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About ICWA " NICWA. NICWA. (2020, December 23). https://www.nicwa.org/about-icwa/.

Friedman, L. (2020, March 25). Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Wins a Victory in Dakota Access Pipeline Case. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/25/climate/dakota-access-pipeline-sioux.html.

Hirsch, M. (2014). The end of Indian treaty-making . American Indian Magazine . https://www.americanindianmagazine.org/sites/default/files/styles/media_style_for_slider/public/2019-07/peace_commission.jpg?itok=kq4RkMRh.

History.com Editors. (2017, December 8). Indian Reservations. History.com. https://www.history.com/topics/native-american-history/indian-reservations#section_5&gid=ci023930a25000248a&pid=9_nypl_native-american_blackfoot.

Khan Academy. (n.d.). The Dawes Act (Dawes Severalty Act) (article). Khan Academy. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/the-gilded-age/american-west/a/the-dawes-act.

Landis, B. (1996). Carlisle Indian Industrial School History. https://home.epix.net/~landis/histry.html.

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In 2007 the Sioux tribe signed a resolution stating that pipelines are not to be on their land. In contrast, an oil company had plans to build a pipeline through sacred land in North Dakota. The original route for this pipeline went through Bismarck, a 90% white area, that said they did not want a pipeline near their water. The route was then moved onto Native land. Dave Archambault II had this to say about it, “Whenever there’s a resource that needs to be exploited, our lands just kept getting taken.”(Dave Archambault II 2016). In 2014 they started steamrolling through areas that threaten the Sioux's water supply and land. A Sioux tribe member, Ladonna Allard, went on Facebook and asked for help protesting the pipeline. Sure enough, people were willing. Three hundred-plus tribes came out to support the Sioux tribe, along with many allies came in support.  The protests were peaceful yet aggressive, but the police did not see it as such, and the governor called a state of emergency. People got pepper-sprayed, attacked by police dogs, and by the end of it, 135 arrests. Even with all the protests for the pipeline not to be built or construction to stop, the pipeline was laid, and it affects Native culture, health, and land.

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During the 70s, a large number of Indigenous children were forcefully taken from their families and culture. It was upsetting to tribes because the family was often fit enough to take in the child. State child welfare and private adoption agencies were responsible for this. In 1978 the Indian Child Welfare Act was put in place to prevent this issue by keeping children with their families and culture. This created progress but more times than not, Native children are placed out-of-home.  To prevent out-of-home placement ICWA (ich-wah) requires caseworkers to make considerations. When it comes to taking on ICWA cases, caseworkers have to do the following; providing active efforts to the family, identifying a placement that fits ICWA, notifying the tribe and parents of the custody proceeding, and actively trying to get the tribe and parents involved with the proceeding. Another way ICWA tries to keep families together is by adding other stipulations in the adoption process. When Native children are adopted, consent must wait ten days after the birth and stated before a judge. ICWA greatly benefits Native children by attempting to keep them close to their culture. Lukas Angus is one child that benefitted from ICWA, ensuring he had connections to his culture, family, and community.  Lukas has strong ties to his community and culture that would not have happened if not for ICWA. Lukas acknowledges this, “What if I didn’t you know end up back with my family things would have been totally different I would have been a different person. This culture that I carry would be gone.” (Lukas Angus 2016).

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Forced Sterilization of Native Women, 1960's-70's

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Forced Sterilization of Native Women, 1960's-70's

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When Native Americans were forced onto reservations, many were highly prone to poverty and became reliant on the U.S. government for things such as health care. The more Native women relied on government health care, the more susceptible they were to sterilization in the 60s and 70s. Indian Health Service (IHS) and participating physicians did not see Native women as intelligent enough to raise children. As this narrative became prominent, participating physicians began to perform sterilizations to “help” Native Americans financially. The thought was that if Native Americans did not children that they could increase their economic status. However, forced sterilization stemmed from the eugenics movement. The eugenics movement was all about getting rid of “inferior” races; by taking away the option to have children, the Native American birth rate drastically dropped to 1.8% by the 80s. Oliver Wendell Holmes’ was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court and not opposed to this movement. In the 1927 Buck v. Bell case, Holmes’ stated, “It is better for all the world if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind.”(Holmes’1927). Holmes' opinion would unofficially become the thought of physicians.  Sterilizations occurred without the consent of the women or complete knowledge. In some cases, women were told it could be reversed.  Physicians could do sterilizations on girls as young as eleven but more commonly performed on fourteen-year-olds and fifteen-year-olds. Native Americans thought of fertility as greatly valuable, making these sterilizations more than abusive and horrific, but stripping to Native culture. Women lost their economic and political power within tribes because they could not produce children. And government health care only covered the procedure itself, making them major health risks for women who could not afford the follow-up care.

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Homer P. Snyder proposed the Indian Citizenship act to recognize the thousands of Native Americans that fought in WW1. It was a federal law signed into law on June 2nd,1924, by President Calvin Coolidge. The law stated, “That all non-citizen Indians born within the territorial limits of the United States be, and they are hereby, declared to be citizens of the United States:”(ICA 1924). Most Tribes approved of the law, saying that it would secure a long-standing political identity. The law continued to states “provided that the granting of such citizenship shall not in any manner impair or otherwise affect the right of any Indian to tribal or other property.”(ICA 1924). However, some tribal leaders such as Santee Sioux and Charles Santee; that had concerns about preserving their Native identities. Tribes were mainly concerned about trusting the government that had previously taken their land and discriminated against them for decades. Although this law was meant to benefit Native Americans, there were some loopholes that the law had. Due to the law being federal, states could still oppress Natives by dictating whether they could vote or not. Natives born before June 2nd,1924 weren’t granted citizenship either. Even so, Native Americans did not have full citizenship or suffrage rights until 24 years after, in 1948.

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In 1924 congress approved the Meriam survey on the state of life on reservations. The results from it were shocking, and the Dawes act established some of these conditions. The Meriam report demanded reform from Congress, which eventually pushed them to pass an act on June 18th, 1934. The Indian Reorganization Act decreased federal control over tribal affairs. Native Americans gained more responsibility for their tribes and the ability to self-govern. Reorganization gave Native people their land back and jurisdiction over their tribe, as well as revolving credit. Revolving credit allowed many Indigenous peoples to improve their economic status, added land to reservations, and greatly improved the health and education of tribes. Although this act greatly benefited tribes, the government still found a way to fix their “Indian problem” by holding Natives on their land. Congress continued to have control over tribes, in the act; “Sec.2. The existing periods of trust placed upon any Indian lands and any reservation on alienation thereof are hereby extended and continued until otherwise directed by Congress.”(IRA 1934).  The government still found a way to fix their “Indian problem” by holding Natives on their land. Despite some of the control congress still held over Natives, this act created progress and reversed aspects of past acts.

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As the U.S. was expanding their land further west, white Americans saw Indigenous peoples as a big issue. In response, the government implemented the reservation system to keep Native Americans on their land, but Natives were seen as “uncivilized”.  Years before, they started fixing this problem by sending Native children to boarding schools, yet it wasn’t enough to assimilate Natives into American society. In 1887 President Grover Cleveland took it a step further, implementing the Dawes Act named after Henry L. Dawes. The objective was to make tribes more civilized by taking Native land and redistributing it. By redistributing land in the way Americans would have, Indigenous peoples were supposed to pick up on American ways. The federal government was authorized to break up tribal land and redistribute it into individual plots. If Natives accepted these allotments they could become U.S. citizens even so the allotments could only be used for personal use. The Dawes act says this stating, “in all cases where any tribe or band of Indians has been, or shall hereafter be, located upon any reservation created for their use.”(DA 1887). This act eliminated much of tribal culture because Native people share their land. One-fourth of the land could go to the head of a family, one-eighth of the land to a single person over eighteen or an orphan under eighteen, and any child born after January 8th, 1887 would get one-sixteenth of an allotment. This act impacted tribes immediately, although there were five tribes that it didn’t affect right away. The Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole tribes were seen as good tribes because they had already implemented much of American society. In 1898 the Curtis Act amended the Dawes Act to apply to these five tribes.

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White Americans started seeing Native people as an issue because they were “savage” and “uncivilized", the unofficial solution that white Americans and the government came up with was assimilation. The hope was that by exposing Native Americans to western culture and stripping them of their own, they would turn into “true” Americans. One official solution was boarding schools; the belief was that with vocational and religious training, Natives could assimilate. In 1868 the Navajo tribe signed a treaty stating that all children must go to boarding school. Years later in 1879 Carlisle Indian Boarding school was established by Richard H. Pratt. Richard Pratt's beliefs about Natives were a strong one, made evident in one of his speeches where he said “A great general has said that the only good Indian is a dead one,”(Pratt 1892). Pratt continued by saying “In a sense, I agree with the sentiment, but only in this: that all the Indian there is in the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him, save the man.”(Pratt 1892). By separating children from their parents, the schools could “kill the Indian” within these kids and make them true Americans. Students endured a lot of physical, mental, and even sexual abuse from staff. Some of the abuse included cutting boy's hair and confinement, which was much like a small jail cell, there were even special made handcuffs for children. More schools started emerging like Haskell Indian Nations and Sherman. The trauma still affects Native tribes with Indian boarding schools ending only 43 years ago, in 1978.

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Post-American revolution The President and The Secretary embraced treaties with Native Americans. After the Civil War treaties became frowned upon by many, resulting in the Appropriations Act in 1871. The reason? Post-Civil War government officials, Military men, reformers, and politicians saw treaties as a symbol of the issues within the U.S. Indian policy. The Nationalist ideology gained popularity with the emergence of the consolidated nation-state growing. Soon people thought that everything should become national, eliminating tribal independence. Henry B. Whipple said that Natives relied on the government too much and should no longer be seen as independent nations, and many agreed with him. In the 1860s, numerous treaties with tribes were made, but the disfavor of treaties gained momentum at the same time. Ely S. Parker stated that Indians should be “wards” of the government to eliminate the false sense of “national independence” Natives had. By 1871 this would become real-life for Indigenous peoples in the U.S., the appropriations act allowed the government to have total control over tribes who had previously had control. Tribes no longer could make decisions for themselves; The U.S. government now had more influence and control over tribes. Aside from the loss of independence, narratives of Indigenous people were enforced further; Aaron Sargent said that Indian tribes were “simply… not independent nations with whom we are to treat as our equals.”(Sargent 1871). The idea the Indigenous people needed America to survive became the only one once this act was put in place.