NAs Gilded Age

Question 1

Positive view

Answer 1

This was a period of positive change. The Plains Wars came to an end, and NAs benefitted from assimilationist policies which provided, education, cultural development and the opportunity to own land, as well as a process towards political citizenship

Question 2

Paul Johnson

Answer 2

Considers assimilation a positive development

Question 3

Battle of Little Bighorn

Answer 3

Victory against Custer at the Battle of Little Bighorn (1876) convinced some of the need for a more moderate approach towards NAs

Question 4

Boarding schools

Answer 4

Schools like Carlisle Indian School (est. 1879) provided children with a better education, with students going on to form the first civil rights groups

Question 5

Better jobs

Answer 5

Education and vocational training provided NAs with the opportunity to find better jobs, with some working in Indian agency officers, interpreters or army scouts

Question 6

Healthcare on reservations

Answer 6

Reservations gave NAs the opportunity to access better healthcare - necessary given low life expectancy and incidence of death and disease

Question 7

Preservation of culture

Answer 7

The reservations, despite assimilationist intentions, allowed tribal life to continue, which perpetuated their culture and sense of belonging

Question 8

Navajo success

Answer 8

The Navajo tribe made considerable gains from reservation life, growing a herd of 15,000 sheep and goats to 1.7 million. They were rewarded by the government with 10.5 million additional acres of land

Question 9

Land ownership

Answer 9

The Dawes Act turned some NAs into landowners, each with 160 acres, giving them a mechanism through which citizenship could be achieved

Question 10

Courts

Answer 10

Reservations in 1890 had their own courts where minor crimes were tried by Indian judges

Question 11

Helen Hunt Jackson

Answer 11

Her 1881 book ‘A Century of Dishonour’ was a scathing indictment of government policy towards NAs, improving knowledge of the cause and demonstrating the existence of a sympathetic sect

Question 12

Mixed view

Answer 12

In some ways, this period represented progress from what went before it as Americans were no longer trying to exterminate NAs. however, the policies implemented were paternalistic and generally unwanted, with the Dawes Act crucially undermining self-determination.

Question 13

Philanthropic organisations

Answer 13

White philanthropic organisations proliferated in the closing decades of the 19th century, one of the most famous being the Indian Rights Association (est. 1882). However, membership was largely motivated by their own religious beliefs and considered NAs as existing in an earlier stage of civilisation.

Question 14

Motivations for Dawes Act

Answer 14

Henry Dawes was convinced that the ownership of land would be a civilising influence on NAs. Many people agreed and were consulted about the policy

Question 15

Negative view

Answer 15

This was a period of regress, as NAs lost much of their independence, tribal land erosion was accelerated and cultural traditions significantly damaged.

Question 16

Medicine Lodge Treaty

Answer 16

In 1867, at the Treaty of Medicine Lodge the Cheyenne and Arapho tribes agreed to be removed and placed on reservation land

Question 17

Buffalo War

Answer 17

The ‘Buffalo War’ of 1873-4 was a last desperate attempt of the Arapho, Cheyenne, Comanche and Kiowa to save the few remaining buffalo herds from white hunters in Oklahoman and Texas

Question 18

Ghost Dance

Answer 18

In 1890 the Ghost Dance spread across the Sioux Reservation, disturbing BIA agents

Question 19

Wounded Knee

Answer 19

In the massacre of Wounded Knee, troops opened fire on a band of Lakota Sioux, killing over 200 men, women and children

Question 20

Failure of schools

Answer 20

Reservation schools offered very poor quality education - low level and geared towards trade and manual work only. Most of those educated in boarding schools found no employment opportunities so returned to reservation life, but were considered ‘untrustworthy’ by those on the reservation

Question 21

Appropriation act

Answer 21

The 1871 Indian Appropriation Act abandoned treaty-making and converting NA policy to a unilateral process

Question 22

Failure of reservations

Answer 22

Denied civil rights as ‘wards of the state’, segregated from society, land was poor and often impossible to cultivate, many Indians became dependant on aid which fluctuated due to corrupt officials

Question 23

Reservation illness

Answer 23

Numerous epidemics and starvations, including droughts in the 1880s, meant that by 1900 only 100,000 of the 240,000 Plains Indians remained

Question 24

Reservation social issues

Answer 24

NAs were encouraged to adopt Christianity and deny traditional religion, and easy availability of alcohol led to alcoholism becoming rife

Question 25

Unimportance of citizenship

Answer 25

Those who gained citizenship often did not appreciate it due to the discrimination they faced when they attempted to assert their rights

Question 26

Dawes Act loss of land

Answer 26

Between 1887 and 1900, reservation land was cut from 150 million acres to 78 million due to a clause which allowed sale of spare land to whites. In 1890 alone 13 million acres were sold. Land ownership was a foreign concept to most NAs, meaning they often accumulated debt and had to sell land

Question 27

Matriarchal erosion

Answer 27

Women in tribes with matriarchal structures (e.g. the Iroquois) lost their status following allotment policy, where land was given to the male head of the family

Question 28

Sun Dance ban

Answer 28

In 1884, the Federal Government prohibited the Sun Dance, further restricting cultural rights

Question 29

Dawes Act restructuring

Answer 29

The Dawes Act completely restructured NA society by creating family units rather than supporting communal living

Question 30

Grant

Answer 30

Sent troops to the Great Sioux Reserve in 1876

Question 31

Harrison

Answer 31

Dismantled the Great Sioux Reserve in 1890

Question 32

Rations

Answer 32

In 1890, over 20% of NAs received rations

Question 33

White River War

Answer 33

Waged between Army and White River Utes in 1879. Even though the Utes won at the Battle of Milk Creek, they surrendered and agreed to be moved to Uintah reservation

Question 34

Tribal structures

Answer 34

Assimilationist policy devastated tribal structures irreversibly, inhibiting self-determination rights, Reservation policy replaced tribal chiefs with Indian Agents - often corrupt

Question 35

Buffalo hunting

Answer 35

1873-1874 - 3 million buffalo killed each year. By the 1880s only a few hundred remained of the estimated 13 million in 1850

Question 36

US v. Kagama

Answer 36

(1886) - upheld the constitutionality of the Major Crimes Act which gave federal courts jurisdiction in certain cases of Indian-on Indian crime, even those committed in reservations