Unit 5 Georgia’s Growing PainsObjective: I will explain significant factors that affected westward expansion in Georgia between 1789 and 1840.

a. I will explain reasons for the establishment of the University of Georgia, and for the westward movement of Georgia’s capitals.

b. I will also evaluate the impact of land policies pursued by Georgia including the headright system, land lotteries, and the Yazoo Land Fraud.

c. I can also explain how technological developments, including the cotton gin and railroads, have had an impact on Georgia’s growth.

d. I can describe the role of William McIntosh in the removal of the Creek from Georgia.

e. I will analyze how key people (John Ross, John Marshall, and Andrew Jackson) and events (Dahlonega Gold Rush and Worcester v. Georgia) led to the removal of the Cherokees from Georgia known as the Trail of Tears.

UGA and State Capitals

SS8H4 a

ONLY WRITE NOTES IN WRITTEN IN RED

The University of Georgia• Established on Jan. 27, 1785 – when the Georgia General

Assembly approved the charter

• America’s first (1st) public college

• Governor Lyman Hall asked Abraham Baldwin to write the charter

• The charter was important to education because it said that education was the responsibility of the state. Today, states fund many parts of the education system.

• Baldwin became the first president of UGA (1785-1801)

• Abraham Baldwin wanted to form the University of Georgia because he thought educated people were more likely to improve Georgia. By being more productive, they would be able to improve their state.

• Did not open to students until Sept. 1801

• Franklin College – first UGA building opened in 1806

• UGA was first public university on paper but the University of North Carolina held classes first – the two schools both claim the title – first public university

UGA-Arches in the background built in 1858

ATHENS TODAY

Virtual Field Trip–University of Georgia

http://contentviewer.adobe.com/s/GPB/d095b43f82f

94c229327b7debcdc8af4/VFT_UniversityGeorgia_We

b/000_GeorgiaMap.html

• The first city and capital of Georgia was Savannah.• From that point forward, the state capital would

move to follow the center of the state’s population in order to be accessible to all.

• As American Indian land was obtained, the population had more space to move into across the state.

• There have been five cities to serve as the state capital of Georgia.

State Capitals

Augusta• During the revolutionary war, as the British

military advanced, the Patriots wanted to move the capital upriver from Savannah to Augusta.

• This was the start of Georgia’s rotating capitals.• War activities would cause the seat of government

to move back and forth between Savannah and Augusta.

• Ultimately, many citizens believed Augusta was too far east as the population was rapidly moving west.

• They wanted the capital to stay centralized.

• The new lands were populated by American Indians, which would soon lead to a boiling point as more and more people moved west.

Early

Augusta,

GA

Louisville• Louisville was the capital of Georgia (after

Savannah and Augusta)• This city was named after French King Louis XVI

for his help during the American Revolution. • Located in Jefferson County, this was Georgia’s

third capital. • It was chosen as it was a more centralized

location for the population. • State legislators hoped it would grow into a trading

port due to its location on the Ogeechee River.• Once developed, the city was successful financially

and socially.

Louisville

• However, its time as the capital ended in 1807 due to several factors. Among those were:

• Malaria outbreaks occurring in the city every year;

• The difficulty of using the Ogeechee River as a trade route;

• And the continual northwestern movement of Georgia’s population.

• One of the most famous events in Louisville was when the state legislators set fire to the Yazoo Land Act with a magnifying glass.

• Georgia gained Creek lands west of Louisville in 1802, and almost immediately the push to move the capital west again had started, so the capital was moved to Milledgeville.

• Milledgeville was named for the governor, John Milledge, and served as the state capital for sixty years.

• It was the capital during the Civil War, but was abandoned as General Sherman marched closer.

• Government documents were loaded to trains to be evacuated to safety.

• After the war, Union troops denied meeting the legislature and took charge of Georgia’s government.

• After the Civil War, a new Georgia constitution was adopted and elections were held. The legislature reconvened in Milledgeville.

Milledgeville

Atlanta

• The final, and current, state capital is Atlanta.• Once the Cherokees had been removed, legislators

started thinking about another westward move for the capital.

• The chartering of the Western and Atlantic Railroad led to the development of the town of Terminus.

• Renamed Marthasville, after former Governor Wilson Lumpkin’s daughter Martha, residents soon protested that the name was too feminine for the frontier.

Atlanta

•In 1847, the General Assembly renamed the town Atlanta, in respect for the Western and Atlantic Railroad.

• The capital was not moved to Atlanta until after the Civil War.

• In 1868, a new constitutional convention was ordered to meet in Atlanta by General Pope.

• Better rail accessibility and a growing population were claimed as reasons for moving the capital to Atlanta.

• The moved was ratified in 1868 and Atlanta became the final state capital.

The current

capitol building

in Atlanta

State Capitals•In 1919, a suggestion was placed to

relocate the capital to Macon, a more centrally-located city.

•Some state offices have moved to the Macon and Tifton areas, but the state capitol complex remains in Atlanta.

•A tool to remember the order of Georgia’s capitals is to remember the S.A.L.M.A acronym.

• The capitals were Savannah, Augusta, Louisville, Milledgeville, and Atlanta.

Name: ___________________ Date: ________

Georgia’s Moving CapitalsLocate and label Georgia’s capitals. Remember to use the S.A.L.M.A acronym to help you. Next to the label, also include the order the capital was established. Finally, draw the path from the first capital to the current

capital to visualize the westward movement of the capitals. You may write the name of the capital in the margins of the page and draw arrows to its location on the map.

Land PoliciesSS8H4 b

Headright System• After the American Revolution, Georgia gained land that went west

to the Mississippi River

• Many war veterans were being given land as payment for their services

• States leaders gave away thousands of acres of land using the Headright System

• In an effort to attract settlers to the new colony of Georgia, the Headright system offered 200 acres of land to the "head" of every household. Additional family members or slaves entitled the land owner to 50 additional acres per individual, up to 1,000 acres total.

Yazoo Act• Until 1802, the western border of Georgia was the

Mississippi River. Under the Yazoo Land Act, the Georgia government sought to sell off the land that now constitutes the states of Alabama and Mississippi. When the land sales began, it quickly grew into a massive fraud perpetrated by several Georgia governors and the state legislature by selling large tracts of land to insiders at absurdly low prices.

• State and Federal leaders were outraged by the corruption of those involved in the Yazoo Land Act. This act resulted in the sale of land that Georgia had claimed in the west, land dubbed the “Yazoo Lands” after a river passing through the area. Legislators sold the land—but to pull off the coup they distributed money and land to other legislators and other wealthy Georgians. For this reason, the act led to those responsible being voted out of office.

Yazoo Act• James Jackson, former revolutionary war hero who became a

U.S. Senator, was so outraged that he resigned from his seat and returned to the state to make right the Yazoo Land Act. Jackson County is named after him.

• He and his political allies took control of the General Assembly and nullified the Yazoo Act.

• In 1802, Georgia ceded the land to the U.S. government for $1.25 million and the promise that the U.S. would surrender American Indian land claims in the state and removed the Creek from Georgia.

•The Yazoo Land Fraud bears the distinction of being one of the worst land-related political scandals in U.S. history. In the face of massive public protest, the act was repealed in 1796 by new governor Jared Irwin. All copies of the land act were then burned publicly.

• The “Burning of the Yazoo Act” at Louisville shows James Jackson and others surrounding the document as they set it on fire.

Yazoo Act

• The Yazoo Land Fraud was one of the most influential factors in the establishment of Georgia's borders. As a result of the Yazoo Land Fraud, the western boundary of Georgia was moved from the Mississippi River to the Chattahoochee River.

• In the settlement that ended the controversy, Georgia ceded the present-day territory of Alabama and Mississippi to the federal government.

Yazoo Land Fraud

Burning of the Yazoo Act

When the law was repealed the Yazoo documents were publically burned at the state capitol in Louisville.

It is said they used a magnifying glass to start the fire to represent “fire from heaven”.

Yazoo Land Fraud Political Cartoon• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngL6Cj80uRo

Land Lotteries

• From 1805-1833 Georgia held eight (8) lotteries

• For the price of a ticket Georgia settlers could gain large amounts of land

• Participants names were placed in one drum while the lots being sold were placed in another drum

• One ticket from each drum would be drawn and that would determine what land you now owned.

• Georgia gave away ¾ of its land away to over 100,000 families this way

LAND LOTTERY

• Under the Land Lottery, a barrel was filled with numbered tickets that represented farm-sized square lots of either 202 or 490 acres. A second barrel was filled with tickets with the names of people who registered for the lottery. A ticket was drawn from each barrel, and the named person "won" that piece of land.

Examples of how land was divided into lots for drawings.

If more people bought tickets than there was land to give away they would put blank tickets in the drum with the land lot numbers. If your name was drawn with one of these blank tickets it was said that you “drew a blank” meaning you got nothing. That is where the saying “drawing a blank” when you can’t remember something comes from.

Technological Developments

SS8H4 c

The Cotton Gin

• Because tobacco was destroying the soil in south – southerners began looking for a new crop to become the economic staple

• Cotton had been grown for years but not at great profits – mainly because it was so hard to clean

• “cleaning cotton” means to remove the seeds• Doing this by hand was very slow – a person could clean about 1 lb. of

cotton a day

• Eli Whitney invented a machine in 1793 that made the process of cleaning the cotton faster and more efficient.

• The Cotton Gin could be run by two people and could clean about 50 lbs. a day – making growing cotton profitable for the first time

• The south was now focused on buying land – lots and lots of land – expansion westward was the goal

• Negative effects• The south became totally dependent on the success of

cotton – “King Cotton”

• Increase of slavery – with the total focus for more land on which to grow more cotton the need for more labor also grew

Georgia Stories – King Cotton and the Cotton Gin

http://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/story/king_cotton_and_the_

cotton_gin

Railroads• First RR in Ga. was chartered in 1832 – was started by businessmen in

Athens who needed a better way to get cotton to Augusta

• During the 1840’s-1850’s Georgia laid more rail lines than any other southern state – Ga. ranked in the top 10 in the nation for miles of track

• The Western and Atlantic RR ran from Chattanooga to a small hub called Terminus (means end of the line)

• Later other RR also used this hub as an ending point and a city began to grow around the RR’s

• In 1843 Terminus changed its name to Marthasville – after Gov. Lumpkin’s daughter

• In 1845 the name was changed again to Atlanta – possibly a reference to Atlantic – the original RR located there

• The railroad brought many people to Atlanta. Because of the railroad, Atlanta became a busy and important place. The city later became the state’s capital.

The construction of railroad lines played the BIGGEST role in the creation of Georgia towns and cities in the 1830s-1850s.

Georgia Stories – The Railroads: Economic Boom

http://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/stories/railroads_economic

_boom

Painting in theBooth Western

Art Museumin Cartersville, GA.

The painting by Robert Tannenbaum,

called ‘Grey Wolf’,expresses the

struggle for success many American

Indians faced in the world.

‘Grey Wolf’by Robert Tannenbaum

• Think about the word “struggle.”

• Now, in your journal, write an

essay on the following:

1) What does the word struggle mean to you?

2) What kinds of struggles have you faced?

3) Lastly, write a paragraph explaining how this painting represents struggle.

Creek removal

SS8H4 d-e

Creeks• Creek Nation

• A confederation of several southeastern tribes• Most numerous in the state and held the most land• Most sided with the British during the American Revolution –

creating a relationship of distrust with most Georgians• Georgians wanted Indian land and wanted their new

government to get it for them• The Creek were displaced from their homes and their land. This

is because the many land lotteries slowly gave away all their land to other Georgians.

• The Second Treaty of Indian Springs was signed by Chief William McIntosh in 1825. It affected the remaining Creek Indians living in the western section of Georgia.

William McIntosh

• William McIntosh was a key figure in the removal of the Creek from Georgia. Born to a Scottish father and Creek mother, McIntosh signed the Treaty of Indian Springs which sold Creek lands to Georgia. It also cost him his life.

• Creek leaders executed McIntosh because he made the agreement without their consent. Creek law held that if a leader gave away land without the full agreement of the Creek Nation he would be subject to execution. McIntosh knew this law, but proceeded with the deal nonetheless.

The plaque reads: “A friendly chief of the

Creek Indians signed the treaty by which all lands west of the Flint

River were ceded to the state of Georgia.

For this, he was murdered by a band of

Creeks who were opposed to the treaty.”

Georgia Stories – Chief William McIntoshhttp://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/story/story_of_chief_willia

m_mcintosh

Cherokee removal and the Trail of Tears

SS8H4 d-e

• Cherokee• Lived in the mountains of north Ga.• Developed a very loyal trading relationship with the British and

remained loyal to them throughout the revolution• Following the revolution the Cherokee tried to make peace with

the new government and believed their best option was to create a nation which copied that of the new country

• 1820’s – they developed a written language, a written constitution, a newspaper – they invited missionaries to set up schools and changed farming techniques to match that of locals – including the use of slaves

• Once gold was discovered in north Georgia in 1828 there no stopping the desire for Cherokee land – Georgians believed they had to be moved

• Indian Removal Act of 1830 – Georgian’s demanded that the U.S. government live up their promise in the Compact of 1802 to removal all Indians for the state

• Worcester v. Georgia• 1832 U.S. Supreme Court Case• Supreme Court ruled that the Cherokee were an independent

nation and did not fall under Ga. Law• This law was ignored by most Georgians and President Andrew

Jackson• Started when Samuel Worcester, a missionary, was arrested for

living among the Cherokee without the permission of the State or Georgia

• The missionaries were found guilty and sentenced to 4 years hard labor in a Milledgeville Prison

• The Cherokee hired lawyers to appeal • U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall condemned

legislators for their actions – and ordered the missionaries set free

• President Andrew Jackson ignored the court’s ruling and the missionaries stayed in jail

• The missionaries were later released by Gov. Lumpkin in 1833

• Treaty of New Echota• 1835 a small group of Cherokees signed a treaty without permission for

the Cherokee Govt. selling the remainder of Cherokee land to the U.S.

• In 1838 the U.S. government began forcefully removing the Cherokee from the state

• Andrew Jackson• President Jackson signed into law the Indian Removal Act in order to

support farmers who wanted to expand in the Southeast region of the United States. The Indian Removal Act led to many tribes being forced out of Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia and moved westward into what was then called "Indian territory". Today it is the state of Oklahoma.

• Had fought alongside the Indians in the Revolution

• Now felt that the land belonged to the whites and Indians had no rights to it

• Ignored Supreme Court rulings when he did not agree with them

• John Marshall• Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court

• Generally sided with the Indians in land disputes

• Was at odds with President Jackson

• John Ross• Was the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation (1827)• Was also mixed and spoke English and practiced many

English customs• He owned a plantation and ferry business• Ross believed if the Cherokee were seen as civilized (being

like the whites) they would be allowed to keep their land• Fought against removal of his people until 1838 – when

he negotiated for the Cherokee to handle their own removal

• His wife along with approx. 4,000 other Cherokee died on the move to Oklahoma

• During the Civil War he supported the U.S. causing a split in the Cherokee Nation

• After the war he reunited his tribe and remained Principal Chief until he died

Georgia Stories – John Rosshttp://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/stories/john_ross

Dahlonega Gold Rush

• The discovery of gold in Dahlonega, Georgia hastened the removal of the Cherokee from Georgia.

• According to legend, a young man kicked an unusual stone while deer hunting in North Georgia.

• This was actually a gold nugget and led to America’s first gold rush.

• Even if this legend is not true, gold was discovered in Georgia, and it was inevitable that the Cherokee would be forced from the land.

Dahlonega Gold Rush

• Many gold miners began settling on Cherokee land – without permission

• In 1832 Ga. held a land lottery – giving away Cherokee land to whites• The desire for land and now gold made the demands by whites to

remove the Indians even louder – forcing the U.S. government to get involved

• In 1838, they got their wish, and the Cherokee were removed by the U.S. Army.

• Gold was plentiful in the area for two decades – so much so that the U.S. government built a mint (a place where money is made) to make coins – produced almost 1.5 million coins

• Gold rush in Ga. ended in 1849 when gold was discovered in California

Dahlonega Gold Rush

The Cherokee Nation referred to the gold rush as “the Great Intrusion” because they believed that the miners had invaded their territory. The Cherokee Nation protested the miners entering their lands, but the miners came anyway.

Dahlonega

Gold Rush

Georgia Stories – America’s First Gold Rushhttp://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/story/americas_first_gold_r

ush

The Trail of Tears• In 1838 after many court cases President Martin Van

Buren ordered the Cherokee forcefully removed from the state of Georgia

• Under the leadership of Gen. Winfield Scott the army rounded up the Cherokee and put them in stockades (wooden fences or jails) – where they were held for months

• The Cherokee were then forced to walk to a reservation in Oklahoma

• Without supplies and in the middle of winter the march became a death trap – over 4,000 people died on the march

Georgia Stories – Trail of Tearshttp://www.gpb.org/georgiastor

ies/story/trail_of_tears