large parties, yearly
make incursions into the country beyond the boundaries of the United
States, and in defiance of the Indians kill the beaver and the
buffalo--the latter merely for the _tongue and skin_, leaving the carcase
to rot upon the ground.[16] Thus is this unfortunate race robbed of their
means of subsistence. Moreover, what guarantee can the Indians have, that
the United States will keep faith for the future, when it is admitted that
they have not done so in times past? How can they be sure that they may
not further be driven from river to river, and from mountain to mountain,
until they reach the shores of the Pacific; and who can tell but that then
it may be found expedient to drive them into the ocean?

The policy of the United States government is evidently to get the Indians
to exterminate each other. Its whole proceedings from the time this
question was first agitated to the present, but too clearly indicate this
intention; and if we wanted proof, that the executive government of the
United States _would act_ on so barbarous and inhuman a policy, we need
only refer to the allocation of the Cherokees, who exchanged lands in
Tennessee for lands west of the Mississippi, pursuant to the treaty of
1819. It was well known that a deadly enmity existed between the Osages
and Cherokees, and that any proximity of the two people, would inevitably
lead to fatal results; yet, with this knowledge, the executive government
placed those Cherokees in the country lying between the Arkansaw and Red
rivers, _immediately joining the territory of the Osages._ It is
unnecessary to state that the result was _as anticipated_--they daily
committed outrages upon the persons and properties of each other, and the
death of many warriors, on both sides, ensued.

The sympathy expressed in that part of the Message relating to the
Indians, if expressed with sincerity, would do much honour to the feelings
that dictated it; but when we come to examine the facts, and investigate
the implied allegations, we shall find that they are most gratuitous; and,
consequently, that the regret of the president at the probable fate of the
Indian, should he remain east of the Mississippi, is grossly hypocritical.
He says, "surrounded by the whites, with their arts of civilization,
which, by destroying the resources of the savage, doom him to weakness and
decay:[17] the fate of the Mohegan, the Narragansett, and the Delaware, is
fast overtaking the Cho