In the 1830s, the U.S. government decided to relocate Native American peoples to territories west of the Mississippi. The government gave many reasons why Native Americans needed to relocate. Tribes who did not move voluntarily were forcibly removed from their ancestral lands. This forced removal would later be known as The Trail of Tears. The U.S. government offered many reasons why Native American people needed to move west of the Mississippi. Many Easterners believed that this decision would protect Native American culture.1 Many Indians attempted to assimilate into white culture in order to remain on their ancestral lands.2 But the settlers did not like Indians mixing in the culture white because they felt the Indians were influenced by alcohol and exploited financially.3 Another reason Easterners, particularly the Georgian government, wanted the Native Americans to move was because prospectors found gold on land controlled by Cherokee Indians.4 The amount of gold found in Cherokee Territory prompted whites to demand that the Cherokee be removed from their land so that gold mining could continue without Cherokee interference. 5 Another reason Georgia was in turmoil was that the Cherokee had established a constitution in 1827. At this point, the Georgia government tried to take over and overturn all Cherokee laws and expand its territory onto Cherokee lands.6 The reason Why Georgia fought so hard for control of Indian lands was because it had given up its land claims to the West in exchange for a promise from the federal government of Indian Land in Georgia.7 Due to all the tumult of the Georgia government, the United States Congress adopts...... middle of paper ......3. Tiya Miles, Ties That Bind: An Afro-Cherokee Family's Story in Slavery and Freedom (electronic resource). (University of California Press, 2005): 149-150.4. Theda Perdue and Michael D. Green, The Cherokee Nation and The Trail of Tears. (New York, New York: The Penguin Group): 43-44.5. Lucy Maddox, Removals: Nineteenth-Century American Literature and the Politics of Indian Affairs. (Oxford University Press, Incorporated, 1991): 27, 37.6. Richard J. Callahan Jr., New Territories, New Perspectives [electronic resource]: The Religious Impact of the Louisiana Purchase. (Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 2008): 57.7. Clara Sue Kidwell, The Effects of Removal on Native American Tribes. (University of Oklahoma National Center for the Humanities). http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/nattrans/ntecoindian/essays/indianremoval.htm