Cheorkee Indians :: essays research papers

MARSHALL, C. J. This bill is brought by the Cherokee nation, praying an injunction to restrain the asseverate of tabun from the execution of certain laws of that state, which, as is alleged, go directly to annihilate the Cherokee as a political society, and to seize for the use of Georgia, the lands of the nation which scram been informed to them by the United States, in solemn treaties repeatedly make and hushed in force.If courts were permitted to indulge their sympathies, a case better calculated to plump up them can scarcely be imagined. A people, once numerous, powerful, and truly independent, comprise by our ancestors in the quiet and uncontrolled possession of an ample domain, step by step sinking beneath our superior policy, our arts and our arms, have yielded their lands, by attendant treaties, each of which contains a solemn guarantee of the residue, until they retain no to a greater finale of their formerly extensive territory than is deemed necessary to their co mfortable subsistence. To preserve this remnant, the fork over application is made.Before we can look into the merits of the case, a preliminary enquiry presents itself. Has this court jurisdiction of the cause? The third article of the constitution describes the extent of the judicial power. The second section closes an enumeration of the cases to which it is extended, with "controversies between a state or citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects." A subsequent clause of the selfsame(prenominal) section gives the supreme court original jurisdiction, in all cases in which a state shall be a party. The party defendant may then unquestionably be accomplishd in this court. May the plaintiff sue in it? Is the Cherokee nation a foreign state, in the sense in which that term is used in the constitution? The counsel for the plaintiffs have well-kept the affirmative of this proposition with great earnestness and ability. So much of the bloodline as was intend ed to prove the guinea pig of the Cherokees as a state, as a distinct political society, separated from others, overt of managing its own personal matters and governing itself, has in the opinion of a majority of the judges, been completely successful. They have been uniformly treated as a state, from the settlement of our country. The numerous treaties made with them by the United States, recognise them as a people capable of maintaining the relations of peace and war, of being responsible in their political character for any violation of their engagements, or for any aggression committed on the citizens of the United States, by any individual of their community.