Indian Policies 1851-1890
1. Concentration
- to separate Native Americans from Anglo Americans, avoid war, allow coexistence
- 1st Laramie Treaty of 1851 - Thomas Fitzpatrick - 9 of 13 Plains nations - define hunting grounds - allow right of passage - gifts and annuities
- 1854 Mormon Cow War - 3 Sioux boys killed stray cow from Mormon wagon train near Laramie - Lt. Grattan fired cannon and Sioux killed him and his 29 men
- 1862 New Ulm massacre of 450 settlers in Minnesota by Little Crow - Gen. Pope drove eastern Dakota into northern plains of the western Lakota nations
- 1863 Bear River massacre of 368 Shoshone in Utah by Gen. Patrick Connor and 2nd California Volunteers
- 1864 Sand Creek massacre of 150 Cheyenne in Colorado by Col. Chivington - articles
- 1865 Congressional investigation led to new policy of reservations
2. Reservation
- to isolate Indians on specific grants of land under Indian authority as if a foreign nation, allowing sale of former Indian lands to miners and ranchers and homesteaders, promising Indians protection of reservation boundaries by Army
- 1865 Little Arkansas Treaties ceded land north of Ark. River, assigned specific reservations to the Cheyenne, Arapaho, Comanche, Kiowa - but warfare continued until the1867 Medicine Lodge Treaties at Fort Larned
- 1865 Sioux Treaty rejected by Red Cloud of the Oglala nation, no access given for Bozeman Trail to Montana silver mines that crossed Powder River hunting grounds
- 1st Sioux War 1866-1868 - Red Cloud became one of the few Indian leaders to win a war against the white man; siege and defeat of Fort Kearny; Capt. Fetterman and 80 men killed by Crazy Horse
- 2nd Laramie Treaty - Oglala to keep 7.5m acres of Powder River hunting grounds "as long as the buffalo range there" - white agencies to provide food and annuities - any change in treaty required 3/4 vote of all adult male Oglala (this treaty was upheld by the Supreme Court in 1980, awarding $24m to Oglala, but not the hunting grounds known today as South Dakota)
3. Peace Policy
Crazy Horse Monument in 1980
See the Highlights of the 50th Anniversary celebration in 1998
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- Ely Parker - 1st Native-American head of BIA 1869
- "Quaker" reforms - responsible Indian agents appointed to reservation agencies
- Gen. O.O. Howard with Tom Jeffords made peace with Cochise and Comanche nation
- Red Cloud and 22 leaders trip to D.C. 1870, dinner at White House with strawberries and ice cream, promised livestock and farm implements and allowed to hunt outside reservation
- civilian Board of Indian Commissioners estab, but conflict with harsher policies of Army's Gen. Sherman and Interior Dept's Carl Schurz
- Indian Ring in Congress took money from appropriations bills
- Supreme Court in 1871 Cherokee Tobacco case - no tax deduction allowed to the Cherokee because Indian treaties were not the same as treaties with foreign nations
- 1871 Congress Act prohibited any more treaties - Indians now to be subject to U.S. law, not to be treated as foreign nations
4. Force Policy
- Gen. Sherman estabd 4 Military Departments in the Plains and built new forts
- 1868 Washita massacre of 102 Cheyenne led by Black Kettle, at the hands of Gen. Custer and 7th Cavalry from Fort Supply in the Outlet.
- 1869-70 winter campaign against Comanche and Kiowa in the Leased District by Gen. Sheridan from new Fort Sill, but raiding parties continued under local leaders such as Santanta and Quanah Parker (Parker in 1884 became promoter of the peyote ritual)
- 1874 Red River Campaign against raiding parties by Gen Nelson Miles from Fort Sill and Fort Reno - 72 leaders captured and removed to Florida
- 2nd Sioux War 1874-76 by Gen. Custer, defeated by Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse at Little Big Horn
- 1877 flight of Chief Joseph and Nez Perce
- 1885 final breakout of Geronimo and pursuit by Gen. George Crook with 3000 until 1886 surrender to Lt. Charles Gatewood
"If the white man wants to live in peace with the Indian he can live in peace....
Treat all men alike. Give them all the same law. Give them all an even chance
to live and grow. All men were made by the same Great Spirit Chief.
They are all brothers. The earth is the mother of all people, and all people
should have equal rights upon it.... Let me be a free man -- free to travel,
free to stop, free to work, free to trade, where I choose, free to choose my own
teachers, free to follow the religion of my fathers, free to think and talk and act for
myself -- and I will obey every law, or submit to the penalty."
(quote from Chief Joseph, pictured left, in 1879 speech in Washington, D.C.)
5. Assimilation
- 1879 Carlisle Indian School by Richard Henry Pratt
- "Kill the Indian, Save the Man" - integration, not segregation
- outing system with white rural families for 3 years after school
- 1 of 8 graduated, became tribal leaders or successful citizens (Jim Thorpe)
- 7 of 8 left school and "back to the blanket" - great cultural shock
- In the White Man's Image from the American Experience on PBS 1992
6. Americanization
- Gen. Crook's scouts after 1876 - helped agents enforce U.S. law on reservations
- 1878 Indian Police at 59 agencies - cut hair, wore uniforms or civilian clothes, gave up native religion, kept only one wife
- 1883 Courts of Indian Offenses - 3 Indian judges enforced rules against polygamy, dances and other "heathenish customs", drunkenness, gambling
- 1885 Major Crimes Act passed after 1883 Crow Dog case that ruled defendants should be judged on reservations by local tribal law; the new 1885 law required Indians to be subject to the laws of the state of territory where the crime was committed
7. Severalty
- 1887 Dawes Act - 1 allotment per family; unallotted land sold to whites
- "The Indian estate amounted in 1887 to 136,394,985 acres.ĘBy 1920 it had shrunk to 72,660,316 acres, of which 17,575,033 acres were leased to whites" from What Were the Results of Allotment? on Native American Documents Project web page
- 1889 Sioux Act - Indians on the 6 Sioux reservations at Pine Ridge, Rosebud, Cheyenne River, Standing Rock, Crow Creek, and Lower Brule were to receive an allotment of 360 acres and be paid $1.25 for the 9m acres unallotted land that would be sold to whites
- 1889 Crook Commission investigated hardship caused by severalty on the Sioux reservations and recommended to Congress major reforms; but Crook died in March 1890 there was no reform
- 1890 Wounded Knee massacre of 153 Sioux on the Pine Ridge reservation (including Sitting Bull) by the 7th Cavalry after attempt to suppress the Ghost Dance that spread to the Sioux from its origin in Nevada 1889 by the Paiute shaman Wovoka
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