History
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The Muscogee (Creek) people descend from a remarkable culture that before A.D. 1500 spanned the region now known as the southeastern United States. They were not one tribe but a union of several that evolved into a confederacy, one of the most sophisticated political organizations north of Mexico. In the early 1800s, American Indian policy focused on removing the Muscogee and other southeastern tribes to areas west of the Mississippi River. The Muscogee reluctantly signed treaties in 1825 and 1832, exchanging the last of their ancestral homelands for lands in Indian Territory. In 1836 and 1837, during the Trail of Tears, half of the 20,000 tribal members forcibly removed by the U.S. Army perished. Soon afterward they began rebuilding their government, only to have it abolished by the federal government in the early 1900s. In the 1970s, the tribe drafted and adopted a new constitution and restored its national council. Today, the Muscogee number more than 80,000.
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Fort Smith, Arkansas · United States
