1802 - Jefferson and the Georgia Compact

        The Georgia compact of 1802 involved the Cherokee, the state of Georgia, and the Federal government.  Who would control Indian lands?  The struggle that ensued over the answer to that question set up the most violent social cataclysms of the 19th century. 

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         Alabama and Mississippi were cut from land that was formerly part of Georgia.   The federal government disputed Georgia's claim to the land, but in getting her to quit her claim to it Thomas Jefferson secretly promised that the federal government would extinguish, at its own expense, title to Cherokee lands within the reserved limits of Georgia as soon as it could be done "peaceably and on reasonable terms."  Under this compact, which would take 40 years to fulfill, any lands that were vacated by the Indians would immediately became the possession of the state, not of the federal government - a egregious violation of treaties, the Constitution's 'supremacy clause,' and the Commerce Clause.

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