David Crockett Defends Native Americans

David Crockett’s opposition to President Andrew Jackson’s 1830 Indian Removal Bill was one of the highpoints in his long, often contentious political career.  As a Tennessean, Crockett did not make things easy for himself by repeatedly bucking Jackson, the state’s most celebrated hero and popular politician.  Yet Crockett managed to win three terms in Congress, while losing two close elections, before packing it in and telling his constituents that they might all go to Hell and he would go to Texas.  He made good on the promise and met his death at the Alamo on March 6, 1836, in Texas’s war for independence from Mexico. 

Crockett’s speech opposing Indian Removal was included in “Davy Crockett Goes to Congress”, the second episode in Walt Disney’s three-part TV mini series that aired on “Disneyland” in 1954-55.  Portrayed by Fess Parker, Crockett gives an angry, rousing speech aimed at shaming the Congress for even considering such an unjust measure.  Parker dramatically tears his copy of the bill in half before storming out of the House chamber to rousing applause.  

                                                 Fess Parker in "Davy Crockett Goes To Congress"

Of course, the speech was not quite so dramatic and was so short that it was not even included in the Register of Debates, the early 19^th century version of today’s far more authoritative Congressional Record.  This omission led Crockett scholars to conclude that he never really gave the speech and that he didn’t want his pro-removal constituency to learn that he had opposed Jackson’s bill.  But Crockett actually boasted about the speech, was very proud of his stand, and aware that, had he tried to conceal the speech, his numerous political opponents would have seen that it was widely published in his district anyway. 

The following excerpt from David Crockett in Congress: The Rise and Fall of the Poor Man’s Friend, by James R. Boylston and myself, explains Crockett’s views on Indian Removal and his speech opposing it.

“Crockett’s support for the Indians and his vote against removal have often been seen as merely part of his consistently strong anti-Jackson stand and just one more swipe at Old Hickory, which lacked real commitment. This view of Crockett’s motives stems largely from the fact that the speech he gave in the House does not appear in the Register of Debates in Congress, suggesting to some that he tried to conceal his defense of Indians from voters. However, the speech was reported in the United States’ Telegraph and published elsewhere in full, including in the Jackson Gazette in Crockett’s home district, and it was mentioned or summarized in newspapers throughout the country. It also appeared in a compilation of speeches on Indian removal.

“Crockett read the reports about his speech in the press and took exception to the way it had been paraphrased in the Telegraph. He wrote to the newspaper to correct its errors, particularly the report that he had said ‘he was opposed in conscience to the measure; and such being the case, he cared not what his constituents thought of his conduct.’ Crockett denied having said anything of the kind and insisted ‘I never hurl defiance at those whose servant I am. I said that my conscience should be my guide. . . and that I believed if my constituents were here, they would justify my vote.’¹ The published speech actually paraphrased him as saying ‘He had his constituents to settle with, he was aware; and should like to please them as well as other gentlemen; but he had also a settlement to make at the bar of his God; and what his conscience dictated to be just and right he would do, be the consequences what they might. He believed that the people who had been kind enough to give him their suffrages supposed him to be an honest man, or they would not have chosen him. If so, they could not but expect that he should act in the way he thought honest and right.’²

“Crockett knew that he could not keep his vote or such a speech secret from his constituents, and he was keenly aware that his position on the issue was unpopular with many of them. Newspapers back home criticized his vote, and he defended it openly in his letters and circulars, which were widely read by his constituents. He also boasted proudly of his vote in his autobiography, published in 1834, and insisted that it was a matter of conscience and his obligation under the trust that voters had placed in him. ‘I had been elected by a majority of three thousand five hundred and eighty-five votes,’ he wrote, ‘and I believed they were honest men, and wouldn’t want me to vote for any unjust notion. . . . I voted against this Indian bill, and my conscience yet tells me that I gave a good honest vote, and one that I believe will not make me ashamed in the day of judgment.’³

“Apparently Crockett had even stronger words in support of the Indians that were cut from his original autobiography manuscript. According to John Gadsby Chapman, who painted Crockett’s portrait in mid- 1834, ‘There were, moreover, many portions of his manuscript, cancelled by the counsel of his advisers, that gave him special vexation—chiefly such relating to inhuman massacres of Indian women and children, which if he wrote of with half the intensified bitterness of reprobation that I have heard him express towards the perpetrators of such atrocious acts, and the officials by whom they were permitted, suppression of their narrative may have been better for the credit of the nation and humanity.’ 4

“Crockett continued to defend his vote even after he was defeated in his bid for reelection in 1831. Writing to a supporter in his district, he condemned Jackson on several counts and showed no regret for his vote in opposition to Indian removal, proclaiming that ‘I also condemned the Course parsued to the Southern Indians I love to sustain the honour of my Country and I will do it while I live in or out of Congress . . . .’^5”

¹ United States’ Telegraph, May 25, 1830.

² Jackson (Tennessee) Gazette, June 26, 1830.

³ David Crockett, A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett of the State of Tennessee, ed. and annotated by James A. Shackford and Stanley J. Folmsbee (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1973), 206.

⁴ Curtis Carroll Davis, “A Legend at Full-Length: Mr. Chapman Paints Colonel Crockett— and Tells About It,” Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 69 (1960), 169–70.

⁵ Crockett to James Davison, August 18, 1831, DRT Library at the Alamo.

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