Comments on: Women’s Petitions against Indian Removal

By: djvoelker

djvoelker — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 13:13:11 +0000

REVIEW OF PORTNOY’S BOOK, Their Right to Speak

See http://tinyurl.com/3xb7da for a good review of Alisse Portnoy’s book on the anti-removal campaign, antislavery, and women’s rights. Also, Portnoy responded to the review at :
http://tinyurl.com/3agph5

By: David Voelker

David Voelker — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 13:06:07 +0000

DATABASE OF PRIMARY SOURCES ON ANTI-REMOVAL PETITIONS

UWGB students can access a database of primary documents related to the anti-removal petition campaign at:

http://tinyurl.com/2hmze3

These documents are part of a database called “Women and Social Movements in the United States.”

By: Alisse Portnoy

Alisse Portnoy — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 16:29:38 +0000

Hello. Professor Voelker invited me to read what you all have written about women’s antiremoval petitions and my essay, and also to say a few words. Thanks so much for your engagement with this issue! I think it’s an important one in women’s and U.S. history, and I appreciate the ways many of you are thinking about the context of the issue–in moments before, contemporary to, and after the campaign.

As it seems for some of you, it is interesting to me, too, that there wasn’t a linear trajectory from antiremoval petitioning to antislavery petitioning to woman suffrage petitioning: it took Beecher abut twenty-five years, for example, finally to realize that it was okay for women to petition against slavery, even though she was against slavery! My sense, though, is that most antiremovalists felt that Native Americans would die, individually and as a people, if they were forced to move–but that African Americans would be better served, would thrive, even, if they were “returned” to Africa (”returned” is such a loaded term, since most African Americans who lived in the United States in the 1830s had been born in the U.S., as had their parents and grandparents–some of whom were European Americans). Many European American antiremovalists believed that “colonization,” or colonizing Africa with African Americans, would be the best solution for everyone, strange and contradictory as that may seem to us now.

Professor Voelker asked me whether I found any evidence in my research that women inpired or led men to actively participate in the antiremoval campaign. I didn’t find any evidence of that happening, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. I know for sure that George Cheever asked his mother to distribute materials for him, and that women in Hallowell were invited to attend an evening discussion about Indian removal that typically was hosted by men (the newspaper ad announced the discussion and specifically said “ladies invited to attend”). But Catharine Beecher and her sister Harriet Beecher (later to be Harriet Beecher Stowe of _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_ fame) talked in their letters about writing only to women, rather than to women and men or to men.

Sorry for the long post! But it’s fun to talk with people about these issues. Good luck with your semester.

By: Roxanne

Roxanne — Wed, 28 Mar 2007 21:25:37 +0000

I think that if it hadn’t been the women coming forth about the removal policy, it might hae been overruled. The women had very good ideas and beliefs about the Indian population and realized it was going to be the end of their culture if they were driven from their land as Andrew Jackson so proposed. Maybe if there was more male backing it would have been more successful. Sad to say that back then and still today it isn’t what you know but it’s who you know that gets things recognized.

By: Amanda Crump

Amanda Crump — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 16:38:47 +0000

Something that I thought was interesting about these groups of women coming together to petition the Removal Act, was that only a handful of the same women came together to petition/fight against slavery. What would be the difference between the two to women? Wouldn’t they have seen the blacks as “poor and oppressed” as they saw the Natives and feel the need to make them into “civilized” people?

By: Brian Knaak

Brian Knaak — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 15:09:26 +0000

In her examination of the women’s petition movement Portney makes a very interesting comparison of women’s compared to men’s anti-removal petitions. Examining the diffences allows for some key insights into the ideologies of both men and women of the early republic.
As noted in previous posts the women’s petitions concentrated primarily on national dignity and the religous convictions. That is, they wanted to act in a benevolent and pious manner as to protect our national honor.
Men, on the other hand concentrated primarily on legal and political institutions. Men believed Indians had a right to the land due to the treaties which were agreed upon. These men were much more concerned with the ideas of the law and justice and payed little attention to the ideas of benevolence and piety.

By: Brian Knaak

Brian Knaak — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 14:54:39 +0000

Portney does an excellent job examining the early foundations of the women’s petition movement. She first points out that most of the women involved in the movement were the daughters of women who were previously in the “Republican Motherhood.” These women believed it was their responsibility to raise virtuous and patriotic children. As these values were taught they no doubt instilled a sense of national pride in the women who would eventually lead the petition movement. In fact, many of the womens petitions explicitly stated that it was their intention to protect the United States “national honor and faith.” It should be noted that this was in the area of indian removal policy only. At this time women did not see themselves as political agents.

The women’s petition movement was also deeply rooted the religous convictions of the time. Many petitions expressed the ideologies of what it meant to be a good Christian. To be a good Christian, they argued, the country should act with piety and benevolance when dealing with indians.

By: Liz Limburg

Liz Limburg — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 13:36:01 +0000

Despite the fact that women were primarily excluded from the public sphere during this time in America, with the influence and support of male authority figures in the North, such as Jeremiah Evarts, the antiremovalist movement gained a significant amount of women support. Both morality and religious beliefs formed the foundation of these petitioners and encouraged these individuals, specifically the women, to boldly declare “their right to speak” and defend the rights previously promised to the Natives by the government. Most of these petitioners believed that Christianizing and assimilating the Natives into American culture was the only just way to deal with the issue.
Catherine Beecher initiated the anti-removal petition campeign that many historians argue was a crucial turning point for women’s rights. I think it is important to note the influence Evarts had on Beecher’s decision. Evarts approached Beecher and said “that American women might save these poor, oppressed Natives, and asked me [Beecher] to devise some method of securing such intervention;” she confidently acted on his words.

By: Cal Rastall

Cal Rastall — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 01:18:39 +0000

Must i admit that women were on the mark for this one by seeing through a man’s (Andrew Jackson administration in particular) BS and giving the big shout-out to the rest of the United States that what the government was doing to the natives of the motherland was actually wrong? I give kudos to Beecher for not falling for the propaganda of our government. Maybe men should listen to women more often.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 14:50:04 +0000

Throughout the article Portnoy discuses that women petitioners saw Indian Removal as an “extraordinary” event and subject in American History, which then and only then they must speak out on what they believe. As Portnoy also discuses they women petitioners took a new spin on the term “republican motherhood”. Using the term “republican motherhood” the women established influence that normally they would not convey onto their husband’s and bother’s government.

These women did not want to see the national honor tarnished in any way. They even went as so far to talk about how these Indian Removal policies would be reflected upon in the future. The petitioning women had to be careful as they drafted the petitions as to not show any ambition to further their careers in politics. If this would have been done the men I would have saw it as a threat to the political system, which would have furthered the ineffectiveness of the petitions.