Andrew Jackson and His Indian Wars

Rating:
Summary: sad story
Review: After reading this book, I suddenly understood why so many Indians today believed that there was some sort of genocide being worked against them. This book covered a very unglorious period of our nation's history and how our nation grew. The author proves to be quite informative in his study and tried to take everything within the context of the period. Was the Indians in the east coast doomed as Jackson believed? The book make it very plain that they were doom because of people like Jackson. If the whites were honorable and true, most of these Indian nations would have survived easily but since the whites were not, the Indians were doomed as Jackson stated and wanted. Its almost amazing how treaties were made and thrown away like toliet paper. After reading a book like this, it really hard for our nation to stand so tall morally. Yes, all this took place a long time ago but we still whine about Pearl Harbor and the Alamo like yesterday. Our nation commited thousands of Pearl Harbor and Alamo on the American Indians as this book tell us so I think for that, it worth a read.

Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: Although Americans are prone to refer to Jackson as "Old Hickory" or, in his day, as "the Hero", the Indian tribes of his day gave him the nickname of "Sharp Knife". This nickname was based upon Jackson's unrelenting warfare against the Creek Indians, particularly at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. Professor Remini shows in his careful and thorough study of Jackson and the Indians that the sobriquet was indeed well deserved. The book is a thorough and careful exposition of the cruelties practiced on the Indians during the Jacksonian Era culminating in their removal from their homes and their relocation west of the Mississippi River during and subsequent to Jackson's Presidency.

Remini is a master of his materials. He has written a National Book Award winning biography of Jackson together with many other works on the Jacksonian Era of our history.

After a brief introductory chapter summarizing Jackson's early years, Remini plunges into the story of Jackson's Indian wars. Prior to his Presidency, Jackson conquered the Creeks, Cherokees, Chickasaws and Seminoles in fierce no-quarter fighting. Jackson was resolute in his wish to remove the Indians from the Southeastern United States.

In addition to his leadership on the battlefield, Jackson was a participant in many treaties with the Indians in which the ceded large portions of their ancestral domain in return for small tracts of land and small sums of money. Here too, Jackson was a domineering, seemingly irresistible figure intent on opening the Southeast to the onrush of white settlement, with little regard for the effect of his actions on the Indians.

As a national hero based upon his victory at the Battle of New Orleans and his conquests of the tribes, Jackson narrowly missed the Presidency in 1824 but was elected in 1828 and 1832. He was able to implement the policy of Indian removal he had conceived in his years as a general and a treaty negotiator. He secured legislation from Congress authorizing the removal of the "Five Civilized Tribes" -- the Cherokees, Chickasaws, Creeks, Choctaws, and Seminoles -- and implemented this policy at great cost and suffering to the Tribes. It is a story all too little known today.

Jackson was a man of determination, strength, and will. He was also, in Remini's account, an American patriot. Shocking as was his treatment of the Indians, Jackson was moved by considerations of American Nationalism. In particular, he wished to protect the coastal areas of the United States from intrigue and invasion by England and France. The European powers tended to use the Indians as a means to threaten the United States.

Although he is properly critical of Jackson's cruelty, arrogance, and deceit towards the tribes, and of the horrors they underwent during the removal, Remini argues that there was no good alternative to the removal policy. If the tribes had not been removed they would have been overwhelmed by onrushing white settlement and lost entirely their tribal identity, as was the case with many northeastern tribes. Paradoxically, Jackson proved right in that the removal policy saved the southeast tribes from extinction. Of course, none of this excuses the cruelty with which the process was implemented; and Remini is far from trying to excuse it.

I came to Remini's book after reading an earlier study of Jackson and the Indians: Michael Paul Rogin's book " Fathers and Children: Andrew Jackson and the Subjugation of the American Indian." I wasn't entirely happy with the Rogin because of its hypercritical tone and because of its psychologizing. Remini's book constitutes a more thorough,thoughtful, and balanced consideration of this sad period in our history. This is a good book for those who wish to try to understand Indian policy and its role in our country's development.

Rating:
Summary: Missed Opportunity
Review: Andrew Jackson and His Indian Wars is exactly as advertised - nothing less, but, unfortunately, nothing more. Remini focuses exclusively on Jackson - his actions, his statements, and his correspondence. We are given virtually no flavor of the other personalities involved. Most disappointing, the Indians themselves are never fleshed out, except in passing. We learn nothing of their culture, or even their armed forces (were they all armed with muskets? Did they employ mounted attacks? Did they capture, have, or use any artillery?) For that matter, we do not even learn much of Jackson's own armies - how many field pieces did they have? How were they transported through the swamps? For a book about Indian *Wars*, these omissions are glaring.

Nor does Remini himself provide any great insights. In the final chapter he recites the view of another historian that removal of Native Americans from the East was the most palatable of four bad choices. Having spent 280 pages with him, it would have been nice to have heard Remini's own view of alternative "solutions" to the white/Indian tensions.

Rating:
Summary: The Man on the Twenty Dollar Bill
Review: I believe the author has done a fair job in evaluating the situation America was faced with regarding the Indians that inhabited the country prior to the arrival of the Europeans. Andrew Jackson was apparently motivated by the desire to protect America's interests from foreign invaders along the gulf coast and a desire to preserve the Indians' culture. The only way to accomplish these goals, Jackson believed was to implement the policy of Indian removal west of the Mississippi River. Jackson portrayed himself to the Indians as a friend when negotiating a treaty to get the Indian tribes to relinguish their lands. The Indians, however, had no choice in the matter. At times I couldn't help but be reminded of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany when he stood victorious over another conquered nation. That may seem like a brutal comparison, but the story of the Indians losing their land in America was nothing less than brutal. Jackson made his share of enemies, namely Henry Clay, for his arbitrary use of power. An example was his execution of two British agents rather than consult his superiors. Author Remini refers to Indian scholar Francis Paul Prucha in stating there were four options available to America in dealing with the Indians. 1. Genocide 2. Integrate the two societies 3. Let the Indians live where they were and enforce existing treaties 4. Removal Yes, the country was faced with a difficult situation and it would have been nice if # 2 or # 3 could have been implemented, but the Indians wanted no part of American culture, and no army was large enough to keep people from invading Indian country. Jackson justified removal to keep foreign invaders from the gulf coast and as being the only way the Indians could keep their culture. Whether keeping their culture was just an excuse for removal west of the Mississippi into other Indian territory, only Jackson really knows. In any case I certainly think we could have found someone else to put on a twenty dollar bill than Andrew Jackson, "Sharpknife."

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing, especially from such a renowned scholar
Review: Let me start with a disclaimer: Prof. Remini was both my instructor in a history course and my Master's seminar advisor when he was a visiting professor at Columbia in 1959-'60. He approved my Master's Essay; I received my M.A. that year.
While his book is, as one would expect from Prof. Remini, clearly written and well-documened, it has a fundamental flaw which leads to my low rating. Not only is Remini unpersuasive in justifying Jackson's relentless efforts to remove the Indians, but he is also internally inconsistent. He argues: "There was no way the American people would continue to allow the presence of the tribes..." yet immediately before this assertion Remini had acknowledged that removal had barely passed Congress. Why was Congress so divided? Because - according to Remini himself - the American people had pressured Congress to protect the Indians' rights.
Not only does Remini have nothing to say to shoot down his own evidence showing wide popular support for the Indians, but he also fails to even discuss why the President who was ready, even eager, to use military force to compel obedience from a rebellious South Carolina at the time of the tariff/nullification controversy would be cowed by supposed popular opposition to the Indians removal.
I've long felt that Jackson had a generally very impressive administration but that his brutality towards the Indians was his greatest flaw as President. (His support for slavery was very wrong, of course, but it was not an issue in which he played a decisive role - as he did regarding the Southeastern tribes.) I wanted to read Remini's book because I thought that he, as the pre-eminent Jacksonian scholar, might at least provide a reasoned explanation for Jackson's actions. As I've made clear, he completely failed to do so.

Rating:
Summary: This author knows his stuff
Review: The list of Remini's work at the beginning of the book shows that he has devoted the better part of his career to studying and writing about Andrew Jackson. For me, that makes this work infinitely more valuable than a "popular history" written by someone who has dealt with everyone from Crazy Horse to General Patton. It enables the author, in dealing with this one aspect of Jackson's career--his wars and treaties with American Indians--to show how it all meshes with his personal and political outlook. He also adds ample insight into the American culture of the time.

I was very impressed that a person who had spent so much time with his subject was able to treat him so even handedly. He did not, in any way, make Jackson into the hero he was believed to be in his own lifetime. The author shows that, at times, Jackson could be a dictatorial maniac. He is also not depicted as being highly intellectual. However,Remini makes it clear that Jackson was just the kind of person America needed at the time, to accomplish its goals (no matter how inhumane they might have been).

In fairness to potential readers, I must admit that this was not the kind of book that "I could not put down." Even though I read quite a bit of history, especially dealing with the many Indian Wars, I didn't really get drawn into this until the point where Jackson got more involved in his political career and closer to the presidency. Though I don't know if this is due to the writing, or simply my personal interests. Even so, this did spark an interest, for me, in the life and career of Andrew Jackson, and I now look forward to reading some of Remini's other works on the man.

Rating:
Summary: an educational study of jackson and us southeast indians
Review: This concise and highly interesting book covers a period of history that was important to the development of the American continent. Unfortunately, the United States' gain was achieved at the great expense of the Indians who inhabited the southeast. Although I thought I knew something about American history, this book showed me how little I knew about this important (and heartbreaking) era when a clash of cultures resulted in Indians being removed from their homes in the woods primarly to the State where I live, Oklahoma, which was created by Congress in 1834, and designated as Indian territory.

Remini gives a direct and fascinating look at Jackson and his relentless attacks upon the southeast and southern Indians. Yet Remini shows that Jackson understood the only way that the tribes of southeastern America could survive the interactions with whites (who murdered the Indians and took their land and property) was by removal to Indian territory west of the Mississippi. This policy was made possible, of course, by the Louisiana Purchase. Thomas Jefferson also advocated the removal of Indians to the land that he had acquired by this Purchase.

Remini points out that Jackson's fame and ultimate rise to the Presidency resulted from public recognition of his military success and genius, first with regard to the Creeks, then the British, and then the Seminoles and Cherokees. For better or worse, Jackson was the most important figure responsible for the Southeast America that we know today.

In this book, when Remini finishes his story, he stops, making this book a treasure. Not a word is wasted, and every page is appreciated. I gained much from reading it.

David W. Lee [e-mail]

Rating:
Summary: Biography at its best
Review: This is a magnificent look at Andrew Jackson's war with the Native Americans. So many biographers bury their subject and forget that most readers what to know who their subject *was*, not merely what they *did.* Remini doesn't fall into this trap. He gives the reader a well-grounded and detailed look at Andrew Jackson as a man: his foibles, passions and prejudices, as well as his extreme ambition and vacillating brilliance.

Remini strikes a beautiful balance when examining Jackson's private life and military/political life. His examination of the Trail of Tears is absolutely riveting, and he weaves Jackson in and out of the narrative with rare poise and skill. The reader can actually picture Jackson in the midst of this conflict, feel his emotions and understand the decisions he made. When a biographer can paint such a vivid picture, the reader will always be rewarded.

This is an excellent book for the entire spectrum of people interested in Jackson. Whether you are a neophyte or an established Jacksonian historian, there is much to enjoy, as well as new material. The footnotes and bibliography are excellent resources and lead to additional sources for the reader. The minute I finished this, I bought the second volume, "Andrew Jackson: The Course of American Freedom, 1822-1832," also available here. This volume is truly an outstanding book