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Overview of the Dawes Act
When Columbus first discovered North America in the late fifteenth Century, a precedent for the treatment of the natives living in the newly discovered land was established. Navtives were seen as inferior and because of this their land was often taken from them. They were seen as less than human and many were killed through the implementation of slave labor on the native population and also because they were extremely susceptible to European diseases. This type of treatment of natives was carried on through the decades. When more and more Europeans migrated to North America, specifically to the area now known as the United States , more and more land was taken from Native Americans. This led to mistrust and rivalry between the newly arrived white people and the natives. Many wars broke out between the two parties and there were many casualties on both sides. Eventually the whites gained dominance over the Native Americans and began to abuse their power by taking away the land that they had promised the Indians. The Indian Removal Act implemented by Andrew Jackson is an example of a blatant abuse of power shown by the United States government. The trend of taking Native American land continued through the nineteenth century.
On February 8th, 1887, the Dawes Act came into effect under the commission of Henry Dawes. This authorized the President to take land from the Native American reservations and divide it into small land portions. Each family was given 160 acres of land. The expectation was that they would live on the land and cultivate it. The intention of the Act was to break up tribal relations and essentially Americanize the Indian people. In the process, Native Americans were forced to turn from their culture and abide by the rules forced upon them. In Section 8, the Act specifies certain Native American tribes that were exempt from the Act. Such groups included the Cherokees, Creeks, and Choctaws. Later, however, under the Cleveland administration, the law extended to include these tribes. Negotiations ensued to allow the Five Civilized Tribes joint ownership of common property in exchange for the abolition of tribal relations and the recognition on their part of state and federal laws. Although the purpose of the Act was to protect property rights of Indians, the law did not achieve the desired effect. Land rushes in the 1890’s began to mark the deterioration of the intention of the Dawes Act. In addition, the land location of the land allotments made farming nearly impossible. The Native Americans also did not have the proper equipment or skills to farm the land. In the end, the Dawes Severalty Act proved to enrich the white people since Native Americans rights were not represented. Despite the fact that the stated purpose was to help the Indian people with property ownership, the poor planning of the Act produced results favorable to white land speculators.
The Dawes Severalty Act had several damaging short term effects on the Native Americans and their culture. First of all, the government did not teach the Native Americans how to properly farm or provide them with adequate supplies and tools. In addition, most of the land given to them was not fit for agriculture activities. Thus the Native Americans had very little success farming and became economically very poor. Secondly, the US government took advantage of their control of the Indian land and used much of the land for their own purposes and sold it to white settlers. The Native Americans ended up unfairly losing much of their land. Secondly, Native American children were forced into boarding schools where they lost much of their culture and identity. At the boarding schools the supervisors made the children dress, act, talk, and learn activities like white people. As a result, Native Americans were unfairly forced to believe their culture was wrong and lost many of their traditional ways.
In 1928 the abuses of the Dawes Act was revealed through the implementation of the Miriam Report. Congress assigned 1000 prominent citizens and Native Americans to examine accusations of corruption and abuse encouraged by the Dawes Act. The group compiled an 800 page report which showed massive fraud and misappropriation by the leaders of the Dawes organization on Native Americans. The Miriam Report led to the repeal of the Dawes Act in 1934, but did not reinstate the land taken from the Native Americans from 1887 until 1934. In an attempt to increase Native American self government and independence, The Indian Reorganization Act was implemented, which Native Americans had the choice to accept or reject. This act designed a credit fund to encourage small business, increased efforts to recruit Native Americans into posts in the Bureau of Indian Affairs, set up an Indian Court system to deal with non-federal crimes, and established a mechanism for Indians to pool their land, purchase new parcels and own land as a corporate entity. Though the act had many good intentions it failed to gain much momentum because of the hindrance the Dawes Act already had created. Many acts to follow were put into action in an attempt to heal relations with the Native Americans, like the "Termination and Relocation" phase of the Reorganization Act of 1954, Public Law 101-644, and the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990. These acts did little more than hinder Native American opportunity by creating more relocation and forcing strict legitimization of Native American ancestry.
Greenwald, Emily. "Dawes Severalty Act." Book Rags. 27 May 2009 <https://www.bookrags.com/research/dawes-severalty-act-aaw-02/>.
"Ethnic Cleansing?." International Journal on World Peace. 22 May 2009 <https://www.dickshovel.com/cleansing.html>.