Indian Reorganization Pros And Cons

Superior Essays
Native Americans have had an estimated 1.5 billion acres of land taken from them by the United States (The Invasion of America). Nearly every tribe’s land has been greatly reduced by white settlers, whether by forceful removal or sneaky laws and enactments. Losing so much land can be devastating to a nation. The location of a nation can determine the natural resources that can be used, the size and population, and the territorial jurisdiction. Land not only provides economic opportunity, but is also a “hallmark of identity”, a “barometer of community integrity”, and “a repository for […] the remains of ancestors and their artifacts, the cornerstones of worldviews, and moral lessons from the past” (d). Native Americans often have a spiritual …show more content…
The Indian Reorganization Act was a law that allowed tribes to once again govern themselves, given that they created a Constitution that was approved by the United States government. Some tribes wrote their own Constitution, but many tried to make it as similar to the United States Constitution as possible, or even used a template provided to them by the United States government. The Winnebago and Muckleshoot Constitutions both try to appeal to the United States government by using the same format as the United States Constitution, writing it in English, and leaving out any form of religion. The structure of their Constitutions are exactly the same, the only difference being the variation of content, so it is likely that they both used a template that was given to them by the United States government. The two are organized by articles that are divided into sections, with an opening preamble. In both Constitutions, the territorial jurisdiction is outlined in Article I, and an extensive list of land laws is recorded in Article …show more content…
The Muckleshoot tribe of Washington, composed of descendents of multiple Western Washington tribes, was reduced when a conflict between Natives and whites lead to cession treaties in 1855. A later meeting between Native tribes and white settlers of Washington lead to the establishment of the Muckleshoot reservation that all the tribes would eventually be grouped into; however, they did not receive all the land that was promised to them (History of the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe), and it was decreased even more by the Dawes Act. The boundaries of the land they were left with are defined in Article I Section 2, which go on to say that “... [the jurisdiction] shall extend to such other lands as may be hereafter added,” opening the possibility of extending them. Many sections of Article VIII end with similar phrases that acknowledge potential land extension or allow the tribe to use land in certain circumstances in order to increase the likelihood of gaining more land in the future. For example, Section 2, which describes how unallotted land shall be dealt with, ends with the phrase “or otherwise used by the tribe as hereinafter provided.” There is also an entire section, Section 12, devoted to describing the conditions in which “tribal funds may used [...] to

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    The Indian Reorganization Act was a combination of good and bad. It can be viewed as bad due to the fact that it was the National governments plan to further transform the Native Americans. They passed the Indian Reorganization act to have the tribes run a government just like the National government. However, The Native Americans had their own culture, and they held a lot of pride to that. The government was unhappy with the Native American’s unwillingness to disregard their lifestyle and become a part of their society.…

    • 384 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    However, allotments might be vended after a constitutional period of time, and extra land not allotted was released to immigrants. The Dawes Severalty Act was created to build trust fund to accumulate and dispense proceeds advantageous for agricultural and grazing purposes on Native American…

    • 479 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    There are similarities between the two governments but the structure of the Constitution is better than its predecessor the Articles of Confederation. To support this claim, there are multiple forms of textual evidence that can be used. To start, when the Constitution was first introduced as an improvement to the A.of C. two noteworthy rebellions are caused. (Doc. D and Doc. E.)…

    • 727 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Congress not being able to create a tax was solved with Article I Section 8. The disputes between states the framers hoped would be settled under Article III,…

    • 509 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Imagine a world where there weren’t consequences to the decisions that have been made regarding the “discovery” of the Americas and the unethical treatment made towards the Native Americans. Would the indigenous people have more rights? Would they be more successful as a nation now without the involvement of the white man? Surely the answer would be yes, however it is too late to ask ourselves questions like that. This essay will look at two court cases described in Walter Echo-Hawk’s book, In the Courts of the Conqueror, a book that details ten of the most negatively impactful court cases in Unites States history regarding the treatment of Native Americans and how they are still being impacted to this very day by the rulings of those cases.…

    • 1027 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    2. One of the most life-threatening deficits that the American Indians had to face because of the United States was the loss of their land. In the case of Johnson V. McIntosh, Johnson bought land from a Native American tribe, The Piankeshaw, in what is now known as Illinois. Later, when the United States actually acquired Illinois, McIntosh obtained a land patent for the same land from the United States Government. The US Supreme Court found that people such as Johnson were not allowed to buy land directly from the Native Americans because the land wasn’t technically theirs to sell.…

    • 1060 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    With the Constitution the federal law is the supreme law but limits the federal government to only the rights labeled in the Constitution. The Constitution is a stronger document that does not allow loopholes like the Articles of Confederation. With this strong document there is a greater chance the document will last much longer and not allow for many interpretations because of its precise…

    • 629 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    First of all, the structure and tone of the two constitutions are very similar. Both of their structures contains rules and laws. They explain the rules in a very clear way, allowing them to have a very precise tone. Although they are similar, they are also different. The Iroquois Constitution is more like a story.…

    • 837 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    How Democratic Was Andrew Jackson? Andrew Jackson the democrat? More like Andrew Jackson the DEMONcrat! Andrew Jackson is considered to be one of the most famous presidents in American history because of his “democratic” views. The era of the “common man” marked the beginning for American democracy where ordinary people had a say in the government.…

    • 1166 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In the articles, the authors highlight important notions such as “sovereignty,” “recognition,” “separateness,” “domestic dependent nations,” “dominate the physical space,” “reform the minds,” and “absorb the economic”. The authors argue that the legal and juridical sovereignty of American Indian provides them with the right to maintain and protect their traditional distinct political and cultural communities. In this pretext, to deal with the growing environmental problems at an alarming level, the tribal governments have inherent and statutory right to set their own environmental standards to meet the emerging environmental challenges. These challenges are serious threats to their socio-cultural, economic, politicolegal, spatial, and temporal…

    • 1111 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    Native American Policies during the Gilded Age Anthony Ciccariello 01 May 2016 HIST407 D001 American Military University Since the North American continent was discovered and inhabited by Europeans there was a distance or gap of misunderstanding between the settlers and the indigenous people. This distance and difference in way of life did not end after the inhabitants created their own country and won their independence from the Great Britain. The American government and the people of the United States began treating Native Americans differently in the years following the Revolutionary War, as westward expansion became more and more important.…

    • 2168 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    On May 28th of the year 1830, President Andrew Jackson signed off on a law named the Indian Removal Policy. This granted the United States Government the right to negotiate with the Native American tribes about relocating the Natives from their current home to land west of the Mississippi River. This law was beneficial to the Native Americans on several accounts. The law ended immediate conflict between the Native Americans and the European American Settlers harassing them, it gave them new land to settle instead of just leaving them with no place to go, and even though some relocations were forced instead of voluntary, the law stated that the Native Americans would be provided with protection and aid during and after their relocation.  The…

    • 1408 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    I. Introduction “Basic Call to Consciousness” is a collection of papers delivered at a conference in Geneva in 1977 by request of several groups such as IITC (International Indian Treaty Council) to create a process to recognize the rights of indigenous nations and peoples which could shed light on the economic and social realities in which Indians live. Chief Oren Lyons, John Mohawk, and Jose Barreiro were the three individuals selected to author the papers. The Haudenosaunee Grand Council would then revise these papers to produce a final draft. However, acts of discrimination abroad and frustration would present obstacles to the Haudenosaunee delegation but they knew that if Native Americans were to gain recognition both in the present and in the future, they would have to overcome. In order to understand the significance of this monumental event, it is important to discuss the following themes: the assertion of self-determination as it relates to indigenous peoples in the Americas ranging from physical acts to the countering of historic legislation.…

    • 1390 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    NAGPRA

    • 1080 Words
    • 5 Pages

    As Europeans spread into the New World, their sense of superiority and entitlement can be found in the various laws that failed to protect the indigenous people’s culture. The passage of NAGPRA (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act) in 1990 would slowly begin to rectify the hurt, damage, and atrocities committed in the name of science. For many Native American’s not only was their land taken, the remains of their ancestors were removed and carted off. The remains along with cultural goods became collectibles, which were studied and later displayed in many of our nation’s museums. Native inhabitants were placed on reservations, coming under further control of the Federal government.…

    • 1080 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    As Europeans expanded across the nation the status of Native Americans “changed from a majority culture of peoples living in sovereign nations to a disadvantaged minority living apart from mainstream U.S culture and subordinate to U.S law” (Shaw et.al.2015:31). The model of economic/political disempowerment applies to the Native Americans as seen through the Indian nations loss of land, power, and independence, all of which has had lasting consequences. An example of such model is the decline of sovereignty, in the beginning period of Sovereignty (1700s-1830s) native nations and the British/U. S government entered treaties as co-equals when exchanging demands, doing such over 400 treaties were signed between the groups which suggest that there was a respect for the native communities as being independent nations (Wk:3, Lecture 2). The period of sovereignty declined steadily as Europeans expanded westward which put white settlers into frequent contact with the native population. The white settlers greedily craved the natives land and resources which created conflict that they thought they could resolve with treaties but the growing U.S population proved to be too much to peacefully resolve with treaties.…

    • 1290 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays