About this time there also appeared, in justification of the treaty and
of his own action in signing it, a pamphlet address issued by Elias
Boudinot of the Cherokee Nation. Mr. Boudinot was one of the ablest and
most cultured of his people, and had long been the editor and publisher
of a newspaper in the nation, printed both in English and Cherokee. The
substance of his argument in vindication of the treaty may have been
creditable from the standpoint of policy and a regard for the future
welfare of his people, but in the abstract it is a dangerous doctrine.
He said:
We cannot conceive of the acts of a minority to be so
reprehensible and unjust as are represented by Mr. Ross. If one
hundred persons are ignorant of their true situation and are so
completely blinded as not to see the destruction that awaits them,
we can see strong reasons to justify the action of a minority of
fifty persons to do what the majority would do if they understood
their condition, to save a nation from political thralldom and
moral degradation.[427]