The new government inherited conflict in the Ohio country, where Indigenous nations rejected American claims based upon the Treaty of Paris-a treaty to which they had not consented. A Native confederacy, including Shawnee, Miami, Delaware and other peoples, resisted settlement north of the Ohio River. American expeditions suffered severe defeats, including the destruction of General Arthur St. Clair’s force in 1791, one of the worst defeats ever inflicted upon the United States Army by Native forces. The defeat exposed military weakness and prompted congressional investigation-an early assertion of legislative oversight. A reorganized army under Anthony Wayne defeated confederacy forces at Fallen Timbers in 1794. The Treaty of Greenville in 1795 ceded large areas of present-day Ohio to the United States. The outcome opened land to accelerating settlement while demonstrating a recurring contradiction: a republic defending its own consent expanded through agreements shaped by military pressure and unequal power.
THE COTTON GIN AND EXPANDING SLAVERY
Eli Whitney’s cotton gin, patented in 1794, made processing short-staple cotton far more profitable. Rather than reducing labor, it intensified demand for enslaved workers and land across the South. Economic growth, territorial expansion and slavery became increasingly intertwined within the early republic.
“The new nation defended sovereignty abroad while repeatedly denying sovereignty to Native peoples at home.”
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