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The Indian tribes of the Great Plains made an agreement with the US. This agreement outlined the area where the indians held sovereignty, the beginning of the reservation system, and tried to divide the indian tribes into two colonies. The Indians agreed in exchange for a promise of food, shelter, and non-disturbance by the US government...this promise wasn't kept.

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Signed by Abraham Lincoln, it could give farmers up to 160 acres of land, in exchange for them working on it, increasing its value, and paying nominal fees for 5 years. This attracted multitudes of Americans, many of them young and poor, who wanted to take advantage of the opportunity. Many of the lands now open to homesteaders were Indian lands.

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A brutal massacre at Sand Creek, Colorado, was led by colonel J.M Chivington and his regiment. Innocent men, women and children were murdered, scalped, and mutilated..they apparently thought they were immune. The men of the regiment reportedly killed the Indians to ensure they would be no "disturbance" in the future.

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In this treaty, the US abandoned the Bozeman trail and Powder River Country. The Sioux were be given land rights to the Black Hills and hunting rights to surrounding territories. However, this treaty was short lived, especially following more gold discoveries in the 1870s.

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1869: Completion of the Transcontinental railroad 

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1869: Completion of the Transcontinental railroad 

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This railroad would bring thousands of settlers, many of them farmers, who looked forward to the prospect of goods and services shipped by rail. The rail workers made a sport of killing local buffalo populations, and tracks were laid straight through Indian land. This contributed to the further misplacing of the Indians and the growing American demand to move them out of the way.

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In the early reservations (formed by the Laramie treaties) the Indians were still attached to a nomadic, kin-centered lifestyle. However, Christian reformers and other humanitarians insisted that the Indians adopt white ways of life, like the English language and Christianity. The near elimination of the buffalo gave the the Indians fewer and fewer options of survival, and the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 practically forced them into a state of dependence.

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Colonel Custer led an expedition into the Black Hills, in Sioux territory gained by the 2nd Laramie treaty, and claimed he had discovered gold. In response to the influx of gold-seekers, the Sioux asked for aid from neighboring tribes, and Custer's 7th regiment charged into battle. His regiment was severely outnumbered, and he lost, though this conflict was followed by numerous others where the Indians weren't so successful.

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Somewhat similar to the Homestead Act of 1862, this act divided the Indians into legal entities with artificial family heads. It gave each family head 160 acres, and they would get full rights to their holdings in exchange for assimilating to white ways and living on the land for 25 years. This ignored the indian's inherent reliance on tribal land ownership, and removed more than half of the reservation lands they had earlier.

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The humanitarians, strict in their treatment of the Indians, allied with the Federal government in punishing the Dakota Sioux indians for performing a ghost dance. Two hundred Indian women, men and children were brutally massacred. This was a message to all who refused to assimilate to the ways of the whites, and after the "battle", 20 Medals of Honor were given.

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1954: The Indian Health Service is Created 

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1954: The Indian Health Service is Created 

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President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed an act removing the control of Indian health from the BIA to the Public Health Service. It was meant to provide better heath care and living support to the Indians on the reservations. This was done following the BIA's failure to improve Indian living conditions by moving them to urban areas in 1953.

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1980: United States vs. Sioux Nation of Indians 

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1980: United States vs. Sioux Nation of Indians 

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Only 90 years after the fact, the Supreme Court ruled that the reservation lands that had been taken following the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 (the Black Hills in particular) violated the 2nd treaty of Fort Laramie. The US offered money to the Indians for the hills, 108 million, but the Indians didn't accept it. They claimed the hills were not for sale, and wanted them to be returned.