LF: Native American fury at naming of US Navy's newest boat after Andrew Jackson, the slave-owning seventh president they say stole their land

Title: Native American fury at naming of US Navy's newest boat after Andrew Jackson, the slave-owning seventh president they say stole their land
Source: Daily Mail Online
URL Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art ... n-Removal-Act-not-honored.html
Published: Dec 11, 2015
Author: Hannah Parry
Post Date: 2015-12-11 09:23:30 by cranky
Keywords: None
Views: 2020
Comments: 14

The commissioning of new naval ship USS Jackson has sparked fury among activists who argue that the slave-owning president responsible for the deaths of thousands of native Americans should not be commemorated.

USS Jackson, designated LCS 6, is the Navy's newest littoral combat ship which was commissioned in Mississippi on Saturday, is said to honor Jackson, Mississippi, which is named for former President Andrew Jackson.

But Native Americans and human rights activists are furious that the seventh president, who is most famously remembered for the 1830 Indian Removal Act, should be celebrated.

The USS Jackson (LCS 6) which was commissioned at the Port of Gulfport, Mississippi, on Saturday, has sparked controversy with its nameChuck Hoskin Jr., secretary of state for the Cherokee Nation, who were forcibly removed from their land by the act in a brutal march which killed more than 4,000, said the choice of name felt like 'a backwards step.'

'For our government to hold Andrew Jackson up to some reverence today, given our nation's better appreciation of American history today than generations ago, is very troubling,' he told CNN. 'For the Cherokee people, Andrew Jackson represents the period of Indian removal,' a legacy of 'trauma' and the 'brutal act' of evicting people from their lands.

Connecticut NAACP President Scot X. Esdaile told CNN the choice of name was 'totally appalling.'

'Amazing how we have an African-American president and the U.S. Navy slipped this thing through. I think it should be reconsidered,' he said adding that Jackson was 'a big-time slavemaster, pro slavery, the whole nine yards.'

This is not the first time that people have objected to the former president being commemorated.

Crew members of the USS Jackson (LCS 6) salute from the deck of their newly commissioned ship during a ceremony at the Port of Gulfport

USS Jackson has a length of 419ft, and features a 57mm BOFORS cannon, close-in weapons system, rolling airframe missile, .50-caliber machine guns and associated mission package weapons

A campaign has been launched to remove the current portrait of former President Andrew Jackson, which has stared out from the face of the $20 since 1928.

Campaigners hope to replace the 7th president with Harriet Tubman, a conductor of the Underground Railroad.

Some 600,000 people voted in the campaign to replace Jackson and the non-profit Women on 20s were planning to petition Barack Obama to replace the slave-owning U.S. president with an abolitionist.

In April, U.S. Senator from New Hampshire Jeanne Shaheen filed legislation that would create a citizens panel to recommend an appropriate choice of woman to place on the $20 to the treasury secretary. She said is hoping to build on the work of Women on 20s.

'A lot of people were destroyed under (Jackson's) watch, and a lot of those actions should not be forgiven,' Esdaile said, adding that even though it was legal to own slaves during his presidency, there were abolitionists advocating for freedom as well. 'We should be naming ships after those individuals,' he said.

The office of the secretary of the Navy did not respond to reporters' requests for comment.

Jackson USS is the fifth littoral combat, LCS, ship in the Navy's fleet, and described as a 'milestone' in the LCS program. It is the third of the Independence variant to join the fleet.

'As we welcome USS Jackson to the fleet, we are reminded of the importance of the partnership between our Navy and our nation's shipbuilding industry; a relationship that has brought us to the Jackson's commissioning, a time-honored tradition during which the Sailors who make up her crew will breathe life into the hull of this great warship,' said the Honorable Ray Mabus, Secretary of the Navy, who delivered the ceremony's principal address.

'We also celebrate the lasting bond this ship will share with the great people of Jackson, Mississippi, as it sails the globe, providing a presence that only our Navy and Marine Corps can maintain.'

This is not the first time that people have objected to the seventh president being commemorated. A campaign has been launched to remove the current portrait of former President Andrew Jackson (pictured in a portrait, right) which has stared out from the face of the $20 (left) since 1928

Secretary of the Navy, Ray Mabus, had christened the Navy's newest Independence-variant littoral combat ship, USS Jackson which has sparked fury among activists

Ray Mabus, speaks to the crowd at the ceremony, where he said he was 'reminded of the importance of the partnership between our Navy and our nation's shipbuilding industry'

Dr. Katherine H. Cochran, daughter of Senator Thad Cochran of Mississippi, who is serving as the ship's sponsor, was the one to give the order to 'man our ship and bring her to life!'

While the ship is the first to be named for the city of Jackson, two other ships have born the moniker of the city's namesake Andrew Jackson.

Built at the Washington Navy Yard in 1832 for the United States Revenue Cutter Service, the first was a cutter that served along the east and gulf coasts discouraging smuggling operations, assisting distressed shipping, and conducting counter piracy operations. THE CONTROVERSIAL PAST OF AMERICA'S SEVENTH PRESIDENT ANDREW JACKSON

Former president Andrew Jackson is a controversial figure, who was known to have built his personal fortune with slave labor while his time in office led to the deaths of thousands of Native Americans, while tens of thousands were stripped of their homeland.

America's seventh president, Jackson, who grew up on the frontier, was seen as an outsider and it is unlikely he would have ever become president if not for the Battle of New Orleans, in which he won a victory against the British at the close of the War of 1812.

'The legacy of the battle is that Americans felt Jackson had saved them from the British. That launched the U.S. into an era of national pride,' said Tony Guzzi, who organized the 'Andrew Jackson, Born for a Storm' exhibit at his historical Hermitage home.

'The big, important thing is it really changed the way Americans felt about their country. They were more confident about the permanency of the U.S., which was only a few decades old.'

'Jackson was the next great war hero after George Washington. They put his image on everything from plates to pitchers to coins to you-name-it,' Guzzi said, adding that many of the ceremonial swords, medallions and gold presentation boxes are on display.

When he came to power he was popular, so popular in fact that his first inauguration was overrun by drunken well-wishers who tore up the White House furniture. Jackson had to escape from a window while his supporters were eventually persuaded to continue their celebrations on the lawn.

But his presidency was plagued with controversy.

The most famous was the 1830 The Indian Removal Act, also known as the Trail of Tears, which caused the death of thousands of Native Americans and robbed them of their lands.

It forced multiple tribes to leave the cotton-rich land, where they had been for generations, to a designated zone on the other side of the Mississippi, which later became the state of Oaklahoma.

He was also a prolific slave owner and never freed a slave of his own will.

His presidency also saw the closure of the national bank and an unprecedented use of the veto that many members of Congress criticized as exceeding his authority.

His time in office was also known for the Petticoat Affair, a social catastrophe that began when members of his household and cabinet refused to socialize with the scandal-plagued wife of War Secretary John Eaton.

The Hermitage, the home of President Andrew Jackson, who is said to have built much of his fortune on the back of slaves

Jackson was seen as a war hero at the time, according to Tony Guzzi, who organized the 'Andrew Jackson, Born for a Storm' exhibit at his historical Hermitage home (pictured at his clothing)

The situation escalated and led to the dissolution of nearly Jackson's entire cabinet.

Today, statues of him remain, such as the famous equestrian piece at the center of Lafayette Park, while he has also been featured in Pulitzer Prize-winning biography 'American Lion' and Broadway rock musical 'Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson.'

The portrait of former President Andrew Jackson has also stared out from the face of the $20 since 1928.

But it may not be for much longer after a campaign to remove the controversial former president, who was responsible for deaths of so many Native Americans, as well as their loss of life.THE TRAIL OF TEARS: JACKSON'S BRUTAL 1830 INDIAN REMOVAL ACT

President Andrew Jackson signed The Indian Removal Act on May 28, 1830, which forced tens of thousands of Native Americans to abandon the lands they had occupied for generations, to relocate to unsettled lands west of the Mississippi.

Few tribes went peacefully and when many resisted, Jackson's government responded in brutal fashion.

Tribes were forcibly moved west by the United States government, often marching more than 1,000 miles, some in stockades.

Between 1836 and 1839, more than ten thousand Native Americans were said to have died on the forced march, which became known as the 'Trail of Tears.'

Andrew Jackson had been a strong proponent of what he called 'Indian removal' since his time as an Army general. He spent years leading brutal campaigns against the Creeks in Georgia and Alabama and the Seminoles in Florida.

They military actions resulted in thousands of acres of Native American land being handed to white farmers.

When Jackson became president he continued his campaign and in 1830, he signed the Indian Removal Act.

The law stated the government had to negotiate removal treaties fairly, voluntarily and peacefully.

They were not allowed to force Native Americans to give up their land.

President Jackson gave little heed to the law, and by the end of the decade, around 125,000 Native Americans had been relocated from their cotton-rich lands in Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina and Florida, to west of the Mississippi - which later became the state of Oklahoma.

The Choctaw became the first tribe to be forcibly moved from its land in the winter of 1831.

Tribes were forcibly moved west by the United States government, often marching more than 1,000 miles, some in stockades (reenactment)

Under threat of invasion by the U.S. Army, the tribe made the long journey on foot - some bound in chains - with no food, supplies or other help from the government.

Around 4,000 people died on the way, earning it the long deadly march the name, the Trail of Tears.

In 1836, another tribe, the Creeks, began a deadly march for Oaklahoma - 3,500 of the 15,000 who set out died.

Representatives from the Cherokee tribe had negotiated the Treaty of New Echota, which traded their land east of the Mississippi for $5 million, with relocation assistance and compensation for lost property.

By 1838, only about 2,000 Cherokees had left Georgia so 7,000 soldiers were sent in who forced them into stockades at bayonet point and marched the tribe more than 1,200 miles to Indian territory.

Disease, starvation and exhaustion killed more than 4,000.

Source: History.com

Speaking as an American with enough Tuscarora blood to be a "registered tribal member" if I wanted,either get off your lame asses and provide for yourselves instead of playing professional victims for handouts,or ESAD.

Why is democracy held in such high esteem when it’s the enemy of the minority and makes all rights relative to the dictates of the majority? (Ron Paul,2012)

American Indians had open borders. Look at how well that worked out for them.