is a map from
82. 3:22today you can see that west of the
83. 3:24Mississippi which again is right here
84. 3:28um there are virtually no Native
85. 3:30Americans the blue sections are Native
86. 3:32Americans um you can also see that in
87. 3:35their u new place to settle so west of
88. 3:38the Mississippi that these Americans
89. 3:41aren't just spread across the country.
90. 3:43Sorry, these natives aren't spread
91. 3:44across the country, but um they live in
92. 3:48specific locations. They seem like
93. 3:50they're grouped together. Um and if you
94. 3:52thought that, you'd be right because u
95. 3:54most of these people were placed in
96. 3:56reservations, which are small, very
97. 3:57restricted areas that are 100%
98. 4:00controlled by the government. So that's
99. 4:01where they uh lived back then and often
100. 4:04still live to this day on reservations.
101. 4:09Next up is subtopic three about forced
102. 4:12assimilation.
103. 4:14Um, as if taking the natives land for
104. 4:16themselves, sending on this perilous
105. 4:18journey across the vast plains that is
106. 4:20the United States and then forcing them
107. 4:22into reservations wasn't terrible
108. 4:24enough, the government turned to a new
109. 4:26strategy uh to take it even further. And
110. 4:28that strategy is opening up reform
111. 4:30schools. Uh, their official goal was
112. 4:33civilization or assimilation. Uh for
113. 4:36those of you who don't know to
114. 4:37assimilate which is a s i m i l a t e.
115. 4:43So to assimilate means to make somebody
116. 4:45become part of another group by forcing
117. 4:47them to give up their own culture and
118. 4:49adopt someone else's. In practice, this
119. 4:51meant completely destroying native
120. 4:53culture and thereby kind of simply
121. 4:55erasing these natives. Um you can see um
122. 5:00a picture of one of these schools. Um
123. 5:04there are over 500 government-f funed
124. 5:07institutions uh many run by churches. Um
125. 5:10what is this kind of school really? What
126. 5:12well they're boarding schools and how do
127. 5:14they they work? Native Americans are
128. 5:16often kidnapped from their famil
129. 5:17family's homes and then sent hundreds of
130. 5:19miles away to go live in boarding
131. 5:21schools. Um once there they were
132. 5:23completely stripped of who they were,
133. 5:25meaning their hair was cut short. They
134. 5:27had to wear Americanstyle uniforms. They
135. 5:29were punished for speaking their own
136. 5:31languages. Um, you can see a picture
137. 5:34here.
138. 5:35Um, oh, sorry, I forgot. Um, their
139. 5:38official slogan for these schools was
140. 5:40kill the Indian, save the man. Meaning,
141. 5:42let's get rid of everything about this
142. 5:44person that makes them a Native American
143. 5:45so that we can just keep the guy
144. 5:47himself. Um, this is a picture of
145. 5:50somebody this happened to. Um, even
146. 5:53though the skin color seems much darker
147. 5:57in the picture on the left, this is
148. 5:59actually the same person. the lighting
149. 6:01is just a little different. And um you
150. 6:04can also see that this person was
151. 6:06stripped of pretty much everything that
152. 6:08makes him Native American. So that's
153. 6:10what they did in those schools. Um it
154. 6:13doesn't really stop there because um
155. 6:15like even today um Catholic schools tend
156. 6:19to have the reputation that they're a
157. 6:21little stricter than other schools. So
158. 6:23you can only imagine what a Catholic
159. 6:25school in 1830 was if it was uh
160. 6:29specifically open for people whose
161. 6:30culture is not respected by those uh
162. 6:34Catholics. So conditions are often
163. 6:36horrific. Uh students suffered physical
164. 6:39abuse, emotional abuse and often even
165. 6:41sexual abuse. Uh many died from poor
166. 6:43hygiene, hunger or disease. uh we don't
167. 6:46even know how many because children were
168. 6:48buried in mass graves uh after they died
169. 6:51and the school kept no records of those
170. 6:53or simply destroyed them. Some of those
171. 6:56graves are still being found today. Um
172. 6:59what's most shocking about this history
173. 7:01is that it's only just starting to come
174. 7:03to light. We're only just starting to
175. 7:06get an idea of how bad it really was. Uh
176. 7:08the US government once ran over 500
177. 7:11boarding schools for native children. So
178. 7:13far, investigators have found burial
179. 7:15sites at only 65 of them. Um, not
180. 7:18because there aren't any in the other
181. 7:21400, whatever. Um, but because nobody's
182. 7:25been over there to look for them. Uh,
183. 7:27most of the graves that they have found
184. 7:28are unmarked, um, hidden for decades. No
185. 7:31names, no records. And that also means
186. 7:33that families never knew what happened
187. 7:35to their children. Hundreds of school
188. 7:37sites, as I mentioned, haven't even been
189. 7:39searched yet. So, the real number is
190. 7:40almost certainly much, much higher.
191. 7:43Um, this sadly will probably not improve
192. 7:46anytime soon because here we go again.
193. 7:49The Trump administration uh recently cut
194. 7:52more than $ 1.5 million in funding for
195. 7:55projects that were helping to uncover
196. 7:57these uh these stories and these burial
197. 7:58sites. This forces researchers to pause
198. 8:01their good work um and just to leave
199. 8:04much of this history buried along with
200. 8:06the memories of the thousands of
201. 8:08children who simply never came home.
202. 8:13All right, that brings us to subtopic
203. 8:15four, um, about what life is like on
204. 8:17these reservations today. So, what we're
205. 8:20really discussing is the long-term
206. 8:21consequences of everything we've just
207. 8:23talked about. Um, because of historic
208. 8:25loss of land, culture, opportunity, and
209. 8:28centuries worth of being treated like
210. 8:30worst case savages and animals, best
211. 8:33case secondass citizens. Uh, many of
212. 8:36these Native American communities still
213. 8:37face extreme poverty and health problems
214. 8:39to this day. Um I'll provide you with a
215. 8:42few examples. Um diabetes rates are
216. 8:46eight times higher than among other
217. 8:48Americans. Uh why is that? Because um
218. 8:51they there's it's it's very hard to find
219. 8:54fresh food on these reservations.
220. 8:55They're often like in the middle of
221. 8:57nowhere. The land is not suitable for
222. 8:59farming. So it's difficult to find even
223. 9:02like a vegetable or a fruit there. Um
224. 9:04there's also a lot of poverty. So, a lot
225. 9:06of them have to have to uh live off of
226. 9:08government sanctioned packages like food
227. 9:10stamps. Um, and for some reason, those
228. 9:13packages contain only very very sugary
229. 9:17uh cheaply pro um cheaply produced um
230. 9:21types of food. So, if you didn't have
231. 9:23diabetes before you had to go on food
232. 9:26stamps and government packages, you'll
233. 9:27certainly have diabetes um if you have
234. 9:31to live off of those. Um these are also
235. 9:33places where there isn't exactly a
236. 9:35hospital nearby. Um so that also means
237. 9:39that a lot of people suffer from the
238. 9:40consequences of diabetes which is a
239. 9:42horrible disease anyway but especially
240. 9:44if you don't have access to decent
241. 9:46healthcare because that will lead to um
242. 9:49limbs being amputated especially feet um
243. 9:52that leads to blindness. So, not only is
244. 9:55uh diabetes much more prevalent, the
245. 9:57consequences of diabetes that isn't
246. 10:00taken care of very well are
247. 10:02catastrophic. Um the unemployment um
248. 10:06rate on these reservations can reach up
249. 10:07to 80%. Um because there simply aren't
250. 10:11any jobs. Um this um gives young people
251. 10:16a very very dire outlook on life. There
252. 10:19are very few opportunities for them on
253. 10:21these reservations. And obviously, and
254. 10:24this happens in any culture, in any
255. 10:26place, whoever you are, if you can't
256. 10:27make money the legal way, well, you need
257. 10:30money. So, you often have to turn to
258. 10:33illegal activities to provide for your
259. 10:35family. That also means that there's a
260. 10:37lot of crime on these reservations.
261. 10:38There are a lot of gangs on these
262. 10:40reservations. Uh, so they are dangerous
263. 10:42places. Um, the another number would be
264. 10:47the infant death rate. So that that's uh
265. 10:49the chance that your your child will die
266. 10:51between the ages of zero and three is
267. 10:5360% higher than in the rest of the
268. 10:55country. Um that has to do with like I
269. 10:58just mentioned the lack of proper
270. 11:00healthcare. Um all of these things
271. 11:03combined, so the disease, the
272. 11:05unemployment, the crime, um there's also
273. 11:09a lot of addiction, um alcoholism,
274. 11:11opioid abuse, all of those things
275. 11:13combined with the hopelessness of
276. 11:16existence on your reservation lead to
277. 11:18extremely high suicide rates. Um the
278. 11:21suicide rate to be exact is 82% higher
279. 11:24than in the rest of the country. Um,
280. 11:27again, all of this combined, um, you get
281. 11:29an average life expectancy of only 52
282. 11:32years old in these reservations compared
283. 11:35to 78 for all other Americans. So,
284. 11:38that's a very, very big contrast. Um,
285. 11:42excuse me. Um, here you can see, um,
286. 11:46some pictures of a current day Native
287. 11:48American reservation. Uh you can for
288. 11:51example see this man standing in front
289. 11:53of his house and you can tell that this
290. 11:56is no rich person's house. Uh same thing
291. 11:59here. It's all very dilapidated and
292. 12:02these are these are not not um nice
293. 12:05places to live. Um unfortunately
294. 12:08discrimination is also still part of
295. 12:10daily life and a good or a bad depending
296. 12:13on how you look at it. Example of this
297. 12:15is of course President Donald Trump.
298. 12:18Here we go again. Um there is a um
299. 12:23senator, Massachusetts senator in
300. 12:25government. This is her. She's called
301. 12:28Elizabeth Warren and she's known to have
302. 12:30even though she looks like a very
303. 12:31average white person, but she's known to
304. 12:33have Native American um ancestors.
305. 12:37And he um refers to her always as
306. 12:41Pocahontas.
307. 12:42That may sound like a joke, but it shows
308. 12:44how little respect there is for Native
309. 12:46American history and identity. I mean,
310. 12:48we talked about the real life story of
311. 12:49Pocahontas. This is a painful chapter of
312. 12:52American history, um, of native history.
313. 12:55So, the president referring to a member
314. 12:58of Congress by the name of Pocahontas is
315. 13:01just very, very painful, I feel. Um, so
316. 13:04to recap, we looked at four main
317. 13:06subtopics uh, in this video. Firstly,
318. 13:08the Indian Removal Act itself, which
319. 13:10forced native peoples off of their
320. 13:12lands. Uh secondly, we talked about the
321. 13:14tragedy of the Trail of Tears, which um
322. 13:17meant the end for about 17,000 out of
323. 13:20100,000 Native Americans who had to
324. 13:22cross the country on foot. Uh thirdly,
325. 13:25we discussed the assimilation policies
326. 13:27that tried to erase Native culture. And
327. 13:29finally, we discussed the lasting impact
328. 13:31of all of this, which is still visible
329. 13:33in the often, well, miserable lives on
330. 13:37reservations uh today.
331. 13:51I want to end the discussion of this
332. 13:52event with a video. What is this video?
333. 13:55Well, it's Trump during his first term
334. 13:57in 2017 and he's receiving um Native
335. 14:00American World War II co-t talkers at
336. 14:02the White House to honor them and thank
337. 14:04them for their service during World War
338. 14:05II. So, what are code talkers? Um this
339. 14:09has to do with um Native American
340. 14:11language really. So as you know during
341. 14:14World War II um allies would send
342. 14:16messages to one another containing very
343. 14:18sensitive information about I don't know
344. 14:20when will this battle take place, how
345. 14:22many people are we putting in this
346. 14:23battle and so on and so on. Um you
347. 14:25couldn't just send that over um because
348. 14:28it's very sensitive information. So what
349. 14:30you would do was encode those messages
350. 14:33um and hope that the enemy is not
351. 14:35capable of deciphering uh those codes to
352. 14:38make sure to like give it an extra kind
353. 14:41of safety. Um Americans soon realized
354. 14:44that they had a very very interesting
355. 14:46weapon when it comes to encoding things
356. 14:49and that's Native American language.
357. 14:51Native American languages are
358. 14:52notoriously among the most difficult
359. 14:54languages to learn on the planet. Even
360. 14:57if you would go uh today and moved into
361. 15:00one of these reservations and spoken
362. 15:02nothing else but their language for the
363. 15:03rest of your life, you would probably
364. 15:05still not by the end of your life have
365. 15:07reached um native level um a native
366. 15:10level in their language because they're
367. 15:12such difficult languages. They're also a
368. 15:15completely separate uh branch of
369. 15:17languages than any other language. So
370. 15:20you have nothing to compare it to. Um
371. 15:23either way, it's very very difficult.
372. 15:25So, how does this become an interesting
373. 15:27weapon for the Americans? Well, if you
374. 15:29um
375. 15:31have a Native American on the one end of
376. 15:34where you want to send your code and you
377. 15:37um have them translate your code from
378. 15:38English to their Native American
379. 15:40language and then encode that, you can
380. 15:42send it over to the other side where
381. 15:44there's a Native American from the same
382. 15:46tribe who can decode the message and
383. 15:48then translate it back from the Native
384. 15:50American to English. Why is that really,
385. 15:52really great? because even if the
386. 15:54Germans were to intercept your code or
387. 15:56your message um and be able to decode
388. 15:59whatever code you use, it would still
389. 16:01not be of any use to them because they
390. 16:04don't speak that specific very rare and
391. 16:07very difficult Native American language.
392. 16:09So that's how um many Native Americans
393. 16:14um joined World War II and made a huge
394. 16:17difference for the American side. every
395. 16:19once in a while they are received in the
396. 16:21White House or rather the surviving
397. 16:23co-alkers are received at the White
398. 16:24House and they are honored and thanked
399. 16:26for their service as I mentioned. So um
400. 16:29how did that go? Well, first off and
401. 16:32this is really this is an interesting
402. 16:34choice. Um Trump decided to receive them
403. 16:36in front of the Andrew Jackson portrait.
404. 16:39This is Andrew Jackson. Um if you paid
405. 16:42close attention during my explanation,
406. 16:44you know that this is the president that
407. 16:47um issued or signed the um Indian
408. 16:51Removal Act. So again, that's very very
409. 16:55insensitive of him because to these
410. 16:57Native Americans, that's the guy, this
411. 16:59President Andrew Jackson, that's the guy
412. 17:02who chased them off of their land. Um
413. 17:05that's not the only sadly insensitive
414. 17:08thing he said. I'll just let you watch
415. 17:10this video and make your own conclusion.
416. 17:14>> And I just want to thank you because
417. 17:16you're very, very special people. You
418. 17:19were here long before any of us were
419. 17:21here.
420. 17:23Although we have a representative in
421. 17:26Congress who they say was here a long
422. 17:28time ago. They call her Pocahontas.
423. 17:32But you know what? I like you because
424. 17:35you are special. You are special people.
425. 17:38You are really incredible people and I
426. 17:42have from the heart, from the absolute
427. 17:44heart, we appreciate what you've done,
428. 17:47how you've done it, the bravery that you
429. 17:50displayed and the love that you have for
430. 17:52your country. Tom, I would say that's as
431. 17:55as good as it gets, wouldn't you say?