Quote to meditate on

We entreat those to whom the foregoing paragraphs are addressed, to remember the great law of love. "Do unto others as ye would that others should do to you." ...We pray them to remember that, for the sake of principle, their forefathers were compelled to leave, therefore driven from the old world, and that the winds of persecution wafted them over the great waters and landed them on the shores of the new world, when the Indian was the sole lord and proprietor of these extensive domains--Let them remember in what way they were received by the savage of American, when power was in his hand, and his ferocity could not be restrained by any human arm. We urge them to bear in mind, that those who would not ask of them a cup of cold water, and a spot of earth... are the descendants of these, whose origins, as inhabitants of North America, history and tradition are alike insufficient to reveal. Let them bring to remembrance all these facts, and they cannot, and we are sure, they will not fail to remember, and sympathize with us in these our trials and sufferings.

-Cherokee public plea for justice in Georgia, 1830