HIST 4070
Spring 2003
In viewing the history of Georgia’s growth, a clear link can be established between the
expansion of Georgia’s western border and the same ideas and methods later used under
the title Manifest Destiny. While the ideas which guided this process were not necessarily
new or original to Georgia, Georgia would set many of the mental, moral, and legal
precedents that the entire nation would later follow in their westward expansion and the
ideas that would come to be known as the nations manifest destiny. The evidence can be
seen by looking at what Manifest Destiny turned out to be and then working backwards to
see where these ideas were based in historical thinking. By doing this it can be seen that
Georgia led the way on these kinds of ideas because of its unique position among the
colonies, and later the states and that it was simply one of the first to set these precedents
on a level to gain national attention. These dangerous precedents would be the symptoms
of and underlying racism that haunts Georgia’s past and linger even today.
Starting at the end, the term manifest destiny actually originates in the 1840’s, and
is most commonly refereed to with regard to the Mexican American war and the
settlement of the American West. The first known use of the term comes from John L.
O’Sullivan who is quoted “Our manifest destiny [is] to overspread the continent allotted
by Providence for the free development of our yearly multiplying millions.” 1 The idea
being that Americans, specifically white Americans with western European heritage, meant
that those people were destined to spread their influence across the whole of the continent
of North America. This destiny was supposedly derived from God apparently on the basis
of an imagined racial superiority believed during the era, and held the idea that white
Americans should settle lands that were ordained for them all the way to the western coast
of the continent. This idea is shaped by a long held idea in America of entitlement to the
land on this continent, its underlying racism, expansionism and imperialist feel have their
beginnings at the outset of the states. And while Georgia was not the first, it shows
starkly and to what degree these ideas pervaded every aspect of expansion from initial
settlement to the end of its westward movement. Georgia sets the stage exactly for the
entire country to follow west achieving their fated manifest destiny.
From Georgia’s very conception onward, its border pushed outward, displacing enormously wealthy men. These traits would play out again on the larger stage of national
westward expansion. The ideas seen on this national level can be followed back to the
mindset displayed by the actions of early Georgians. Thus Georgia can be shown as one
of the ideological leaders for the implementation of a pre-ordained right to move west, this
idea would shape US history as few other ideas have since the American Revolution. It is
also through viewing Georgia’s growth that some of the basic issues of racism that plague
the United States for its entire history, and persist today, emerge not only in Georgia but
as a national problem that can be seen clearly in Georgia.
The beginnings of this parallel originate with Georgia’s charter. The area of what
is now Georgia was chartered by the British in a move to settle the “unclaimed” lands
between South Carolina and Spanish Florida.2 This imperialist move brought with it
embedded ideas of an empire; that to conquer was natural and that this should be done to
keep in competition with the other world powers of the day. This can be seen as the first
seeds of westward expansion inherent in Georgia’s beginning. Direct evidence of this
mindset is found in Georgia’s charter, it describes the area to be settled as being south of
the Savannah River and north of the Altamaha River with lines running west from their
headwaters to “the South Seas” this being the Pacific Ocean.3 This is one of the ways
that Georgia sets a precedent legally for the goal of expansion to the west coast. In
Georgia’s start it is already legally entitled to expand as far as the continent would allow
westward, and while this would come to an end, the mental attitude that all the new lands,
the lands for future settlement were to the west is put her in legal documentation from the
King himself. This illustrates the connection between the earliest Georgian dispositions
toward westward movement, and the later attitudes of Americans in the sense that the
lands to the west were in some way belonged to Europeans and that those Europeans
needed only to move to those areas they were destined to inhabit across the entire
continent. Here also appears the complete disrespect shown for native people. These
lands were described in the charter as “unclaimed” because no other European power had
a strong claim on them at the time, they were in fact inhabited. This disregard for the
native American tribes that lived in Georgia also speaks to the underlying racism inherent
in the mindset of such settlement. This would remain a staple of expansionist notions
throughout Manifest Destiny and would also figure prominently into the policies of
Andrew Jackson as a military officer and later as President.
While other colonies and later states probably shared these ideas of inevitable
expansion Georgia seems to have set the bar that expansion would be accomplished all the
way to the sea, whatever the costs. The phrase “westward from the headwaters of the
rivers respectively in directions to the South Seas” points to Georgia as the precursor to
Manifest Destiny, the other British colonies of North America until after the French and
Indian War were limited in settlement possibilities to the area east of the Appalachian
mountains. This changed with the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 4 because of this it seems
Georgia was thus able to lead the way, originally envisioned as extending the width of the
continent. Though this claim of territory from sea to sea was soon curtailed by Spanish
then French control of the Louisiana Territory Georgia was still envisioned as spreading
all the way to the Mississippi River. Which was still an ambitious claim for Georgia
considering the lack of control it possessed over areas of the state much further east than
that lofty border. The White inhabitants of the state were pushing the western border
west all the way to the Mississippi river, and yet there were large pockets of the state
which were still controlled not by the white settlers, but rather were still under the control
of the Cherokee and the Creeks living with in today’s state borders.
Ironically the death of Georgia’s western growth was largely due to he
strengthening of the central US government that would take up the ideals used in
Georgia’s expansion on the national and continental level, this limitation of Georgia’s
growth would come from and at the same time add to the idea of expansion for financial
gain without much in the way of moral restraint was passed on to the same federal
government that was stopping Georgia’s expansion. This breakup of Georgia followed
closely on the heels of one of the largest fraud scams in the legislative history of Georgia
or any other state for that matter. In 1796 the state legislature sold some 50,000,000
acres to land speculators. The land was alongside the Yazoo river, a tributary of the
Mississippi River, and the deal would therefore become known as the Yazoo land fraud.
The land was sold to four companies of speculators for roughly $500,000.5 Nearly the
entire legislature was either in a position to benefit directly from the sale as investors or
had been bribed in some way to push the sale through. The benefits came most expressly
to those members of the legislature that also made up the companies which bought the
land. These men were able to vote themselves the ability to buy incredibly desirable lands
from the state at low prices, thus they would be able to make tremendous profits buy
exploiting their positions as representatives of the people. News of this scandal including
the fact that the records of the legislative session were burned did not bode well for the
legislators involved. The following elections saw a large turnover in seats of members
involved in the scandal. This illegal, morally deplorable behavior, on the part of Georgia’s
politicians also added extensively to existing pressures for the state of Georgia to divest
itself of its lands west of the Chatahoochee river to the federal government. Following the
Yazoo land fraud the federal government had the leverage needed to convince Georgia to
give up those western claims. This land was ceded to the national government in 1802
from Georgia and was used to form the states of Alabama, which had previously been a
county of Georgia along the Mississippi and Mississippi. The federal government was
directly helped thus by the greed exhibited by those involved in the Yazoo land fraud.
This also helps to explain a dangerous precedent in American history in that, to profit from
westward expansion people were willing to unscrupulous and even illegal things to get
ahead. This idea or fact about human nature would also replay itself later in American
history in the form of Manifest Destiny and the settlement of the American west.
Georgia’s much decreased size did not end problems it had inside its own smaller
borders. These problems of control in the state refer again to an area in which Georgia’s
actions reflect as a step towards the ideas and actions of manifest destiny, that being the
way in which Georgia dealt with the native peoples of the state. Much like the nation as a
whole Georgia has a mixed record in its treatment of Native Americans. The state did not
originally, as might be assumed, simply remove the natives with a heavy handed approach
but rather in many instances earlier in the states history the state worked diplomatically to
further its expansion into the territory of the native population. These diplomatic efforts
were respectful towards the Natives and for their part the native population also seemed
to desire a diplomatic solution to the problems brought on by Georgia’s western push.6
One example of how the record is mixed can be shown through the Treaty of New York in
1790 under which the Creeks gave up the lands between the Ogeechee and the Oconee
rivers.7 This treaty however did not put an end to the troubles between the natives and
the incoming Georgians. This is made apparent by an affidavit by a citizen of Jefferson
County in which he describes harassment he received from a group of Native Americans,
this is an excellent example of Georgia’s continuing trouble between the native people and
the settlers this altercation took place in January of 1798.8 Such troubles between the two
groups blur the lines of what exactly happened prior to the all out removal of the native
Americans from Georgia. This issue is vastly complicated by the conflicting details which
fly against the normal binary of expansionist whites moving against faultless natives. This
general understanding of the two sides has definite roots in reality.
While there was an effort to resolve conflicts diplomatically the underlying
principle of all the efforts, diplomatic or other was to remove the native people and
expand the territory of Georgia as though the new Georgians had an inherent right to the
lands of he creeks and other peoples because they as white Europeans were in some way
racially or culturally superior. This comes to pass not just in the early days of Georgia,
but into the 1830’s and Jackson’s administration. Though the border of Georgia was set
at its furthest point west by 1802 when it ceded the Mississippi territory to the federal
government there was still a great portion of Georgia that was not controlled by Georgia’s
government. Maps as late as 1829 show the north and southwest corners of the state still
listed as Indian territories controlled by either the Creeks in the south or the Cherokee in
the north. It is in Georgia’s dealings with these natives that Georgia continued to set the
precedent for the removal of native Americans on a national scale. The standard set in
Georgia came when the Cherokee were unfortunate enough to have situated themselves
directly on top of gold deposits that white Georgians wanted. In keeping in line with the
racist and expansionist ideas of the time these white Georgians felt that not only did they
want the gold, but that they were fated to have it and entitled to take it from the people
living there if they should happen to be Indians.
The Cherokee took their case to the Supreme Court and in the case of Worcester
v. Georgia and the high court held that the Cherokee had their own “distinct community”
that the state of Georgia could not exert control over.9 This would seem to have set a
legal precedent establishing the rights of Native Americans as equal to those of other
American’s but the situation had exactly the opposite effect. Though the Supreme Court
sided with the Cherokee the court was in no position to enforce its ruling, the Jackson
administration likewise did nothing to enforce the courts decision. Rather the
Administration of Jackson, who was known for his hatred and persecution of Native
Americans, in fact forcibly removed the Cherokee from their homes and ancestral lands to
lands in Oklahoma along what became known as the “Trail of Tears” so termed because of
the terrible conditions that the Cherokee were placed under in this forced march. In this
situation the Cherokee were obviously in the right, they were even vindicated legally under
US law as explained by the highest court in the land. Being right had nothing to do with
who was removed though. This situation adds to the evidence of an expansion at any cost
mentality that Georgia was at the forefront of. It also again displays the overt racism
which underscored these ideas. This exact attitude comes into play numerous times
throughout US history and follows the western movement of American settlement to the
Pacific ocean. From there on this is a national movement and a national problem of how
the Native peoples of lands were to be treated, but this point in history is an explicit link
between those national forces and their origins in the theater of Georgia. And this link is
an unfortunate one, it sets up , not a gradual movement into the west of the continent, but
a sudden explosion of settlement in the west, as if flood gates had been opened.
Again that is not to say that these ideas were originally from Georgia, but it
is clear that in light of the evidence a direct connection can be made between the ideal
prevalent in Georgian and the ideas held by the entire nation in a few years. This
extension of the racist ideas of Georgia’s expansion led to the westward expansion of the
entire country, not just Alabama and Mississippi which were carved out of the then
massive Georgia, but also well beyond the Mississippi river. In the 1840’s following
Jackson’s administration the United States would go to war with Mexico over the issue of
annexing Texas. This was fueled by the same ideas which led to Georgia had set the
precedent for by stealing their lands form the natives and by cheating the whites out of a
fair shot at owing those stolen lands. These ideas end up leading the United States to
invade Mexico and take from that country a large portion of land that would become
today’s states of Texas parts of Oklahoma new Mexico Arizona and California. This
military land grab had been morally set up by one of the US’s previous military land
acquisitions, that being the removal of the Cherokees from north west corner of Georgia.
Even though the expansion of Georgian was mostly ended in 1802 with the
formation of Alabama and Mississippi, the parallels are quite clear even with such slight
evidence as this that the ideas shaping Georgia's westward movement would return again
to lead the entire nation west where further land deals would place those making the laws
in positions to benefit. The racist attitudes which translated later into the dogma of
Manifest destiny may not have originated in the then British colony of Georgian but there
can be little doubt that such attitudes were at least prevalent at the time and displayed
actively in the state of Georgia. Manifest Destiny came to mean explicitly the idea that
white Europeans not only had a right to remove native people from lands but that those
same Europeans had a duty and a destiny to do so, spreading their influence and culture
from one ocean to the other.
1Bailey, Thomas A., and Kennedy, David M. The American Pageant. DC Heath and Co.:
Lexington, MA, 1991. p.363
2Kenneth Coleman, Georgia History in Outline, The University of Georgia P Athens 1960.
3Georgia's Charter of 1732. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1942
4Documents Illustrative of the Formation of the Union of the American States. Government
Printing Office, 1927. House Document No. 398.
5Kenneth Coleman p 30
6Daniel Murphy. A talk from the kings, beloved men and warriors of part of the Upper
Towns [of the Creek Nation], the Tallese[e] King [acting as] speaker,1786 June 25.
Document TCC207
7Kenneth Coleman p 30
8William Cavanah. Affidavit [of] William Cavanah. 1798 Jan 28 Jefferson County, GA
Hargrett are
Book and Manuscript Library, the University Of Georgia libraries collection: Creek Indian
Manuscript box: 01 folder: 01 document: 01
9Masur, Louis P. 1831 Year of the Eclipse. Hill and Wang: NY, 2001. p. 126.
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