Reservation System

A Policy of Expansion

Almost as soon as the thirteen British colonies became the United States, the new nation began to spread out across the North American land mass. Through a process of conquest that lasted until about 1900, the United States seized most of the lands and wealth that once belonged to Indigenous Peoples. To support its actions, the U.S. government constructed a complex philosophy of conquest that became a national myth called “Manifest Destiny.”

White Americans who adopted this view believed that God meant them to take over all the lands and wealth of the Indigenous Peoples. Supporting this policy was the then-prevailing worldview among European Americans, which classified non-Whites as inherently inferior. This view was then codified into the legal and juridical system of the United States. Using this foundation, Indigenous People who could not militarily defeat the United States were forced to sign treaties in which they ceded land in exchange for their lives.

Treaties with Native Americans made it appear that these enormous cessions of land were legitimate market transactions between equals, when in reality these agreements were largely coerced or dictated by the United States. Indeed, treaty negotiators sometimes used fraud, corruption, threats of extermination, liquor, and outright lies to obtain a signed treaty. As part of each treaty, the United States offered to deliver goods and services, as well as a piece of land—a reservation—on which the indigenous nation had to reside.

Having confined Indigenous People on reservations, the federal government refused to recognize their human rights. The Bill of Rights and Constitution were viewed as not applying to Native people, who were not even considered human beings under U.S. law until 1879. A government agent was appointed for each reservation, and this person had almost absolute power over the lives of its residents. Thus, Native people were virtual prisoners on reservations for most of the 19th century. They needed the agent's permission to leave the reservation, and if they went without it, they could be hunted down and executed or returned to the reservation by the U.S. military.

In September 1878, the Northern Cheyenne fled their Oklahoma reservation, and many died in an attempt to return to their traditional homelands in the Powder River country of Montana and Wyoming. They were pursued by more than 15,000 U.S. troops. One band of women, children, and old people, and a handful of men were captured and held in an unheated guardhouse in the dead of winter at Camp Robinson, Nebraska. The captives declared that they would rather die than return to the reservation.

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