The Present Day Trail of Tears

In the 1830’s President Andrew Jackson signed the “Indian Removal Act” which removed native Americans, using military force, from the southeast USA, including Kentucky. These native Americans were removed to “Indian Territory,” now known as Oklahoma. They were removed because the “white settlers” felt uncomfortable around them and wanted their lands for themselves. The native Americans were accused of all types of criminal activities by both the USA government and the white settlers. These accusations were untrue. One of those native American tribes was the Shawnee native American nation. The white settlers, with government’s military force, took their land, without compensation, and forcefully removed them. The “Trail of Tears” is worth googling where we learn that thousands of those native Americans, including thousands of children and women, died on that forced march from places like Kentucky to Oklahoma. I was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma. I grew up knowing about the Trail of Tears. It involved the Shawnee native Americans, called “Indians,” which was intended to be a demeaning term. With this as a part of our nation’s history, the present emphasis of forcefully removing immigrants seems like a repeat of a terrible portion of American history. No wonder the Government does not want this part of the nation’s history to be told and studied. This was not morally right in the 1830s and it is not right in 2025.