Tecumseh's Appeal - Ari Sclar

“The annihilation of our race is at hand unless we unite in one common cause against the common foe…Our broad domains are fast escaping from our grasp. Every year our white intruders become more greedy, exacting, oppressive and overbearing. Every year contentions spring up between them and our people and when blood is shed we have to make atonement whether right or wrong…you have too long borne with grievous usurpation inflicted by arrogant Americans. Be no longer their dupes. If there be one here tonight who believes that his rights will not sooner or later be taken from him by the avaricious American pale faces, his ignorance ought to excite pity, for he knows little of the character of our common foe.

• Tecumseh, ‘Speech before a joint council of the Choctow and Chickasaw Nations’ (1811)

1. What is the purpose and point of view of Tecumseh in this speech? What events would have led Tecumseh to make this speech

in 1811?

2. How would Tecumseh have viewed the attempts by Native Americans to avoid bloodshed in the 1820s and 1830s?