Editing Indian removal (section)

==Jeffersonian policy==
{{Main|Thomas Jefferson and Native Americans}}

As president, [[Thomas Jefferson]] developed a far-reaching Indian policy with two primary goals. He wanted to assure that the Native nations (not foreign nations) were tightly bound to the new United States, as he considered the security of the nation to be paramount.<ref name="Pres" /> He also wanted to "civilize" them into adopting an agricultural, rather than a [[hunter-gatherer]], lifestyle.<ref name="Prucha1985" /> These goals would be achieved through treaties and the development of trade.<ref name="Calloway1998" />

Jefferson initially promoted an American policy which encouraged Native Americans to become [[Cultural assimilation|assimilated]], or "[[civilization|civilized]]".<ref name="TuckerHendrickson1992" /> He made sustained efforts to win the friendship and cooperation of many Native American tribes as president, repeatedly articulating his desire for a united nation of whites and Indians<ref name="GrossbergTomlins2008" /> as in his November 3, 1802, letter to Seneca spiritual leader [[Handsome Lake]]:{{blockquote|Go on then, brother, in the great reformation you have undertaken&nbsp;... In all your enterprises for the good of your people, you may count with confidence on the aid and protection of the United States, and on the sincerity and zeal with which I am myself animated in the furthering of this humane work.  You are our brethren of the same land; we wish your prosperity as brethren should do.  Farewell.<ref name="Oberg2011" />}}

When a delegation from the Cherokee Nation's Upper Towns lobbied Jefferson for the full and equal citizenship promised to Indians living in American territory by George Washington, his response indicated that he was willing to grant citizenship to those Indian nations who sought it.<ref name="McLoughlin1992" /> In his eighth annual message to Congress on November 8, 1808, he presented a vision of white and Indian unity:

{{Blockquote|With our Indian neighbors the public peace has been steadily maintained ... And, generally, from a conviction that we consider them as part of ourselves, and cherish with sincerity their rights and interests, the attachment of the Indian tribes is gaining strength daily... and will amply requite us for the justice and friendship practiced towards them ... [O]ne of the two great divisions of the Cherokee nation have now under consideration to solicit the citizenship of the United States, and to be identified with us in-laws and government, in such progressive manner as we shall think best.<ref name="MillerCenter20168" />}}

As some of Jefferson's other writings illustrate, however, he was ambivalent about Indian assimilation and used the words "exterminate" and "extirpate" about tribes who resisted American expansion and were willing to fight for their lands.<ref name="Miller2006" /> Jefferson intended to change Indian lifestyles from hunting and gathering to farming, largely through "the decrease of game rendering their subsistence by hunting insufficient".<ref name="Black2015" /> He expected the change to agriculture to make them dependent on white Americans for goods, and more likely to surrender their land or allow themselves to be moved west of the [[Mississippi River]].<ref name="Buckley2008" /><ref name="BartropJacobs2014" /> In an 1803 letter to [[William Henry Harrison]], Jefferson wrote:<ref name="Prucha2000" />

{{Blockquote|Should any tribe be foolhardy enough to take up the hatchet at any time, the seizing the whole country of that tribe, and driving them across the Mississippi, as the only condition of peace, would be an example to others, and a furtherance of our final consolidation.<ref name="JeffersonHarrison1803" />}}

In that letter, Jefferson spoke about protecting the Indians from injustices perpetrated by settlers:

{{Blockquote|Our system is to live in perpetual peace with the Indians, to cultivate an affectionate attachment from them, by everything just and liberal which we can do for them within ... reason, and by giving them effectual protection against wrongs from our own people.<ref name="ADL2005" />}}

According to the treaty of February 27, 1819, the US government would offer citizenship and {{convert|640|acre|ha}} of land per family to Cherokees who lived east of the Mississippi.<ref name="McLoughlin1992256" /><ref name="Kappler1903" /><ref name="McLoughlin1981" /> Native American land was sometimes purchased, by treaty or under [[duress]]. The idea of land exchange, that Native Americans would give up their land east of the Mississippi in exchange for a similar amount of territory west of the river, was first proposed by Jefferson in 1803 and first incorporated into treaties in 1817 (years after the Jefferson presidency). The [[Indian Removal Act]] of 1830 included this concept.<ref name="BartropJacobs2014" />