Notes

john Ross was only a small part Cherokee, he was mostly white. he is the one that helped make the Cherokee constitution. he made the constitution so that he could clearly define what was rightfully Cherokee land in a hope to fight the Americans politically; basically making the argument that their constitution is just as real as the american one john ridge was a son to a major Cherokee leader. he wanted the Cherokee to sell their land to the whites and make deals with them. one deal in specific is that the american would take their land for exchange for land further west. the Americans wanted to move them further west so that they didn't have to deal with them. john ridge and his father disagreed with a majority of their tribe, and they broke the law that Ross made when he said that anybody selling land to the Americans behind the tribes back can be reprimanded or even killed in any way formidable. after they Ross's betrayed the clan, they were brutally murdered. what they did is they gathered a few other chiefs that also wanted to move west and went to the Americans and agreed to their terms, which not only affected them, but it forced their people out as well, they signed for their entire tribe.