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Dawes Act Thesis

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Passed in 1887 the Dawes Act, also known as The General Allotment Act, assigned portions of Native American reservations into individual and family hands. Individuals received either 80 or 160 acre plots, and in some instances families received higher acreages. In 1887, over 135 million acres of American soil belonged to Native Americans. In 1934, that number had been reduced to a little over 45 million. The remaining land was sold to settlers, much of it for little or no money. The Dawes Act had a negative effect on American Indians, as it ended their shared holding of property, which gave them a home and a spot in the tribe. The land granted to most of the Native Americans was not adequate for profitable capability. Most allotment land,
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286 Words | 2 Pages

The Dawes Act, was introduced by Henry Dawes, a Senator from Massachusetts. Simply put, the Act broke up previous land settlements given to Native Americans in the form of reservations and separated them into smaller, separate parcels of land to live on. More importantly, the Act required Natives to live apart from their nations and assimilate into European culture. Dawes felt that the law, once fully realized, would save Native Americans from the alternative, which was their total slaughtering.

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253 Words | 2 Pages

The depth of hostility felt by many white Americans toward the Indians was very aggressive in my opinion. I personally do not understand why they were so cruel to the Native Americans when the Indians were there first. I understand the concept that they needed to have sustainability and needs, but I think the white Americans did it the wrong way. Next, I think the main goal of the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 was to compromise and share the land equally with the Indians.

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193 Words | 1 Pages

The government had the power over reservations of Nations, and could divide them up amongst individual Native Americans. The Dawes Allotment Act, affected Native sovereignty because the Native Government had no say in what their land would be used for. The text stated, "Indian

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1127 Words | 5 Pages

Dawes Severalty Act De Juan Evans-Taylor Humboldt State University Abstract The Dawes Act of 1887, some of the time alluded to as the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 or the General Allotment Act, was marked into law on January 8, 1887, by US President Grover Cleveland. This was approved by the president to appropriate and redistribute tribal grounds in the American West. It expressly tried to crush the social union of Indian tribes and to along these lines dispose of the rest of the remnants of Indian culture and society. Just by repudiating their own customs, it was accepted, could the Indians at any point turn out to be genuinely "American."

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489 Words | 2 Pages

Technology advances such as the Railroad and weapons were major advances that played a major impact on the Plains Indians’ lives. To begin with, lives of the Plains Indians were affected by the settlers by government actions. One act in particular was the Dawes Act which destroyed tribal culture. This act provided for the gradual elimination of tribal ownership of land and the allotment of tracts to individual owners. By splitting up reservations into smaller units that were given to individuals from the

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199 Words | 1 Pages

More indians tribes were destroyed during war with the whites, and since the Native Americans did not have as much technology, food, and medicine as the whites, they lost a lot of warriors. Many Native Americans would leave their tribes in search for food only to be confronted and ambushed by white soldiers. Some Native Americans chose to surrender rather than to be moved to a different location. After the Indian and American War, the General Allotment Act was passed, also known as The Dawes Act of 1887. The Dawes Act granted Native Americans land allotments.

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1852 Words | 8 Pages

The changes that were seen after the act was put into law included the end of the communal holding of property by the Native Americans. They would fractionated into individual plots of property, which caused more than half of their lands to be sold off. Women were not given any land under this act, and had to be married to receive the full 160 acres offered. While the Act was supposed to help the Indians, many resisted the changes that came with individual property ownership. They thought that becoming ranchers and farmers was distasteful.

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801 Words | 4 Pages

Specifically, Cleveland argued that the act would give Indians the opportunity to adjust to American culture, by allowing them to begin farming their own land. Furthermore, privatization is a sure way to increase output and quality. We wholeheartedly agreed with Cleveland on this point, and felt that the Dawes Act was a solution to a myriad of problems plaguing the Wild West. Therefore, we voted in favor of Grover Cleveland on the subject of the Dawes Act during the third

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784 Words | 4 Pages

First of all, Native Americans were settled on a hotbed of natural resources which included oil and precious metals such as silver and gold. There was also much fertile land that would entice farmers and frontiersmen to move out west. On this land there was so much potential economic opportunity for farmers, cattle drivers, miners and many other occupations. The government developed the popular public misconception that the indians were misusing the land and that Americans had the right to take advantage of the opportunities that lie in the west. These ideas led to the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 which authorized encroachment of Indian lands by the US government in order to divide up reservations and control Indian activity.

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459 Words | 2 Pages

The Allotment Act The Dawes Act and its supporters sang a very similar tune to southerners who justified slavery as their patriarchal and christian duty. The Dawes Act allowed the President of the United States to survey the reservations Indians lived on and allot its land to heads of households, single persons over eighteen, and to orphans. This meant that the President went into reservations and redistributed the land, upsetting the system Native Americans had previously. Slave owners of the Antebellum South believed that the Black men and women needed to be enslaved, for they could not function without a patriarchal master. Westerners too saw the Native Americans as inferior, and felt that they had to help the tribal people be free of

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1105 Words | 5 Pages

When the Europeans began colonizing the New World, they had a problematic relationship with the Native Americans. The Europeans sought to control a land that the Natives inhabited all their lives. They came and decided to take whatever they wanted regardless of how it affected the Native Americans. They legislated several laws, such as the Indian Removal Act, to establish their authority. The Indian Removal Act had a negative impact on the Native Americans because they were driven away from their ancestral homes, forced to adopt a different lifestyle, and their journey westwards caused the deaths of many Native Americans.

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441 Words | 2 Pages

Life for the Native Americans was much harder during and after the western expansion. For example, the US took land from the Indians leading the formation of reservations, White men almost hunted the Buffalo , an important food source for the Indians, to extinction, and forced the Indians to get rid of their culture. Because of the western expansion, the area of land the Indians could occupy decreased significantly. The government would make treaties with the Indians allowing them to keep a certain area of land, but this would soon be broken ; When the Pacific Railroad Act was passed it stated that wherever a track was laid the company would own any land 200 ft surrounding the track including Indian land ; the Government would make sure that

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445 Words | 2 Pages

However, the Homestead Act required farmers and labors to have the cash to move, buy equipment, and have patients for their farms to become self-sufficient, which was not always the case. Therefore, in 1873 the Timber Culture Act was passed to adjust the Homestead Act. Each homesteader was inclined to claim another 160 acres if within four years if they planted trees on a quarter of it. Successfully distributing 10 million additional acres, Congress continued to pass laws to encourage more to go west. The Desert Land Act of 1877 aided cattle ranchers by allowing them to obtain 640 acres if they promise to irrigate it.

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847 Words | 4 Pages

Also, the extinction of buffalo affected them negatively and the domination of the whites disrupted their surroundings. The Westward Expansion impacted the Native Americans land and culture. Before the Americans started coming to the West and settling, the Native Americans had a peaceful life. Twenty-eight tribes lived in the Great

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307 Words | 2 Pages

Firstly, Native Americans were already in an inconvenient position, being relocated multiple times, and were further being pressured to move again. With the railroad in place, many white settlers would go onto the Native Americans’ land and hunt wild Buffalo to near extinction. To add

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