he economic terms of these leases were unequal

“After the massacre, Grandmother Earth covered them with a white blanket; everything was covered with snow. Those frozen bodies lay there three days and they  [the soldiers] just pick them up and throw them in that trench over there, and nobody didn’t even pray or anything; not even a pipe carrier come aroun

Sitting Bull’s arrest had been ordered by the Indian agent because the agent wrongly believed that Sitting Bull was the driving force behind the Ghost Dance. During the course of his arrest, there was a gunfight and he was killed.

Sitting Bull led his forces to sanctuary in Canada in early 1877. On May 6, 1877, the Lakota leader Crazy Horse surrendered with over 1,000 of his follower

instead attempted to force another land cession from the Lakotas

The government envisioned that once they were confined to isolated reservations, Native people could be taught to live in houses, become farmers, and speak, read, and write English.

In order to resolve the conflicts—and clear Native people out of the way for the development which would come with the railroad—the commissioners set out to relocate Native nations in two reservations.

“There are lots of ways as a member of the Osage Nation that you can expect to benefit from this government.”1

fter twelve years of U.S. Court of Federal Claims trust accounting and trust management lawsuits, a U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia trust accounting case, and extensive discovery, motions, and rulings, the Osage Nation and the U.S. government negoti-ated an agreement on October 14, 2011, for $380 million to compensate for mismanagement of tribal trust funds that occurred between 1972 and 2000.

The principal chief sent out material that painted the Freedmen as new-comers, as persons who are trying to access services, benefits, only that they had no Indian blood.

Cornsilk self- identifies as a “by- blood citizen” of the Cherokee Nation and lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma

Provided, The Cherokees residing in said district shall enjoy all the rights and privileges of other Cherokees who may elect to settle in said district as hereinbefore provided, and shall hold the same rights and privileges and be subject to the same liabilities as those who elect to settle in said district under the provisions of this treaty;

They have a separate religion a nd a separate language. Children· come to school that have never seen a chair . never slept on a raised bed, never climbed stairs or been on a second floor, never turned o n a water faucet or used a flush toilet. Navaho background is really primitive

Perhaps th e Navajo Service should have a separate budget within the Indian Bu reau such as that set up for Alaska.

The 10 year rehabilitation plan for the Navaj o Service p r o-poses f ull educat ion, th e same as a ny ot h er American gets. Any cutting of it will simply d oom tha t many Navaho children to a fu t ure li f e of ignorance, ill i teracy, and disease.

School teachers on the Navajo Reservation are paid less than those in the surrounding states, although their ta s k is more difficult because of the great lan-guage and cultural barriers.

These people are acting as the Indian·s· legal representatives in Wash ington-in fact, the Indian's only representatives. as he cannot vote.

Personally, I fee} The ragged f amily who live in this hut of timber and_~ typify the primitive life of some 60,000 other Navah{_ l that anyone who contributed to Navaho N!lief will have wasted ha contribution unless he follows it up by a letter to Congn,u.

The Navahos were given no other means of makipg a living to replace the lost sheep.

I£ bad men among the Indians shall commit a wrong or depredationto be given up to the ' • • 1·nited state,, etc. upon the person or property of any one, white, black, or Indian, subs ject to the authority of the United States

the Government will pay the tribe whatever amount of damage may be assessed by three disinterested commissioners to be appointed by the President for that purpose, one of said commission­ers to be a chief or head-man of the tribe.

They will never kill or scalp white men, nor attempt to do them harm.

n mu o a sums o money or o er annu1 ies prov1 e Duty of agent, schooihou,.-, 'rnd teachers. Seeds and agricul­tural Implements. Delivery of articlesin lieu of money and to be paid to the Indians herein named under any treaty or treaties annuities. heretofore made, the United States agrees to deliver at the agency-house on the reservation herein named, on the first day of September of each year for ten years, the following articles, to wit: Such articles of clothing, goods, or raw materials in lieu thereof, as C10thing, etc. the agent may make his estimate for, not exceeding in value five dol­lars per India

ere tim er an water may e con­venient, the following buildings:

H bad men among the whites, or among other people subject to the and punished. authority of the United States, shall commit any wrong upon the per­son or pi·operty of the Indians, the Unite<l States will, upon proof made to the agent and forwarded to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs at Washington City, proceed at once to cause the offender to be arrested and punished according to the laws of the United States, and also to reimburse the injured persons for the loss sustained.

These Indians are our responsibility--we took every thing away from them and pushed them out on reservations so arid that it takes 10 acres to graze one sheep, and expect them to eke out an existence…Now I do not know to whom to appeal for help, but it should be forthcoming. We have sent millions to Europe to feed the destitute and now we should send aid to our fellow Americans who are just as hungar

There are a number of Indians on the reservation that are able to earn a living who have refused to perform labor for rations for themselves and their families, and I have refused to issue rations to such people. Those who do not have enough to live on can blame themselves.”

The Indian is like the white man in his affection for his children and he feels keenly the sickness and the loss of his offspring.

“Some people assert that the Indians prefer to live as they do; that they are happier in their idleness and irresponsibility

the authors of the report made it clear that the suffering on reservations was not the fault of Native people.

n overwhelming majority of the Indians are poor, even extremely poor, and they are not adjusted to the economic and social system of the white man.”

It was okay, but it was a hardship on my parents. Even though I had a schol-arship, the transportation they had to pay for

See dear, you tell us all about it now, then we don’t have tobring it up again all weekend

The dam, which flooded much of the land protected by the Pickering Treaty, was allegedly “the price of keeping Pennsylvania in line for John F. Kennedy at the 1960 Democratic convention.”

presumably defending the free world from communism, it violated one of its oldest treaties with an Indigenous nation.

the effectiveness of this sixteenth-century doctrine at jus-tifying the seizure and occupation of Indian lands was so thorough, as evidenced in the complete aggrandizement of the Western Hemisphere, that colonial Americans did not think twice about assuming its power of expropriation.

A tribal government which successfully performs the duties assumed by it will find itself taking over more and more of the authority which in the past was exercised by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs and his agents.”

Represented as a "law enforcement" measure, PL280 robs Indian communities of the core of their governing authority and operates to convert reservation areas into refuges from responsibilities, where many people, not restricted by race, can take full advantage of a veritable vacuum of controlling law, or law which commands its first respect for justice by encouraging an absence of offenses

In addition, the law should provide that an Indian Nation, to protect its exercise of rights or the exercise of treaty or tribal rights by its members, or when engaging in new activities based upon sovereign or treaty rights, may issue an interim "Declaratory Opinion on Interpretation of Rights", which shall be controlling upon the exercise of police powers or administrative authorities of that Indian Natio

the same or a single issue, or a few similar issues

a joint session of Congress and the American people through national communication

President may resume the exercise of his full constitutional authority for acting in the matters of Indian Affairs

We seek a new American majority - a majority that is not content merely to confirm itself by superiority in numbers, but which by conscience is committed toward prevailing upon the public will in ceasing wrongs and in doing right.

he solidification of the rolls as legal proof of tribal identity by congressional ruling has facilitated the continued identification of trib- al peoples by them and, more particularly, by blo

Since only legally identified Indians could receive individual par- cels, citizenship rolls were instituted to identify tribal members and ad- ministrate the issuance of land titles (patent

, an Indian prod- uct, or the product of a particular Indian or Indian tribe or tribal organization, resident within the United States

Any substantial improvements heretofore made by any Indian, and which he shall be compelled to abandon in consequence of this treaty, shall be valued under the direction of the President, and payment to be made accordingly thereof.

it shall be lawful for them to reside upon any ground not in the actual claim and occupation of citizens of the United States,

Organizers gave speeches demanding change in Indian affairs, acknowledgement of treaty rights, the creation of an advisory board consisting of Native members, and a study of fishing in Washington’s rivers.

warning against approving “individuals intermarried with white people.” 

All descendants of such members who were, on June 1, 1934, residing within the present boundaries of any Indian reservation. 

Collier felt that tribal members needed a process by which they could learn the democratic processes of government

as a signifier of maturity for men—women were grouped with their parents if unmarried, their spouse if married. But for the Cherokees, a set age wasn’t the marker of maturity, it was behavior. 

If the person did not claim to be “full-blood,” the official questioned them about their parents and grandparents. The interviewer established the person’s “blood quantum”: three quarters, one half, three eighths, so on. The number was recorded on the individual’s enrollment card. Once enrolled you were enrolled as a member of the tribal nation, but also enrolled as a member of a racial group – “full blood,” “mixed-blood,” or “negro.” 

legal deconstruction of tribal justice systems can be linked to the Major Crimes Act

efforts to extinguish tribal governments and commit ethnic cleansing and genocide,

Sarah Deer on Native Women and Sexual Violence 89assaults in Indian Country fall under the auspices of the federal government

When you look at the scholarly history, many times the gendered analysis is left ou

we have to deal with the reluc-tance of people to understand how colonialism is gendered and also sexualized

Sarah Deer: Well, I think a number of factors come into play, but I think the most obvious one is that colonial projects that from the get- go— from literally Columbus on— have viewed Native women as less that human, as rape- able: people that are, you know, non- people; people that didn’t matter; people that needed to be done away with.

that such lands shall revert to the United States, if the Indians become extinct, or abandon the same.

“[a]ny Indian who commits” certain enumerated offenses “against the person or property of another Indian or any other person” “shall be subject to the same law and penalties as all other persons committing any of the above offenses, within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States.

In the alternative, Oklahoma contends that Congress never established a reservation but instead created a “dependent Indian community.”

Oklahoma points to no ambiguous language in any of the relevant statutes that could plausibly be read as an act of cession

Congress has since broken more than a few promises to the Tribe. Nevertheless, the Creek Reservation persists today. Pp. 6–28.

so long as they shall exist as a nation, and continue to occupy the country hereby assigned to them,”

Bureau recorded no fewer than 87.4 percent of American Indians speak-ing heritage languages as first languages; by 1980 that had plummeted to 29.3 percent; and by 2000, only 18 percent spoke languages other than English at home.

atives are twice as likely to die young as the general population, with a 638 percent greater chance of dying from an alcohol-related disease, an 81 percent greater chance of being murdered, and a 91 percent greater chance of committing suicide

But even before the era of colonization, migrat-ing had become a primary cultural value.

Treaties compelled Indians to change how they lived.

Treaties led to dramatic changes in the Indian world: loss of land and political autonomy, assent to assimilation polices, the creation of quasi-private property on com-munal lands, and much else

nor shall any State orTerritory ever have a right to pass laws for the government of such Indians, but they shall be allowed to govern themselves, so far asmay be compatible with the general jurisdiction which Congress may think proper to exercise over them.

migrate, they shall be removed at theexpense of the United States, and shall receive subsistence while upon the journey, and for one year after their arrival at their newhomes—Provided however, that this article shall not be construed so as to compel any Creek Indian to emigrate, but they shall be freeto go or stay, as they pleas

excepting however from this provisionthose white persons who have made their own improvements, and not expelled the Creeks from their

And twenty sections shall be selected, under the direction of the President for the orphanchildren of the Creeks, and divided and retained or sold for their bene!t as the President may direc

They transported them to holding camps, where they were housed until enough people were gathered to make up a removal party. Many suffered from exposure, bad water, and inadequate food in these holding camps. Much of the death toll attributed to the Trail of Tears occurred in these camps before the march.

Each time, they were met with the advice that they should just remove west of the Mississippi. They refused repeatedly.

fter registering with an Indian agent they would supposedly receive land and citizenship in the state. However, the agent blocked the efforts of Choctaws who wished to remain, refusing to register those who asked or destroying registrations of those who signed up. In the end, only 69 Choctaw families received an allotment of land in Mississippi under the treaty

f they did not agree to remove, the president would declare war on them and send in the army

“We therefore humbly petition our beloved children, the head men and warriors, to hold out to the last in support of our common right, as the Cherokee nation have been the first settlers of this land; we therefore claim the right to the soil.”

The stereotypes of the Indian tribes on the frontiers of white settlement as uncivilized, war- loving, and irreconcilably savage enemies had been used by colonizing Europeans since their fi rst encoun-ters with the native peoples of the New World.

If any citizen or citizens of the United States, shall presume to settle upon the landsallotted to the Shawanoes by this treaty, he or they shall be put out of the protection of theUnited States

intention of any nation or body ofIndians to make war on the citizens of the United States

manner any citizen of the United States who shalldo an injury to any Indian of the Shawanoe nation, or to any other Indian Indians residingin their towns, and under their protection, shall be punished according to the laws of theUnited States

Library of CongressArticles of a treaty, concluded at the mouth of the Great Miami, on the north-western bank of the Ohio, the thirty-first of January, onethousand seven hundred and eighty-six, between the commissioners plenipotentiary of the United States of America, of the one part,and the chiefs and warriors of the Shawanoe Nation of the other part. http://www.loc.gov/resource/bdsdcc.18101of the United States, or any of them, that nation shall deliver such offender, or offenders tothe officer commanding the nearest post of the United States, to be punished according tothe ordinances of Congress;

evidently designed by Him who formed it for purposes more useful than Indian hunting

substitute of humanity and benevolence

e Creator delivered to men upon his formation—be fruitful, multiply, and replenish the earth and subdue it.”

“Treaties were expedients by which ignorant, intractable, and savage people were induced without bloodshed to yield up what civilized people had a right to possess by virtue of that comment

To leave them in possession of their country, was to leave the country a wilderness; to govern them as a distinct people, was impossible, because they were as brave and high spirited as they were fierce, and were ready to repel by arms every attempt on their independence.

fierce savages, whose occupation was war

false anthropological distinction

Native people lacked civilization and Christianity, and that European willingness to “bestow” these gifts of civilization would be “ample compensation” for any resulting loss of land.

In this ruling, Marshall carved out an ambiguous middle ground for Native people—they did not have title to their land—that belonged to the US, but they did have the rights of use and occupancy.

discovery gave an exclusive right to extinguish the Indian title of occupancy, either by purchase or conques

civilized inhabitants

should acknowledge as the law by which the right of acquisition, which they all asserted, should be regulated as between themselves

previous sales that had been negotiated by individuals and Native people had no standing. [2]

question came down to did Native people have the right to give a title to land to a private individual and have that title hold up in Court?

“What is ‘the power of Indians to give, and private individuals to receive, a title which can be sustained in the Courts of the country?’” The Court ruled that they had no such power.

None of the original grantees to the land had taken possession of it, due to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War. Although they did petition Congress to confirm their titles to the land, Congress never confirmed their titles.

descendants of a citizen of England who claimed title to a piece of land located in Illinois territory under a direct purchase from the Illinois and Piankeshaw nations.

In the interest of national unity, those states ceded their western claims to the central government, in order to ratify the Articles of Confederation in 1781

And… “moral obligations.” What is a moral obligation?

So, the trust relationship, in the fewest possible words, the trust relationship is all about land and money.

The BIA is the largest employer of Native people (Walmart is the second largest).

It manages land (55 million surface acres and 57 million subsurface minerals estates), provides tribes with programs and services, and evaluates claims for tribal acknowledgement from tribes unrecognized by the federal government

the bureaucratic arm of the federal government responsible for maintaining the trust relationship

the Supreme Court has used language suggesting that it entails legal duties, moral obligations, and the fulfillment of understandings and expectation

legally enforceable fiduciary obligation

Over the years, the trust doctrine has been at the center of numerous other Supreme Court cases, thus making it one of the most important principles in federal Indian law.

“The federal Indian trust responsibility is a legal obligation under which the United States “has charged itself with moral obligations of the highest responsibility and trust” toward Indian tribes

574 federally recognized Native nations.

n fact, when Oklahoma had a window of opportunity in the 1950s to extend statelaw into Indian country through federal legislation known as Public Law 280,42Oklahoma failed to take advantage of the federal legislation based on the misconception

Under immense pressure, each of the Five Tribes eventually entered intoagreements with the United States for the allotment of tribal lands, with theunderstanding that if the tribes did not consent to allotment, all three branches of thefederal government were aligned to force allotment without tribal input

President Theodore Roosevelt stated his preference thatboth Oklahoma and Indian Territory be admitted as a single state.11 Following thePresident's remarks, no action was taken in Congress with respect to Sequoyahstatehood.12 The majority adopted the single state option,13 and the Sequoyahmovement was defeated, paving the way for Oklahoma statehood in 1907

TULSA LA W RE VIEWfederal territory of Oklahoma to the west.Following the convention, the Sequoyah Constitution was presented to eligiblevoters3 and the measure was ratified by an overwhelming margin of 56,279 to 9,073.4Approximately 75% of eligible voters participated in the election, including citizens ofthe Five Tribes and other U.S. citizens residing within Indian Territory in 1905 that hadnot previously established tribal citizenship

he modem tribal governments, asthe successors to the governments of the historic Five Tribes, stand much stronger todaythan they were on the eve of statehood, especially on the eve of the proposed Sequoyahstatehood

For instance, free elections topopularly elect tribal officials remained suspended under federal law, not to be "allowed" by the federalgovernment until the passage of the Principal Chiefs Act of 1970.

DEFEAT OR MIXED BLESSING? TRIBALSOVEREIGNTY AND THE STATE OF SEQUOYAHStacy L. Leeds*I. INTRODUCTIONAmerican Indian legal history is replete with stories of foreseeable consequences.Most of these stories involve the United States failing to uphold treaty guarantees. Ineach of these stories, the United States ignores the tribal diplomatic efforts of the time,engages in unilateral federal action, and tribal autonomy is forever diminished

In that fight, we again lost our property, but we will not give it up. This spring our people started their farms again, and if a favorable season, we expect to raise good crops. The young men are plowing; our people are purcha

We have about 500 hogs left, having lost about 2000 head during the hght last August, between the wild bands and the United States troops at the Wichita agency. We also lost some horses and a good many cattle

I belong to the Kaw tribe, and we came down here without an interpreter. I do not think I have learned all of your proceedings yet, as I think the acting interpreter does not take as much pains with us as he does with the Osages.

hey have tables and chairs. They wear citizen clothes, quit blankets. They think it best to settle and improve. We want a deed for our reservation, that our places may go to our chil-dren, when the old people are gone.

We have a good school at the agency and send all our children that can be taken care of. There are in all nearly 100 scholars ; they are improving fast, many of them can read and write and are fast learning to talk the language of the white people. We want more school houses

Which means that under the liberal laws andregulations of the several Indian Nations,'whitepeople are being constantly admitted to citizenship.

coveted country will be opened up to whitesettlement, under proper restrictions, by the Indiansthemselves, if they were permitted to go on in theirown way.

carried into effect would result inthe'establishment of a barbaric dominion within acivilized republic, subdivided into nearly twentydifferent nations, all speaking different languages,and each under its individual chiefs."

The Okmulgee Constitution proposed the for-mation of a Territorial Government, the officers ofwhich should be chosen by the Indians from their ownrace, practically independent of the United StatesGovernment but operating under its sanction, withoutany modification of the tribal relations alreadyexisting among them. It was in fact intended as analliance of the Indians against the encroachments

Whereas the enemies of the United States have endeavored, by every artifice in their power, to possess the Indians in general with an opinion, that it is the design of the States aforesaid, to extirpate the Indians and take possession of their country to obviate such false suggestion,

The mode of such trials to be hereafter fixed by the wise men of the United States in Congress assembled, with the assistance of such deputies of the Delaware nation, as may be appointed to act in concert with them in adjusting this matter to their mutual liking. And it is further agreed between the parties aforesaid, that neither shall entertain or give countenance to the enemies of the other, or protect in their respective states, criminal fugitives, servants or slaves, but the same to apprehend, and secure and deliver to the State or States, to which such enemies, criminals, servants or slaves respectively belong.

their enemies are brought to reasonable terms of accommodation: and that if either of them shall discover any hostile designs forming against the other, they shall give the earliest notice thereof that timeous measures may be taken to prevent their ill effect.

xtrinsic motivation, which includes a desire to get better grades, is not only different from, but often undermines, intrinsic motivation, a desire to learn for its own sake (Kohn 1999a)

“In that case, 30 years,” the master replied.  His explanation:  “If you have one eye on how close you are to achieving your goal, that leaves only one eye for your task.

Grades create a preference for the easiest possible task

They remind us just how long it’s been clear there’s something wrong with what we’re doing as well as just how little progress we’ve made in acting on that realization.

  Collecting information doesn’t require tests, and sharing that information doesn’t require grades.  In fact, students would be a lot better off without either of these relics from a less enlightened age.

“That the principle of waging war for an object which may be obtained by a treaty, is justly to be questioned.”

In response to Pontiac’s Rebellion, officials in London issued the Proclamation of 1763, prohibiting further colonial settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains, reserving those lands exclusively for Natives. It also banned the sale of Native land to private individuals.

Smallpox had broken out already. When two Native leaders tried to broker a cease fire with the British, the British gave them “two blankets and a handkerchief out of the Small Pox hospital.”

group of men and women prophets

They were united under Pontiac, an Ottawa chief, and follower of Neolin, a Delaware religious prophet