[QUOTE=Captain Amazing]
Well, or most of the Presidents of the 18th and 19th centuries. None of them have particularly admirable records when it comes to dealing with the Indians. There’s a reason Helen Hunt Jackson called her look at US-Indian relations “A Century of Dishonor”
[/QUOTE]
I’m pretty sure that, as President, William Henry Harrison did nothing dishonorable to the various Indian nations.
ETA: Unless you consider three hour long inauguration speeches to be a crime against humanity.
You don’t see Chrifties (a christmas fifty) that much outside the holiday. The night after Chrimma I went to a bar and everyone had chrifties they had gotten from their families.
[QUOTE=bdgr]
It has NOT A DAMN thing to do with todays standards.
The murdering backstabbing bastard violated the laws and standards of HIS time. Today’s standards don’t enter into it
THIS IS AS OFFENSIVE as making excuses for Hitler by saying “He made the trains run on time, and we cant judge what he did to the jews by todays standards” .
[/QUOTE]
OtakuLoki"The biggest reason that I dislike the hatred all going towards Andrew Jackson is because he then becomes a scapegoat, in the ancient sense of the word: a sacrifice for the communal guilt. Blaming any single President for the Trail of Tears ignores the reality that the US wasn’t willing (nor, do I think it was able) to police itself to respect the Cherokee land claims. And the majority of the population of the States acquiesced to this. The Trail of Tears was not imposed upon the Cherokee solely by the actions of Andrew Jackson."
**
Captain Amazing***“Well, or most of the Presidents of the 18th and 19th centuries. None of them have particularly admirable records when it comes to dealing with the Indians. There’s a reason Helen Hunt Jackson called her look at US-Indian relations “A Century of Dishonor”*”
**spoke- **"Ulysses S. Grant’s Indian policies were responsible for as many or more Indian deaths than Andrew Jackson, yet I don’t hear anybody griping about Grant on the $50 bill."
The Trail of Tears actually went down during President Van Buren’s watch, not Jackson’s. General Winfield Scott is usually blamed for the horrors commited during the forced evacuation. I don’t see many rants about them. In fact, if any one President should be blamed, it’s Van Buren, not Jackson.
Thus, Jackson’s views on “the Indian Problem” were, like it or not, not too far off from the norm for his day. Sadly.
Lastly I refer you to:
And, I hope you have forgiven the Nazis for bombing Pearl Harbor.
[QUOTE=DrDeth]
The Trail of Tears actually went down during President Van Buren’s watch, not Jackson’s.
[/QUOTE]
Van Buren was the Indian Hater’s handpicked successor precisely because he was a reliable lapdog. The Indian Removal Act had already been enacted before he took office. Blaming him for the Trail of Tears would be like blaming Obama for enforcing the Patriot [sic] Act when he takes office.
[QUOTE=choie]
I dunno, if Obama enforces the PATRIOT Act when he takes office, damn right I’d blame him. Why must we have only one locus for our anger?
[/QUOTE]
A legitimate question, and one I can understand your asking it. But as we have long known from our own historians, the specifics are much more complex than that. We took the advice of Thomas Jefferson and educated ourselves. We invented an alphabet and taught ourselves to read and write. We built homes in the style of whites, dressed in the style of whites, and made laws — even writing a Constitution — in the style of whites. We made every attempt to live honorably and peacefully among our white neighbors. When General Jackson needed warriors for his fights against our mutual enemies, we provided them. We fought by The Devil’s side, risking our own lives to make possible his lopsided victory against the Creek. But in the end, he was the man who crafted our removal and caused the extermination of thousands of our people, just as he was the man who turned a blind eye when the Postmaster General in South Carolina was burning pamphlets mailed to churches by Northern abolitionists. Van Buren was no more saintly than the Indian Hater himself, but Van Buren got his payback with an economic depression and a presidency that is universally ridiculed. Jackson, meanwhile, continues to be honored by those who believe that just because he was nice to puppies, he was overall a good man. (To use a metaphor.)
[QUOTE=spoke-]
Ulysses S. Grant’s Indian policies were responsible for as many or more Indian deaths than Andrew Jackson, yet I don’t hear anybody griping about Grant on the $50 bill.
[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=Liberal]
A legitimate question, and one I can understand your asking it. But as we have long known from our own historians, the specifics are much more complex than that. We took the advice of Thomas Jefferson and educated ourselves. We invented an alphabet and taught ourselves to read and write. We built homes in the style of whites, dressed in the style of whites, and made laws — even writing a Constitution — in the style of whites. We made every attempt to live honorably and peacefully among our white neighbors. When General Jackson needed warriors for his fights against our mutual enemies, we provided them. We fought by The Devil’s side, risking our own lives to make possible his lopsided victory against the Creek. But in the end, he was the man who crafted our removal and caused the extermination of thousands of our people, just as he was the man who turned a blind eye when the Postmaster General in South Carolina was burning pamphlets mailed to churches by Northern abolitionists. Van Buren was no more saintly than the Indian Hater himself, but Van Buren got his payback with an economic depression and a presidency that is universally ridiculed. Jackson, meanwhile, continues to be honored by those who believe that just because he was nice to puppies, he was overall a good man. (To use a metaphor.)
[/QUOTE]
This and other arguments, BTW, are starting to win me over to Liberal’s side here. President Jackson’s was certainly not a bright time in the history of America as a land of the free, and a man of as much importance as he had in those days ought not escape modern criticism, it seems.
I don’t know enough about that time period to say conclusively where I stand on this, though. However, Liberal, I do apologize for implying that you fabricated your Cherokee heritage, here and elsewhere. That was a little…err…hostile of me.
Very true. The USA PATRIOT Act is not a declaration of newly illegal things, but an expansion of the executive branch’s influence on the lifes of innocent Americans. Anyone who participates in using the “tools” provided by the Act is as guilty as the White House and Senate of the time were for giving us the thing in the first place.
[QUOTE=Guinastasia]
Jesus Christ, you’re a shitty historian, Lib.
[/QUOTE] Guin, I haven’t addressed you yet because it is almost always a waste of time. You seldom give any respect to what I say. But with that comment to me, I challenge you to show where in this thread I’ve demonstrated being a “shitty historian”. Are you just being pissy and mean because you didn’t get the pile-on you’d hoped for?
[QUOTE=Hostile Dialect]
I don’t know enough about that time period to say conclusively where I stand on this, though. However, Liberal, I do apologize for implying that you fabricated your Cherokee heritage, here and elsewhere. That was a little…err…hostile of me.
[/QUOTE]
Your apology is accepted. And appreciated. Wado. (Thank you.)
