Henry Knox came to George Washington as president, and urged him to resolve the question of the Native Americans. The plan was that we will set up a series of enclaves east of the Mississippi in which we find treaties with the Native American tribes. But most of them had sided with the British Army during the American Revolution. So talk a little bit about how we went from that at that time to what happened in Georgia today.
Joseph Ellis, of Mt. Holyoke College and author of American Creation, talks about the triumphs and tragedies of the founding of the United States. His goal in the book and in this podcast is to tell a story for grownups rather than for children, where the Founders are neither saints nor evil white, patriarchal slave-holding demons. It is a nuanced story of triumph--a military victory over a seemingly unbeatable vastly more experienced army, the creation of the first geographically large republic, a nation without a state religion, a nation that creates a party system with a loyal opposition, a Constitution with the virtues of ambiguous sovereignty, and tragedy--the failure to resolve the slavery issue, and the tragic conflict with the Native Americans. Some of these outcomes were intended by the Founders, others emerged unintended.