ABSTRACT
The term Native American will refer to members of mainland tribes or to the peoples of Alaska and Hawaii. Political and trade relations with Native American societies were fundamental to the early colonization and settlement. The importance of Native political and trade alliances to the eventual pattern of development in the New World is hard to measure, but the intensity of European solicitation of such relations suggests it was considered paramount at the time. The southeastern Native Americans, some of whom occupied coveted potential cotton lands, were members of the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Seminole tribes. Economic aspirations of Europeans and European Americans have been the driving force in the history of the United States. Inherent in the frontier economy characterization of the economic history of the United States is the westward expansion of the non-indigenous population. The chapter presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
