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Van Buren's First Annual Message, December 4, 1837: Mississippi

Stipulations have been made with all the Indian tribes to remove them beyond the Mississippi, except with the band of the Wyandotts, the Six Nations, in New York; the Menomonees, Mandans, and Stockbridges, in Wisconsin; and Miamies, in Indiana. With all but the Menomonees, it is expected that arrangements for their emigration will be completed the present year. The resistance which has been opposed to their removal by some tribes, even after treaties had been made with them to that effect, has arisen from various causes, operating differently on each of them.

In most instances they have been instigated to resistance by persons to whom the trade with them and the acquisition of their annuities were important; and in some by the personal influence of interested chiefs. These obstacles must be overcome; for the government cannot relinquish the execution of this policy without sacrificing important interests, and abandoning the tribes remaining east of the Mississippi to certain destruction.

The decrease in numbers of the tribes within the limits of the states and territories has been most rapid. If they be removed, they can be protected from those associations and evil practices which exert so pernicious and destructive an influence over their destinies. They can be induced to labor, and to acquire property, and its acquisition will inspire them with a feeling of independence. Their minds can be cultivated, and they can be taught the value of salutary and uniform laws, and be made sensible of the blessings of free government, and capable of enjoying its advantages. In the possession of property, knowledge, and a good government, free to give what direction they please to their labor, and sharers in the legislation by which their persons and the profits of their industry are to be protected and secured, they will have an ever-present conviction of the importance of union, of peace among themselves and of the preservation of amicable relations with us.