Last edited by NGE Staff on 10/19/2016In the court case Worcester v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court held in 1832 that the Cherokee IndiansSamuel Worcesterconstituted a nation holding distinct sovereign powers. Although the decision became the foundation of the principle of tribal sovereignty in the twentieth century, it did not protect the Cherokees from being removed from their ancestral homeland in the Southeast.In the 1820s and 1830s Georgia conducted a relentless campaign to remove the Cherokees, who held territory within the borders of Georgia, North Carolina, Alabama, and Tennessee at the time. In 1827 the Cherokees established a constitutional government. The Cherokees were not only restructuring their government but also declaring to the American public that they were a sovereign nation that could not be removed without their consent