14
5
G. William Rice, Teaching Decolonization: Reacquisition of Indian Lands Within and Without
the Box—An Essay, 82 N.D. L. Rev. 811 (2006). In particular note the text of that article be-
tween pages 816–22 and 833–34 considering the language of various treaties between the
United States and Indian tribes.
6
Treaty with the Senecas, Mixed Senecas and Shawnees. Quapaws, Arts. 16, 20, 6 Feb. 23,
1867, 15 Stat. 513; Treaty with the Delawares, July 2, 1861, 12 Stat. 1177 (requiring that if
purchase money was not paid, land had to be returned to United States in trust for the tribe);
Treaty with the Senecas, Tonawanda Band, Art. 3, 11 Stat. 735; 12 Stat. 991, November 5, 1857
(authority to repurchase lands from the holder of ‘‘the fee’’ who had previously purchased the
Indian title).
7
Elk v. Wilkins, 112 US 94, (1884).
8
Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 20 S.Ct. 1, 44 L.Ed. 49, (1899).
9
General Allotment Act of Feb. 8th, 1887, Ch. 119, 24 Stat. 388. For a scholarly view of this
Act, see Judith Royster, The Legacy of Allotment, 27 AZSLJ 1 Spring, 1995.
10
See Jones v. Meehan, 175 U.S. 1, 24 (1899).
11
Indian General Allotment (Dawes) Act, ch. 119, 24 Stat. 388 (1887) (codified as amended
in scattered sections of 25 U.S.C., repealed by the Indian Land Consolidation Act of 2000, 114
Stat. 2007).
12
12S. Comm. on Indian Affairs, Hearings on S. 2755: To Grant To Indians Living Under Fed-
eral Tutelage The Freedom To Organize For Purposes Of Local Self-government And Economic
Enterprise, 73rd Cong., 2nd Sess. Part 1, Pages 17 (Feb. 27, 1934). [hereinafter Hearing on S.
2755, Part 1]; S. Comm. on Indian Affairs, Hearings on S. 2755 and S. 3645: A Bill To Grant
To Indians Living Under Federal Tutelage The Freedom To Organize For Purposes Of Local Self-
government And Economic Enterprise; To Provide For The Necessary Training Of Indians In Ad-
ministrative And Economic Affairs; To Conserve And Develop Indian Lands; And To Promote
The More Effective Administration Of Justice In Matters Affecting Indian Tribes And Commu-
nities By Establishing A Federal Court Of Indian Affairs, 73rd Cong., 2nd Sess. Part 2, Page
58 (April 28, 1934) [hereinafter Hearing on S. 2755 and S. 3645, Part 2].
Until the allotment period, Indian treaties with rare exceptions, drew boundaries
between the United States and the Indian tribal nations, or ceded some tribal lands
to the United States while reserving the remainder, or swapped lands with the
United States with the new lands to be held as Indian lands are held as a treaty
recognized title.
5
Only a few of the several hundred treaties actually suggest that
title to tribal lands was to be held ‘‘in trust’’ for the Tribe.
6
With rare exceptions,
federal statutes applicable within those Indian territories were aimed at controlling
American citizens who were interacting in trade or other capacities with Indian peo-
ple. Indian people, by and large, were not citizens of the United States absent natu-
ralization but were governed by their own laws,
7
and their land tenure systems
were controlled by tribal, not federal or state law.
8
The genesis of the Indian Reorganization Act can be traced back at least to the
General Allotment Act of 1887.
9
In the General Allotment Act of 1887, Congress for
the first time generally imposed American real property and inheritance law upon
many Indian territories,
10
forced the division of the tribal domain amongst the indi-
vidual citizens of tribes to be held by a United States title ‘‘in trust’’ for the indi-
vidual allottee and their heirs, and created a fictitious ‘‘surplus’’ of land that the
tribe could be required to sell.
11
The result was devastating to the Indian land base,
and tribal authority over it as tribal land and property laws were displaced by those
of the United States. In short, the idea of ‘‘trust land’’ and a non-Indian legal system
was introduced into many reservations, usually then followed by an influx of non-
Indian settlers as a result of the taking of the ‘‘surplus’’ lands that were ‘‘created’’
after the living individual Indians received an allotment. Though perhaps intended
as a benevolent measure by some, the allotment system could not have been better
designed to destroy tribal government, individualize tribal properties, and pave the
way for assimilation of Indian people, forcibly if necessary, into the mass of Amer-
ican citizens. It was remarkably effective in converting Indian lands into non-Indian
land.
In the Committee’s prior hearing, S. Hrg. 111–136, a chart at page two of the
hearing transcript shows that in 1850 Indian people owned in excess of 330,000,000
acres of land. This acreage was reduced to 156,000,000 acres by 1881 according to
that chart, a net loss during the later part of the treaty period of a bit over 50 per-
cent of the Indian lands. According to information presented to Congress by Com-
missioner Collier during the hearings on the Wheeler-Howard Indian Reorganiza-
tion Act, the administration placed the figure of tribal land ownership at the begin-
ning of the allotment period in 1887 as 138,000,000 acres of land. By 1934, Indian
land ownership had been reduced another two-thirds from 138,000,000 to 48,000,000
acres. But this did not tell the whole story. Even these shocking figures were mis-
leading. Of the 48,000,000 remaining acres, some 20,000,000 acres were in
unallotted reservations, another 20,000,000 acres were desert or semi-desert lands,
and some 7,000,000 were in fractionated heirship status awaiting sale to non-Indi-
ans.
12
Between 1908 and 1934 ninety percent of the lands of the Five Civilized
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