MOONF.Y] TRKATY OF \VASHIX(;TON 1828 139 



for iinvone of the tribe who should uiuiertuke to cede or oxehanjji'e land 

 t)(doiijiing to the Nation.' 



After a long series of negotiations such pressure was brought to 

 beai' upon a delegation vdiich \isited \\'ashington in 1828 that consent 

 was at last obtained to an exchange of the Arkansas tract for another 

 piece of seven million acres lying fai'thei- west, tog-ether with "a i)er- 

 jx'tuai outlet west" of the tr:ict thus assigned, as far west as the 

 sovereignty of the I'nited Stati>s might extend.' The boundaries 

 given for this seven-million-aci'e tract and the adjoining western 

 outlet were modified by treaty at Fort Gibson tive years later so as to 

 be practically e({uivalent to the present territory of the Cherokee 

 Nation in Indian Territory, with the Cherokee strip recently ceded. 



The preamble of the Washington treaty of ]May 0, 18:28. recites that 

 ■■ \\'hereas, it being the anxious desire of the Governmentof the L'uited 

 States to secui-e to the Cherokee nation of Indians, as well those now 

 li\ing within the limits of the territory of Arkansas as those of their 

 fi'iends and brothers who reside in states east of the Mississippi, 

 and who may wish to join their brothers of the West, a permanent 

 honic^ and which shall. ui\der the most solemn guarantee of the United 

 States, be and remain theirs forever — a home that shall never, in all 

 futui'e time. b(> embarrassed l)v having extended around it tln> lines 

 or ])laeed over it the juiisdiction of a territory or state, nor l)e pressed 

 upon by the extension in any way of anj- of the limits of any existing 

 teri'itory or state; and whereas the present location of the Cherokees 

 in Arkansas being unfavoralile to their present repose, and tending, 

 as the past demonstrates, to their future degradation and misery, and 

 the Cherokees being anxious to avoid such consequences," etc. — there- 

 fore, they cede everything confirmed to them in 1817. 



Article 2 defines the boundaries of the new tract and the western 

 outlet to be given in exchange, lying immediately west of the present 

 Arkansas line, while the next ai'ticle provides for the removal of all 

 whites and others residing within the said boundaries, "so that no 

 obstacles ai-ising out of the presence of a white population, or any 

 l)opidati()n of any othei- sort, shall exist to annoy the Cherokees. and 

 also to keep all such from the west of said line in futuri>." 



Other articles provide for payment for improvements left l)ehind; 

 for a cash sum of ^50,U()0 to pav for trouble and expense of removal 

 and to compensate for the inferior (juality of the lands in the new 

 tract: for ^(!, 000 to pay for recovei-ing stock which may stray away 

 " in ((uest of the pastures from which they may l)e driven :" $8,7()0 for 

 .spoliations committed by Osage and whites; ^500 to (ieorge (nie.ss 

 {Se(|uoya) — who w'as himself one of the signers — in consideration of 

 the beneficial I'csults to his tribe from the alphabet invented l)y him; 

 $20,000 in ten annual payments for education; $1,000 for a printing 



> Eoyce, Cherokee Xation, op. fit., p. 24.5. - Ibiti.. pp. 2J7, 24S. 



