The key factors that shaped U.S. Indian policy and led to the fractured state of Indian land tenure in Indian Country today include the countless federal laws and legislative acts.  The single most devastating federal policy was the General Allotment Act of 1887.

The U.S. federal government began the policy of allotting Indian land as early as 1798.  Several treaties with Indian tribes included provisions that stated land would be divided among their individual members.  After 1871, Congress declared that no further treaties would be made and all future dealings would be conducted through federal legislation.

There were reasons for the allotment process to be supported.  First, many considered the Indian way of life and collective use of land to be inappropriate.  They also saw the individual ownership of private property as an essential part of civilization.  This would give Indian people a reason to stay in one place, cultivate land, disregard the cohesiveness of the Tribe, and adopt the practices of the American settler population.

At the time, many thought that Indians had too much land.  They were eager to see their lands opened up for settlement.  As a result, Congress in 1877 passed the General Allotment Act.  This authorized the president, Grover Cleveland, to survey the Indian tribal land and divide the area into allotments for individual Indians and families.

The Allotment Act was applied to reservations when, in the President’s opinion, it was advantageous for particular Indian nations.  Members of the selected tribe or reservation were given permission to select pieces of land — usually about 160 acres in size — for themselves and their children, or the tracts were assigned by the agency superintendent.

If the amount of reservation land exceeded the amount needed for allotment, the federal government could negotiate to purchase the land from the tribes and sell it to non-Indian settlers.  As a result, 60 million acres were either ceded outright or sold to the government for non-Indian homesteaders and corporations as “surplus lands.”

Under the policy of allotment, Indian land ownership was not the same as land ownership for other homesteaders.  Non-Indian settlers could sell or dispose of their land because they had control and ownership of their ground.  Under the General Allotment Act, Indian allottees were considered “incompetent” to handle their land affairs; therefore, the U. S. would retain legal title to the land as trustee for the allottee.

As long as the allotment was held in trust by the federal government, the Indian landholder could use the land but not sell or lease it without the federal government’s approval.  However, the Act stated that 25 years after the allotment was issued, Indian allottees would be given complete control and ownership of their land.  At that point, the land owner could sell or lease it to anyone.

Despite the original safeguards in place to help Indian people retain their land, the General Allotment Act caused Indian land holdings to plunge from 138 million acres in 1887 to 48 million acres by 1934 when allotment ended.

This happened for several reasons.  First, during the allotment of many reservations, the most productive land was identified as “surplus to Indian needs” and sold off to white settlers or other business interests.  In addition, many Indian people did not become the farmers the U.S. government wanted them to be.

In 1928, a government report entitled “The Problem of Indian Administration” sharply criticized the policy of allotment and the U.S. Indian Service in general.  This report proved the destructiveness of their policies and resulted in significant changes.

On May 16, 1904, Mary Sully, at the age of 53, was once again a widow (first husband was John Kinkaid) and left with eight children.  After Jack’s death, she continued to live on Sully Flats for several years.  In 1907-08, she and the children homesteaded northwest of Dallas in Tripp County.  She lived and worked the homestead with the children until they were grown and on their own.

Samuel (Sam) was born in 1893 and never married.  He worked on the homestead with his mother until he passed away in 1932.  Mary was born on Christmas Day, December 25, 1851 in Dakota Territory.  She was 86 years old when she passed away in 1937.

After Jack’s death, Mary had numerous conflicts with Tribal, B.I.A., and federal officials.  Two of these conflicts made the headlines in many newspapers in the area and across the country.  The first was when in 1906 she filed for a pension from the government because Jack had been a soldier in the Union Army during the early days of the Civil War.  He drifted to Dakota after his term of enlistment had expired.

The second conflict that made headlines across the country started in early 1908 when, as a Sioux Indian, she filed a claim for herself and children for government land under the allotting act of 1887.  This bitter and personal struggle for the land lasted until the United States Supreme Court made a decision in 1912.

Mrs. Sully’s lawyer, George Jeffers of Dallas, because of his involvement in the case, became the most knowledgeable person in the entire country on the various allotting acts passed by Congress.  He was often called to Washington to advise congressmen.

In 1986, President Ronald Regan said:  “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.’”

 

Author Clarence Shoemaker, originally published in the Gregory Times-Advocate on March 22, 2023