The Papers of Chief John Ross (review)

BOOK REVIEWS79 The Papers ofChiefJohn Ross. Edited by Gary E. Moulton. 2 vols. (Norman : University of Oklahoma Press, 1985. Pp. 1552. $95.00 set.) The removal of the Cherokee Indians in the 1 830s stands as one of the saddest chapters in American Indian history. The Trail of Tears was doubly tragic because the Cherokees were "civilized," to use the words of the day. Imparting Anglo-European civilization to Native Americans had been the goal of Indian policy from the earliest years ofthe republic, but even the wholesale adoption of European ways by the Cherokees failed to save their tribal lands. The Supreme Court cases that supported the Indians' right to reside in Georgia have become well known clichés of the Jacksonian Era. Nevertheless, the inability of the American government to protect Cherokee treaty obligations makes one realize that the rule oflaw can break down in the United States as well as in less civilized places. The two large volumes under review, The Papers of ChiefJohn Ross, allow readers to trace the career ofthe most important Cherokee leader of the nineteenth century. Highly intelligent and literate, Chief Ross represents a type of Indian leader often neglected in general textbook accounts of Indian-white relations. Look, for example, at those Indians designated by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr., as patriot chiefs: Hiawatha, King Philip, Popé, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola, Black Hawk, Crazy Horse, and ChiefJoseph. Each of Josephy's patriot chiefs was a war leader. In contrast, while John Ross did not counsel cooperation with the federal government's removal program, he never urged violent resistance. Ross's tragedy was his belief that the legal system would prevail against the will of a determined president . Born in 1790, John Ross was an ideal choice to lead the Cherokees during the first halfofthe nineteenth century. Only one-eighth Cherokee, Ross was a product of cultural blending, which "instilled in him a pride in his Indian identity and a growing recognition that Cherokee integrity would have to be maintained by an enlightened, educated leadership" (p. 3). Following a somewhat hesitant start in business, Ross went on to achieve considerable prosperity as a planter, and by his twenty-fifty birthday he was a recognized leader ofthe Cherokee tribe. In the years from 1828 through his death in 1866, no other Cherokee rivaled Ross in political importance. Most readers of these volumes will concentrate on the many pages devoted to resisting Jackson's and Van Buren's removal schemes, but the years after the Trail of Tears should not be ignored. The Cherokees were not a united tribe, and factional politics is conveyed throughout the papers. In 1861 the Civil War posed a special problem for the Indians. At first, Ross favored the Union, but Confederate forces proved too numerous. He signed a treaty with the Confederacy, but abandoned the Southern cause at the first opportunity. Cherokee soldiers under the command ofConfederate Lieutenant Colonel Stand Watie destroyed his home and property. 80CIVIL WAR HISTORY Ross spent the last years ofhis life in Philadephia and Washington trying to heal the tribe's internal disputes and develop a plan for Cherokee reconstruction . Gary E. Moulton, professor of history at the University of Nebraska, is well qualified to edit Ross's papers. A longtime student of Ross and the Cherokees, Moulton published a splendid biography of Ross in 1978. The editor states that he omitted nothing of importance from these volumes, and that does seem to be the case. Moulton has refrained from elaborate explanatory footnotes, which at times would have been useful, but each item's location is indicated. These two volumes of documents are important research tools for students of nineteenth-century Indian affairs and they belong on the shelves of all university libraries. Gerald Thompson The University of Toledo The Poetry ofEvents: Daniel Webster's Rhetoric ofthe Constitution and Union. By Paul D. Erickson. (New York and London: New York University Press, 1986. Pp. 224. $32.00.) Daniel Webster was unquestionably one of the seminal figures ofthe early national period of American history. Indeed, without Webster's determined efforts to maintain the union ofthe states, even at the cost oftolerating the continued existence ofslavery, the early...