Fluent Essays

Tecumseh to William Henry Harrison, 1810 (see primary source documents for Week 2 for a copy of this sourcde)Your response should be up to two pages long. It should include a clear thesis and a set of arguments that responds to the questions below.Part I: Essay - Questions to be answered:What is the significance of this document for understanding America at the beginning of the 19th Century?Why does Tecumseh believe that U.S. policies toward Native Americans are flawed?What does Tecumseh believe that Native Americans should do to protect tribes that inhabit North America?What does Tecumseh’s letter tell us about Native American resistance?Discuss the relationship of Tecumsehs letter to the letter from Thomas Jefferson to William Henry Harrison regarding policies toward the Native Americans. How does Jeffersons letter influence your interpretation of Tecumsehs plan for resistance?Part II: Discussion Question – please add this below your essay (not as part of it). You can put it on the same page as your essay, but in a separate section.Please pose one discussion question about this reading. What do you think is important to talk about with regard to this source? What is a question that you could ask to deepen your understanding by relating it to other readings, class themes, or issues in American history? Responses will be graded according to the following criteria:Does the response address all the questions posed?Does the response demonstrate that the student has done a close and careful reading of the text?Does the response offer a thoughtful engagement with the text?Does the response demonstrate a concerted effort to think about the significance of the text and its relationship to course topics and other readings in the class, specifically the letter from Thomas Jefferson to Harrison?Does the response make sense? Are the ideas within it clearly communicated?Is the response written in essay form, with a thesis, a set of paragraphs that each address a distinct argument in support of the thesis, and a conclusion?Have you included one question, separate from the essay, that engages the source? tecumseh__1810.docx Unformatted Attachment Preview Tecumseh, 1810 In the early 1800s, two Shawnee brothers, Tecumseh and the Prophet, organized many Native American nations into a confederation. They wanted to keep white settlers from taking more Indian lands. One problem they faced was that some Indian leaders agreed to sell land to the United States. In the following speech, Tecumseh argued that no one had the right to sell land since it belonged to all people. Houses are built for you to hold councils in; the Indians hold theirs in the open air. I am a Shawnee. My forefathers were warriors. Their son is a warrior. From them I only take my existence. From my tribe I take nothing. I have made myself what I am. And I would that I could make the red people as great as the conceptions of my own mind, when I think of the Great Spirit that rules over us all. … I would not then come to Governor Harrison to ask him to tear up the treaty. [Tecumseh referred to the 1795 Treaty of Greenville, which gave the United States parts of the Northwest Territory. He had refused to attend the Greenville peace council.] But I would say to him, Brother, you have the liberty to return to your own country. You wish to prevent the Indians from doing as we wish them, to unite and let them consider their lands as the common property of the whole. You take the tribes aside and advise them not to come into this measure. … You want by your distinctions of Indian tribes, in allotting to each a particular, to make them war with each other. You never see an Indian endeavor to make the white people do this. You are continually driving the red people, when at last you will drive them into the great lake [Lake Michigan], where they can neither stand nor work. Since my residence at Tippecanoe, we have endeavored to level distinctions, to destroy village chiefs, by whom all mischiefs were done. It is they who sell the land to the Americans. Brother, this land that was sold, and the goods that were given for it, was only done by a few. … In the future we are prepared to punish those who propose to sell land to the Americans. If you continue to purchase them, it will make war among the different tribes, and at last I do not know what will be the consequences among the white people. The way, the only way to stop this evil, is for the red men to unite in claiming a common and equal right in the land, as it was at first, and should be now—for it was never divided, but belongs to us all. No tribe has the right to sell, even to each other, much less to strangers. … Sell a country! Why not sell the air, the great sea, as well as the earth? Did not the Great Spirit make them all for the use of his children? How can we have confidence in the white people? When Jesus Christ came upon the earth you killed him and nailed him to the cross. You thought he was dead, and you were mistaken. You have the Shakers among you, and you laugh and make light of their worship. Everything I have told you is the truth. The Great Spirit has inspired me. ... Purchase answer to see full attachment