CS Knowledge Base

From the beginning of the European colonization of the Americas, Europeans often removed Indigenous peoples from their homelands. The means varied, including treaties made under considerable duress, forceful ejection, violence, and in a few cases voluntary moves based on mutual agreement. The removal caused many problems such as tribes losing the means of livelihood by being restricted to a defined area, poor quality of land for agriculture, and hostility between tribes.^[12]

Early English settlers in the Americas entered into treaties with Native American tribes as a method of legitimizing their conquests in the face of competing claims by the Spanish Empire and violent resistance from the tribes themselves.^[13] Applying the term "treaty" to such unequal relationships may seem paradoxical from a modern perspective because in modern English, the word "treaty" usually connotes an agreement between two states of theoretically equal sovereignty, not an agreement between conquered people and a conqueror.^[13] However, in premodern times, it was common for European princes to routinely enter into unequal treaties with lesser dependent powers.^[13]

The first reservation was established by the Treaty of Easton on August 29, 1758, between the chiefs of thirteen Native American nations, representing tribes of the Iroquois, Lenape (Delaware), and Shawnee, and the colonial governments of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Located in southern New Jersey, it was called Brotherton Indian Reservation^[14] and also Edgepillock^[15] or Edgepelick.^[16] The area was 3,284 acres (13.29 km²).^[15] Today it is called Indian Mills in Shamong Township.^[15][16]

In 1764 the British government's Board of Trade proposed the "Plan for the Future Management of Indian Affairs".^[17] Although never adopted formally, the plan established the British government's expectation that land would only be bought by colonial governments, not individuals, and that land would only be purchased at public meetings.^[17] Additionally, this plan dictated that the Indians would be properly consulted when ascertaining and defining the boundaries of colonial settlement.^[17]

The private contracts that once characterized the sale of Indian land to various individuals and groups—from farmers to towns—were replaced by treaties between sovereigns.^[17] This protocol was adopted by the United States Government after the American Revolution.^[17]

On March 11, 1824, U.S. Vice President John C. Calhoun founded the Office of Indian Affairs (now the Bureau of Indian Affairs) as a division of the United States Department of War (now the United States Department of Defense), to solve the land problem with 38 treaties with American Indian tribes.^[18]

The Marshall Trilogy is a set of three Supreme Court decisions in the early nineteenth century affirming the legal and political standing of Indian nations.

• Johnson v. McIntosh (1823), holding that private citizens could not purchase lands from Native Americans.
• Cherokee Nation v. Georgia (1831), holding the Cherokee nation a "domestic dependent nation", with a relationship to the United States like that of a "ward to its guardian".
• Worcester v. Georgia (1832), which laid out the relationship between tribes and the state and federal governments, stating that the federal government was the sole authority to deal with Indian nations.^[19]

Marshall's phrasing "laid the groundwork for future protection of tribal sovereignty by Marshall and his immediate successors, but the characterization also created an opportunity for much later courts to discover limits to tribal sovereignty inherent in domestic dependent status. Marshall's reference to tribes as 'wards' was to have an equally mixed history".^[20]

Indian Treaties, and Laws and Regulations Relating to Indian Affairs (1825) was a document signed by President Andrew Jackson^[21] in which he states that "we have placed the land reserves in a better state for the benefit of society" with approval of Indigenous reservations before 1850.^[22] The letter is signed by Isaac Shelby and Jackson. It discusses several regulations regarding the Native Americans and the approval of Indigenous segregation and the reservation system.

President Martin Van Buren negotiated a treaty with the Saginaw Chippewas in 1837 to build a lighthouse. The President of the United States of America was directly involved in the creation of new treaties regarding Indian Reservations before 1850. Van Buren stated that indigenous reservations are "all their reserves of land in the state of Michigan, on the principle of said reserves being sold at the public land offices for their benefit and the actual proceeds being paid to them."^[23] The agreement dictated that the indigenous tribe sell their land to build a lighthouse.^[23]

A treaty signed by John Forsyth, the Secretary of State on behalf of Van Buren, also dictates where indigenous peoples must live in terms of the reservation system in America between the Oneida People in 1838. This treaty allows the indigenous peoples five years on a specific reserve "the west shores of Saganaw bay".^[24] The creation of reservations for indigenous people of America could be as little as a five-year approval before 1850. Article two of the treaty claims "the reserves on the river Angrais and at Rifle river, of which said Indians are to have the usufruct and occupancy for five years." Indigenous people had restraints pushed on them by the five-year allowance.

Scholarly author Buck Woodard used executive papers from Governor William H. Cabell in his article, "Indian Land sales and allotment in Antebellum Virginia" to discuss Indigenous reservations in America before 1705, specifically in Virginia.^[25] He claims "the colonial government again recognized the Nottoway's land rights by treaty in 1713, at the conclusion of the Tuscaro War."^[25] The indigenous peoples of America had land treaty agreements as early as 1713.^[25]

The American Indigenous Reservation system started with "the Royal Proclamation of 1763, where Great Britain set aside an enormous resource for Indians in the territory of the present United States."^[26] The United States put forward another act when "Congress passed the Indian Removal Act in 1830".^[27] A third act pushed through was "the federal government relocated "portions of [the] 'Five Civilized Tribes' from the southeastern states in the Non-Intercourse Act of 1834."^[28] All three of these laws set into motion the Indigenous Reservation system in the United States of America, resulting in the forceful removal of Indigenous peoples into specific land Reservations.^[27]

Scholarly author James Oberly discusses "The Treaty of 1831 between the Menominee Nation and the United States"^[29] in his article, "Decision on Duck Creek: Two Green Bay Reservations and Their Boundaries, 1816–1996", showing yet another treaty regarding Indigenous Reservations before 1850. There is a conflict between the Menomee Nation and the State of Wisconsin and "the 1831 Menomee Treaty … ran the boundary between the lands of the Oneida, known in the Treaty as the "New York Indians".^[29] This Treaty from 1831 is the cause of conflicts and is disputed because the land was good hunting grounds.

The Trade and Intercourse Act of 1834 says "In the 1834 Indian Trade and Intercourse Act, the United States defined the boundaries of Indian County."^[30] Also, "For Unrau, Indigenous Country is less on Indigenous homeland and more a place where the U.S. removed Indians from east of the Mississippi River and applied unique laws."^[30] The United States of America applied laws on Indigenous Reservations depending on where they were located like the Mississippi River. This act came too, because "the federal government began to compress Indigenous lands because it needed to send troops to Texas during the Mexican-American War and protect American immigration traveling to Oregon and California."^[31] The Federal Government of America had their own needs and desires for Indigenous Land Reservations. He says, "the reconnaissance of explorers and other American officials understood that Indigenous Country possessed good land, bountiful game, and potential mineral resources."^[31] The American Government claimed Indigenous land for their own benefits with these creations of Indigenous Land Reservations .

States such as Texas had their own policy when it came to Indian Reservations in America before 1850. Scholarly author George D. Harmon discusses Texas' own reservation system which "Prior to 1845, Texas had inaugurated and pursued her own Indian Policy of the U.S."^[32] Texas was one of the States before 1850 that chose to create their own reservation system as seen in Harmon's article, "The United States Indian Policy in Texas, 1845–1860."^[33] The State of "Texas had given only a few hundred acres of land in 1840, for the purpose of colonization".^[32] However, "In March 1847, … [a] special agent [was sent] to Texas to manage the Indian affairs in the State until Congress should take some definite and final action."^[34] The United States of America allowed its states to make up their own treaties such as this one in Texas for the purpose of colonization.

The passage of the Indian Removal Act of 1830 marked the systematization of a U.S. federal government policy of moving Native populations away from European-populated areas, whether forcibly or voluntarily.

One example was the Five Civilized Tribes, who were removed from their historical homelands in the Southeastern United States and moved to Indian Territory, in a forced mass migration that came to be known as the Trail of Tears. Some of the lands these tribes were given to inhabit following the removals eventually became Indian reservations.

In 1851, the United States Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Act which authorized the creation of Indian reservations in Indian Territory (which became Oklahoma). Relations between white settlers and Natives had grown increasingly worse as the settlers encroached on territory and natural resources in the West.^[35]

In 1868, President Ulysses S. Grant pursued a "Peace Policy" as an attempt to avoid violence.^[36] The policy included a reorganization of the Indian Service, with the goal of relocating various tribes from their ancestral homes to parcels of lands established specifically for their inhabitation. The policy called for the replacement of government officials by religious men, nominated by churches, to oversee the Indian agencies on reservations in order to teach Christianity to the Native American tribes. The Quakers were especially active in this policy on reservations.^[37]

The policy was controversial from the start. Reservations were generally established by executive order. In many cases, white settlers objected to the size of land parcels, which were subsequently reduced. A report submitted to Congress in 1868 found widespread corruption among the federal Native American agencies and generally poor conditions among the relocated tribes.

The Indian Appropriations Act of 1871 had two significant sections. First, the Act ended United States recognition of additional Native American tribes or independent nations and prohibited additional treaties. Thus, it required the federal government no longer interact with the various tribes through treaties, but rather through statutes: