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Assimilation and the Dawes Act of 1887
Assimilation and the Dawes Act of 1887
Throughout the majority of the history of the United States, Native Americans that had been subject to the federal government's whims had been treated as “wards of the state,” with the various organizations at the state and federal level interfacing directly with them as “guardians.” The chief among these organizations being what is known today as the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), which oversaw federal regulations regarding Native Americans. Standard practice throughout the 19th century was for officials to interact directly with tribes, which were officially recognized by the federal government as semi-sovereign bodies, though many Native American bands did not operate under the same tribal organization system throughout the 1800’s, leading to confusion as time went on. As settlers began to illegally claim and control lands owned by Native Americans and protected by treaties with the federal government, the need for a shift in policy in the late 19th century resulted in the General Allotment Act of 1887, also known as the Dawes Act for its congressional sponsor Henry Dawes.
The Dawes Act reorganized territory owned by Native Americans in the United States through a policy of allotment and resulted in surplus land titles now held in trust by the federal government being opened to white settlers, creating a situation in which Native Americans across the country lost a combined total of two thirds of their organized land, most of which was sold to westward-moving families. Alongside this, boarding schools were established to replace Native American culture with Anglo-American traditions, which aimed to convert the Native Americans into homesteaders. Over time, this method of “forced assimilation” became the dominant strategy for dealing with what legislators called the “Indian Problem,” which was reinforced by federal law such as the Dawes Act. Difficulties from land and water rights also arose during this period, leading many Native American communities to become economically devastated, with many groups experiencing setbacks similar to those felt by the general populace during the Great Depression far in advance of the Depression itself in 1929.
Copy of the Dawes-Severalty Act of 1887, accessed from Library of Congress. The Indian Reorganization Act would eventually seek to completely replace the Dawes Act and end allotment.
The Progressive Era and the 1928 Meriam Report
The Progressive Era and the 1928 Meriam Report
Prior to the passage of the Indian Reorganization Act, the relationship between the United States and Native Americans had been mostly dictated by local concerns rather than being directly influenced by federal policy. In his book A Fateful Time, historian Elmer Rusco aptly claimed that, “actual Indian policy had been in practice, for most of our national history, little more than the summation of local decision-making,” with the notable exceptions of the Dawes Act of 1887 and the IRA in 1934. During the “Progressive Era” from about 1900 to the start of the First World War, the concept of the “tribal alternative,” which advocated for Native American societies existing separate from the structure of the United States on the basis of cultural differences. Advocates of the tribal alternative believed that Native American governments deserved sovereignty and should be facilitated to allow Native Americans to achieve goals they set themselves. Bills proposing the tribal alternative did not appear in federal legislative circles until the 1910’s, many of which focused on providing power to mixed-race Indians, while full-blood Native Americans were excluded from more rights because they would not meet competency requirements.
After decades of damage at the hands of federal allotment programs and assimilation policies, Native American society became the subject of a nongovernmental study that ultimately resulted in the 1928 Meriam Report, which was a comprehensive document that detailed Native Americans and their poor status on reservations that eventually was accepted by federal officials as proof that the allotment policy had failed. Conducted with an eye for examining educational opportunities, health, and the legal possibilities afforded to Native Americans at the time, the Meriam Report convinced federal legislators that change was necessary, though many policy makers continued to believe that assimilation was the best option to remedying the poor conditions that Native Americans faced both on and off of reservations.
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