Unit 1.2 DB: Native American Policies

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Dawes Severalty Act 1037

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“Every Indian born within the territorial limits of the United States to whom allotments shall have been made … is hereby declared to be a citizen of the United States.”

western migration safer and faster than it had been in the past. At the same time, rapid population growth resulting largely from immigration contributed to overcrowding of urban areas and competition for jobs. Many saw the Jeffer- sonian hope for a nation of independent homesteaders as less and less realistic. Nevertheless, many Americans resis- ted “wage slavery,” determined to pursue the dream of homesteading. The federal government aided potential homesteaders by passing the Homestead Act in 1862, pro- viding land grants to hundreds of thousands of Americans.

White American migration into the West did not occur without opposition, however. The trans-Mississippi West was home to both American Indians native to that region and tribes that had been forcibly migrated from the eastern United States in the eighteenth and early nineteenth cen- turies. These groups did not passively accept homesteaders’ claims to their land. Those who posed the greatest obstacle to American homesteaders were the Plains Indians. Pri- marily semisedentary people, the Plains Indians, including the Cheyenne, the Comanche, the Crow, the Kiowa, and the Sioux, subsisted mainly by hunting buffalo. Home- steaders impeded their ability to survive by breaking land into parcels protected as private property, preventing both the buffalo and the Plains Indians from roaming freely. In many cases Native Americans responded violently in an effort to deter settlers. Homesteaders in turn complained that the government should protect them from Indian attacks. The situation in the West was exacerbated because businessmen, homesteaders, and railroad companies also wanted to remove the American Indians living on reserva- tions in the West. Although the federal government had ini- tially set up reservations in areas considered undesirable for white settlement, as land grew scarcer, the appeal of reservation land increased. In addition, in some cases, such as in the Dakota Territory, valuable natural resources like gold were discovered on Indian lands.

Throughout the second half of the nineteenth century, Native Americans responded to white settlers in a number of ways. Many tribal leaders appealed to U.S. politicians to recognize their equality as men and to appreciate tribal sov- ereignty. Those who made treaties with the federal govern- ment or received promises of land rights lacked recourse when the agreements were ignored or forgotten. Conse-

Overview

In the second half of the nineteenth centu- ry the federal government initiated an aggressive set of policies designed to free up western land for white settlers and to accul- turate American Indians to American values and practices. Decades of work toward this end culminated in the Dawes Severalty Act

of 1887. Named after the Massachusetts senator Henry L. Dawes, who headed the Senate’s Committee on Indian Affairs, the act broke the land of most remaining reserva- tions into parcels to be farmed by individual American Indi- ans or nuclear American Indian families. Partitioning Indi- an land in this manner, Congress hoped, would force native peoples to give up communal living and to adopt American farming practices. Eventually, policy makers reasoned, American Indians would embrace all American cultural norms and become integrated into U.S. society.

When the Dawes Act passed in 1887, Americans’ views of native peoples varied considerably. Some groups, particu- larly evangelicals, dedicated themselves to both the religious and the cultural conversion of American Indians. Viewing themselves as benevolent teachers, they believed that they had a duty to acculturate American Indians. Others thought that American Indians were inassimilable, racially inferior savages who were destined for extinction. Few felt that Indi- an tribes deserved to be treated as sovereign nations as they had been in the past. While the crafters of the Dawes Act believed themselves to have the best interests of American Indians at heart, the act ultimately hurt native peoples, dis- possessing them of their lands and further marginalizing them. People unsympathetic to American Indians manipu- lated the Dawes Act for their own financial gain, resulting in the massive displacement of native peoples. As a conse- quence, by 1900 the American Indian population had fallen to its lowest point in U.S. history.

Context

Following the Civil War, Americans had a reinvigorated interest in western migration. Transnational railroads made

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1038 Milestone Documents in American History

quently, many Native Americans escalated attacks on American settlers and troops in an effort to protect their way of life. However, even protracted Indian wars, such as that waged by the Apache in the Southwest, eventually resulted in Indian surrender. Indian victories, such as the Sioux and Cheyenne defeat of General George Armstrong Custer and his troops at Little Bighorn, resulted in harsh- er retribution by American settlers and troops. By the 1880s many Native Americans saw acquiescence to U.S. policies as their best chance for survival.

About the Author

Crafted by the U.S. Congress, the Dawes Act was based on the contribution of many individuals, although it is pri- marily credited to Senator Henry L. Dawes of Massachu- setts, who chaired the Senate’s Indian Affairs Committee. Dawes was initially skeptical about attempts to acculturate American Indians through land allotment but was persuad- ed by advocates to promote the act. Dawes made an excep- tional candidate because he both chaired the Indian Affairs Committee and represented the state with the largest con- tingent of participants in the Indian reform movement.

Henry Laurens Dawes was born in Cummington, Massa- chusetts, on October 30, 1816. Trained as a lawyer, Dawes entered politics at a young age. As the Republican candidate, he was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representa- tives at age thirty-two and continued his political career in the Massachusetts state senate followed by the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. During the 1850s, 1860s, and 1870s Dawes adamantly supported antislavery and Reconstruction policies. During the 1880s he became an advocate for Indian reform groups in the Senate. The meet- ings held by groups sympathetic to the plight of American Indians at Lake Mohonk, New York, particularly influenced Dawes. Dawes increasingly advocated allotment of reserva- tion lands to acculturate American Indians and to integrate them into American society. He remained an active advocate for Indian rights until his death on February 5, 1903.

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

◆ Section 1 Section 1 of the Dawes Act states the main purpose of

the act. The act provides the president of the United States with the right to survey and divide reservation lands among individual American Indians and American Indian families. It also stipulates the manner in which the land will be divided, providing every head of household with one-quar- ter section of land, every single person over age eighteen or orphan under age eighteen with one-eighth section of land, and all other unmarried people under the age of eighteen with one-sixteenth section of land. Section 1 does not spec- ify the actual size of a section but suggests that sections will be determined based on government survey of reserva- tions and the size of the Indian population living on each.

Time Line

1862 ■ May 6 Congress passes the Homestead Act, which encourages western settlement by independent homesteaders.

1864 ■ November 29 A Colorado militia attacks and murders sleeping Cheyenne and Arapaho Indians who had been relocated to Colorado.

1865– ■ The Great Sioux War occurs when the Sioux attempt to defend their territory against invading gold miners in Montana.

1867 ■ Congress adopts a policy of “small reservations,” relegating Plains Indians to reservations in the Dakota Territory or the land that would become Oklahoma.

1876 ■ June 25–26 The battle of the Little Bighorn occurs in the Dakota Territory. General George Armstrong Custer and his small band of troops are ambushed and massacred by Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. The incident is often referred to as Custer’s Last Stand.

1879 ■ January 14 The Nez Perce Indian chief Joseph delivers a speech to President Rutherford B. Hayes and others in Washington, D.C., deploring the U.S. government’s forceful resettlement of his people to a reservation and demanding equality for Native Americans.

1887 ■ February 8 Congress passes the Dawes Severalty Act.

1890 ■ December 29 The battle of Wounded Knee Creek occurs; American soldiers massacre between 150 and 200 Indians, mostly women and children, who had taken part in the Ghost Dance movement.

1867

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If an American Indian receives an allotment suitable only for ranching and not for agriculture, the act guarantees that he will get an additional allotment.

◆ Section 2 Section 2 guarantees the right of each American Indian

to choose the area of land that will become his allotment. Heads of household are charged with choosing plots in the name of their minor children, and Bureau of Land Man- agement agents are responsible for choosing land on behalf of orphaned children. If two people entitled to allotments want the same tract of land, the parcel will be divided between them, and they will receive from another area the remainder of land due to them. After Indians make their selections, agents are responsible for drawing preliminary boundaries, which they are to revise after resurveying the land and adding or subtracting from the various plots to standardize their size.

Section 2 also anticipates potential problems arising from the act. It insists that the agents responsible for choosing land on behalf of orphaned children choose land based on the best interests of those children. Suspecting some resistance to land division and allotment, Section 2 states that if an American Indian entitled to a portion of the newly divided reservations does not stake his claim to a par- tition of land within four years, the secretary of the interi- or should have a land agent choose a parcel on behalf of that Indian and issue a patent to the Indian in question for the plot of land in his name.

◆ Section 3 The purpose of Section 3 is to establish the manner in

which allotments will be made, who will make them, who will appoint the officers who grant allotments, and how allotments will be documented. It states that the president will assign agents responsible for overseeing the allotment process. Records of allotment will be stored in both the Indian Office and the General Land Office.

◆ Section 4 Section 4 explains how the system of allotment will

apply to American Indians who do not live on reservations. It states that an Indian residing off a reservation has the right to an allotment parcel equal to that of a native living on a reservation and that he can choose a parcel from any area of unsettled land. Although American Indians can choose their allotment from areas of unsurveyed land, the allotments will be adjusted once the land is surveyed. Sec- tion 4 also explains that the U.S. Treasury will compensate local land offices for the land settled by Indians.

◆ Section 5 Section 5 specifies the requirements for American Indi-

ans to gain ownership of their allotments. It states that once American Indians choose their plots of lands, those plots will be patented to them but held in trust by the U.S. government for twenty-five years. During those twenty-five years American Indians cannot sell the land. Furthermore,

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1893 ■ The western historian Fredrick Jackson Turner delivers his “frontier thesis,” arguing that the existence of a frontier influenced the American character and was key to maintaining such qualities as freedom and independence.

1890 ■ The federal government declares the frontier officially closed.

1900 ■ The American Indian population is estimated at 250,000, the lowest in U.S. history up to that time.

Time Line

Section 5 nullifies any sale of allotted land prior to the end of the twenty-five-year period. If an allottee dies during the period in which the government holds his land in trust, his heirs will inherit the right to the land.

Additionally, Section 5 discusses options for reservation land not allotted to individuals under the provision of the act. It states that the federal government can negotiate with tribes to purchase unallotted reservation land but that land purchased from tribes can be used only to encourage actual settlers. Settlers will be restricted to land grants no larger than 160 acres per person. Religious organizations engaged in converting or educating native people are also entitled to tracts of land of no more than 160 acres. Like American Indians living on allotments, non-native settlers will have their land held in trust by the federal government, but only for five years.

The fees paid by homesteaders for tracts of former Indi- an land are relegated to the American Indians who had pre- viously held the rights to the land in question. The money can be used by Congress for educating or otherwise “civi- lizing” the American Indians from the reservation in ques- tion. Section 5 concludes by stating that American Indians who have taken advantage of the allotment policy as well as those who have become U.S. citizens will have preference in the hiring of public employees working in American Indian communities.

◆ Section 6 Section 6 deals with the legal and citizenship status of

American Indians who participate in the allotment pro- gram. All American Indians who receive allotments, it states, will become American citizens and have all of the rights of American citizens. It stipulates that no local or state government can pass laws denying equal protection by law to American Indians who have taken part in the allotment program. In addition, Section 6 specifies that all American Indians who take part in the allotment process

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will become subject to the laws of the state or territory in which they reside.

◆ Section 7 Section 7 endows the secretary of the interior with the

authority to regulate water resources, if they are needed to make reservation land fertile for agricultural use. The sec- retary is charged with equitably distributing water among the American Indians living on a reservation. Section 7 also forbids giving water rights to one individual if doing so would hurt another.

◆ Section 8 Section 8 excludes certain tribes (Cherokee, Creek,

Choctaw, Chickasaw, Fox, Osage, Miami, Peoria, Sac, and Seminole) and certain regions (Seneca Nation of New York reservations and Sioux Nation territory in Nebraska) from the provisions of the act.

◆ Section 9 Section 9 states that the cost of surveying lands author-

ized by the act will be paid out of a $100,000 account in the Treasury. The $100,000 will be repaid to the Treasury from the sale of land acquired from American Indians based on the standards set forth by the act.

◆ Section 10 Section 10 protects the federal government’s right to exer-

cise eminent domain over land allotted to American Indians.

◆ Section 11 Section 11 certifies that the act cannot be used to halt

the relocation of the Southern Ute Indians from their cur- rent reservation in southwestern Colorado to a new reser- vation.

Audience

The Dawes Act was written by politicians for politicians and bureaucrats. The language is technical and verbose, but also pointedly specific. The drafters of the act, who saw themselves as friends of the American Indian, attempted to draft an act so specific that those wishing to use the new policy to displace American Indians would not be able to do so. Notably, the initial act was drafted so seamlessly that speculators had difficulty obtaining legal rights to Native allotments until after the Dawes Act was amended in 1891.

The Dawes Act was written with the understanding that employees of the General Land Office and the Bureau of Indian Affairs would frequently refer to it. For that reason these employees are specifically addressed throughout the act, and their actions are strictly proscribed. The act fre- quently warns agents against attempting to use their posi- tion for personal gain, stating, for example, that agents choosing plots of land for orphaned children must consid- er the best interests of the children and that tribes agree- ing to sell reservation land to the government must be fair- ly compensated. Because of the extreme technicality of the language used in the Dawes Act, it was clearly not intend- ed for an American Indian audience. Most American Indi- ans could not read English, and even those who could read would have had difficulty interpreting the act.

Impact

Few American Indians converted to American styles of farming or adopted American cultural norms as a result of the Dawes Act. The act assigned plots of land to individual Indians but did not include a provision to train them in farming practices. Few American Indians had experience farming. They did not have the required equipment and goods to begin farming, and most encountered difficulty if they tried to buy things on credit. Although in the 1880s and 1890s Congress approved small grants for American Indians to purchase seeds and farming equipment, the grants were far too small and inconsistent to aid American Indians significantly in converting to sedentary living and farming. Those American Indians who tried to mimic Amer- ican homesteaders therefore usually reaped small, unprof- itable harvests and quickly abandoned their efforts.

American Indians did not immediately feel the effects of the Dawes Act. Although speculators began making agree- ments for the trade or sale of Indian lands almost as soon as the act passed, they rarely began settling or developing the land for fear of expropriation. Ironically, although the Dawes Act intended to Americanize Indians, because the

Senator Henry Dawes of Massachusetts (Library of Congress)

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federal government held the allotments in trust for twenty- five years, American Indians were able to maintain their traditional ways of life in the years immediately following the passage of the Dawes Act. While many made agree- ments regarding their allotments that would ultimately lead to their displacement, during the years in which the land remained in trust, American Indians were able to continue to hunt game and to use resources throughout their reser- vations. Few American Indians accepted the notion of pri-

vate property, and on most reservations they continued to live as though they held their lands communally.

Within the first decade of the Dawes Act’s inception, state and local governments found loopholes allowing out- siders to purchase American Indian allotments. Once spec- ulators and businesses gained ownership of Indian lands, American Indians felt the effects of the Dawes Act swiftly. Fences went up, restricting the movement of Indians as well as the game they hunted. Key resources, such as rivers and

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Essential Quotes

“

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“An Act to provide for the allotment of lands in severalty to Indians on the various reservations, and to extend the protection of the laws of the United

States and the Territories over the Indians, and for other purposes.” (Section 1)

“That upon the approval of the allotments provided for in this act by the Secretary of the Interior, he shall cause patents to issue therefor in the

name of allottees … and declare that the United States does and will hold the land thus allotted, for the period of twenty-five years, in trust for the

sole use and benefit of the Indian to whom such allotment shall have been made, or, in case of his decease, of his heirs.”

(Section 5)

“And provided further, That at any time after lands have been allotted to all the Indians of any tribe … it shall be lawful for the Secretary of the

Interior to negotiate … for the purchase and release … of such portions of its reservation not allotted as such tribe shall … consent to sell, on such

terms and conditions as shall be considered just and equitable between the United States and said tribe of Indians.”

(Section 5)

“And every Indian born within the territorial limits of the United States to whom allotments shall have been made under the provisions of this act …

and every Indian … who has voluntarily taken up … his residence separate and apart from any tribe of Indians therein … is hereby declared

to be a citizen of the United States, and is entitled to all the rights, privileges, and immunities of such citizens.”

(Section 6)

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forests, were relegated to private, non-Indian owners, often eliminating the subsistence ability of American Indians.

In addition, the funds made from the sale of reservation land that the Dawes Act had earmarked for programs to improve American Indians’ lives were grossly mismanaged. Compensation for land sales often did not make its way to Indian accounts for decades. Even when payments for reser- vation land made it to the federally held Indian accounts, they were used for ends that few Native Americans viewed as beneficial. In her study of the effects of the Dawes Act on the American Indians of Minnesota, the historian Melissa L. Meyer writes, “Facile generalizations about Anishinaabe dependence on welfare gratuities mask the fact that they essentially financed their own ‘assimilation’” (p. 388). Money from the sale of Indian lands usually funded schools and social welfare programs aimed at Americanizing Indians. In 1934, when the Dawes Act was reversed through the Indi- an Reorganization Act, American Indians owned less than half the land that they had owned in 1887.

Related Documents

Burke Act. California State University, San Marcos, Web site. http:// www.csusm.edu/nadp/a1906.htm. Accessed on January 18, 2008. In 1906 the U.S. Congress amended the Dawes Act with the Burke Act, which did away with many of the protective specifications of the ini- tial act, most notably allowing Native Americans to sell their allotted land immediately rather than waiting twenty-five years.

Chief Joseph. “An Indian’s View on Indian Affairs.” North American Review no. 128 (April 1879). In this speech, delivered in 1879 to Pres- ident Rutherford B. Hayes and other dignitaries in Washington, D.C., Chief Joseph invokes the American ideals of freedom and equality in an effort to prevent the further marginalization of his people.

Kappler, Charles J., ed. Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties. 7 vols. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1904–1941. Oklahoma State University Web site. http://digital.library.okstate. edu/kappler/. Accessed on January 6, 2008. With a variety of sources pertaining to federal Indian policy, particularly relating to the use of land, these volumes contain treaties, congressional min- utes, and other primary sources relating to a variety of Indian tribes.

Pratt, Richard. “Kill the Indian … and Save the Man.” In Reading the American Past: Selected Historical Documents, ed. Michael P. Johnson. 4th ed. New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007. Pratt, a supporter of the federal government’s attempt to acculturate and “civilize” American Indians, argues for the necessity of American education for Indians who had taken part in the allotment process made possible by the Dawes Act.

Bibliography

■ Articles Carlson, Leonard A. “The Dawes Act and Indian Farming.” Journal of Economic History 38, no. 1 (March 1978): 274–276.

Cotroneo, Ross R., and Jack Dozier. “A Time of Disintegration: The Coeur d’Alene and the Dawes Act.” Western Historical Quar- terly 5, no. 4 (October 1974): 405–419.

Leibhardt, Barbara. “Allotment Policy in an Incongruous Legal System: The Yakima Indian Nation as a Case Study, 1887–1934.” Agricultural History 65, no. 4 (Autumn 1991): 78–103

Meyer, Melissa L. “‘We Can Not Get a Living as We Used To’: Dis- possession and the White Earth Anishinaabeg, 1889–1920.” Amer- ican Historical Review 96, no. 2 (April 1991): 368–394.

■ Books Adelman, Gerard. Major Objections to the Dawes Act of 1887: Their Content and Results. Columbus: Ohio State University, 1970.

Carlson, Leonard A. Indians, Bureaucrats, and Land: The Dawes Act and the Decline of Indian Farming. Westport, Conn.: Green- wood Press, 1981.

Fritz, Henry E. The Movement for Indian Assimilation, 1860–1980. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1963.

Greenwald, Emily. Reconfiguring the Reservation: The Nez Perces, Jicarilla Apaches, and the Dawes Act. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2002.

Hauptman, Laurence M., and L. Gordon McLester, III. The Onei- da Indians in the Age of Allotment, 1860–1920. Norman: Universi- ty of Oklahoma Press, 2006.

Johnston, Robert D., and Catherine McNicol Stock, eds. The Countryside in the Age of the Modern State: Political Histories of Rural America. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2001.

McDonnell, Janet A. The Dispossession of the American Indian, 1887–1934. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991.

Otis, D. S. The Dawes Act and the Allotment of Indian Lands, ed. Francis Paul Prucha. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1973.

Prucha, Francis Paul, comp. The Indian in American History. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1971.

———, ed. Americanizing the American Indians; Writings by the “Friends of the Indian,” 1880–1900. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1973.

———. Indian Policy in the United States: Historical Essays. Lin- coln: University of Nebraska Press, 1981.

Stubben, Jerry D. Native Americans and Political Participation: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO, 2006.

■ Web Sites Autry National Center Web site.

http://www.autrynationalcenter.org/. Accessed on October 20, 2007.

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National Museum of the American Indian Web site. http://www.nmai.si.edu/. Accessed on October 20, 2007.

“Native American Documents Project.” California State Universi- ty, San Marcos, Web site.

http://www.csusm.edu/projects/nadp/nadp.htm. Accessed on October 20, 2007.

—By G. Mehera Gerardo

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Questions for Further Study

1. The Dawes Act was part of an assimilationist trend in American Indian policy that emerged after the Ameri-

can Civil War. It departed considerably from earlier policies that dealt with American Indians. Compare the Dawes

Act to President Andrew Jackson’s message to Congress on Indian Removal (1830). How do Jackson’s attitudes

compare with those reflected in the Dawes Act? How would you characterize Jacksonian Indian policy? How do

you think assimilationists viewed Jackson’s ideas?

2. One stated purpose of the Dawes Act was to “civilize” the American Indian. The act is also sometimes referred

to as “An Act for the Salvation of the American Indian.” What problems might arise from a bill based on a belief in

the superiority of white American society and the inferiority of American Indian society?

3. Compare and contrast the Dawes Act to the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882). How do the two acts deal with eth-

nic groups considered to be “problems” in the late nineteenth century? Is one group treated with greater respect

than the other? If so, how? Do you think the two acts were inspired by a shared ideology? Why or why not?

4. How might American Indians have responded to the Dawes Act? Do you think they understood what the fed-

eral government hoped to accomplish through it? Do you think they would have resisted efforts to acculturate them

to American norms? Would they have viewed people like Dawes as “friends of the Indian”? Why or why not?

5. Scholars often describe the Dawes Act as the last of a series of policies that destroyed American Indians’ tra-

ditional way of life. What elements of the Dawes Act would have changed American Indians’ lifestyles? Could

American Indians have maintained any of their traditional practices under the Dawes Act? If so, how?

6. A central precept of the Dawes Act was that encouraging American Indians to adopt American styles of farm-

ing and give up communal living was the crucial first step to Americanizing them. Why did policy makers consider

farming so important? Does the Dawes Act fit into the Jeffersonian ideal of the United States being an agrarian

republic? If so, how?

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Glossary

aforesaid previously mentioned; already referred to

allot to allocate a portion

allottee the receiver of an allotment

appropriation something set aside for a specific purpose

deem to regard as

disposition bestowal

embrace to contain

patent a document granting an exclusive right

pro rata in proportion

riparian relating to a body of water

severalty the quality of being distinct or autonomous

stipulation an agreed-to condition in a contract

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Document Text

Dawes Severalty Act

An Act to provide for the allotment of lands in severalty to Indians on the various reservations, and to extend the protection of the laws of the United States and the Territories over the Indians, and for other purposes

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Con- gress assembled, That in all cases where any tribe or band of Indi- ans has been, or shall hereafter be, located upon any reservation created for their use, either by treaty stipulation or by virtue of an act of Congress or executive order setting apart the same for their use, the President of the United States be, and he hereby is, authorized, whenever in his opinion any reservation or any part thereof of such Indians is advantageous for agricultural and grazing purposes, to cause said reservation, or any part thereof, to be surveyed, or resurveyed if necessary, and to allot the lands in said reservation in severalty to any Indian located thereon in quantities as follows:

To each head of a family, one-quarter of a section; To each single person over eighteen years of age,

one-eighth of a section; To each orphan child under eighteen years of age,

one-eighth of a section; and To each other single person under eighteen years

now living, or who may be born prior to the date of the order of the President directing an allotment of the lands embraced in any reservation, one-sixteenth of a section:

Provided, That in case there is not sufficient land in any of said reservations to allot lands to each indi- vidual of the classes above named in quantities as above provided, the lands embraced in such reserva- tion or reservations shall be allotted to each individ- ual of each of said classes pro rata in accordance with the provisions of this act: And provided further, That where the treaty or act of Congress setting apart such reservation provides the allotment of

lands in severalty in quantities in excess of those herein provided, the President, in making allot- ments upon such reservation, shall allot the lands to each indi- vidual Indian belonging thereon in quantity as specified in such treaty or act: And provided fur- ther, That when the lands allotted are only valuable for grazing pur- poses, an additional allotment of such grazing lands, in quantities as above provided, shall be made to each individual.

Sec. 2. That all allotments set apart under the provisions of this act shall be selected by the Indi-

ans, heads of families selecting for their minor chil- dren, and the agents shall select for each orphan child, and in such manner as to embrace the improvements of the Indians making the selection. where the improvements of two or more Indians have been made on the same legal subdivision of land, unless they shall otherwise agree, a provisional line may be run dividing said lands between them, and the amount to which each is entitled shall be equalized in the assignment of the remainder of the land to which they are entitled under his act: Provid- ed, That if any one entitled to an allotment shall fail to make a selection within four years after the Pres- ident shall direct that allotments may be made on a particular reservation, the Secretary of the Interior may direct the agent of such tribe or band, if such there be, and if there be no agent, then a special agent appointed for that purpose, to make a selection for such Indian, which selection shall be allotted as in cases where selections are made by the Indians, and patents shall issue in like manner.

Sec. 3. That the allotments provided for in this act shall be made by special agents appointed by the President for such purpose, and the agents in charge of the respective reservations on which the allot- ments are directed to be made, under such rules and regulations as the Secretary of the Interior may from time to time prescribe, and shall be certified by such agents to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, in

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Document Text

duplicate, one copy to be retained in the Indian Office and the other to be transmitted to the Secre- tary of the Interior for his action, and to be deposit- ed in the General Land Office.

Sec. 4. That where any Indian not residing upon a reservation, or for whose tribe no reservation has been provided by treaty, act of Congress, or executive order, shall make settlement upon any surveyed or unsurveyed lands of the United States not otherwise appropriated, he or she shall be entitled, upon appli- cation to the local land-office for the district in which the lands arc located, to have the same allot- ted to him or her, and to his or her children, in quan- tities and manner as provided in this act for Indians residing upon reservations; and when such settle- ment is made upon unsurveyed lands, the grant to such Indians shall be adjusted upon the survey of the lands so as to conform thereto; and patents shall be issued to them for such lands in the manner and with the restrictions as herein provided. And the fees to which the officers of such local land-office would have been entitled had such lands been entered under the general laws for the disposition of the pub- lic lands shall be paid to them, from any moneys in the Treasury of the United States not otherwise appropriated, upon a statement of an account in their behalf for such fees by the Commissioner of the General Land Office, and a certification of such account to the Secretary of the Treasury by the Sec- retary of the Interior.

Sec. 5. That upon the approval of the allotments provided for in this act by the Secretary of the Inte- rior, he shall cause patents to issue therefor in the name of the allottees, which patents shall be of the legal effect, and declare that the United States does and will hold the land thus allotted, for the period of twenty-five years, in trust for the sole use and bene- fit of the Indian to whom such allotment shall have been made, or, in case of his decease, of his heirs according to the laws of the State or Territory where such land is located, and that at the expiration of said period the United States will convey the same by patent to said Indian, or his heirs as aforesaid, in fee, discharged of said trust and free of all charge or incumbrance whatsoever: Provided, That the Presi- dent of the United States may in any case in his dis- cretion extend the period. And if any conveyance shall be made of the lands set apart and allotted as herein provided, or any contract made touching the same, before the expiration of the time above men- tioned, such conveyance or contract shall be absolutely null and void: Provided, That the law of

descent and partition in force in the State or Territo- ry where such lands are situate shall apply thereto after patents therefor have been executed and deliv- ered, except as herein otherwise provided; and the laws of the State of Kansas regulating the descent and partition of real estate shall, so far as practica- ble, apply to all lands in the Indian Territory which may be allotted in severalty under the provisions of this act: And provided further, That at any time after lands have been allotted to all the Indians of any tribe as herein provided, or sooner if in the opinion of the President it shall be for the best interests of said tribe, it shall be lawful for the Secretary of the Interior to negotiate with such Indian tribe for the purchase and release by said tribe, in conformity with the treaty or statute under which such reserva- tion is held, of such portions of its reservation not allotted as such tribe shall, from time to time, con- sent to sell, on such terms and conditions as shall be considered just and equitable between the United States and said tribe of Indians, which purchase shall not be complete until ratified by Congress, and the form and manner of executing such release pre- scribed by Congress: Provided however, That all lands adapted to agriculture, with or without irriga- tion so sold or released to the United States by any Indian tribe shall be held by the United States for the sale purpose of securing homes to actual settlers and shall be disposed of by the United States to actual and bona fide settlers only tracts not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres to any one person, on such terms as Congress shall prescribe, subject to grants which Congress may make in aid of education: And provided further, That no patents shall issue therefor except to the person so taking the same as and home- stead, or his heirs, and after the expiration of five years occupancy therof as such homestead; and any conveyance of said lands taken as a homestead, or any contract touching the same, or lieu thereon, cre- ated prior to the date of such patent, shall be null and void. And the sums agreed to be paid by the United States as purchase money for any portion of any such reservation shall be held in the Treasury of the United States for the sole use of the tribe or tribes Indians; to whom such reservations belonged; and the same, with interest thereon at three per cent per annum, shall be at all times subject to appropri- ation by Congress for the education and civilization of such tribe or tribes of Indians or the members thereof. The patents aforesaid shall be recorded in the General Land Office, and afterward delivered, free of charge, to the allottee entitled thereto. And if

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