feb 8, 1887 - Dawes Act

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As a means to impose upon the Indigenous people and tribes what the white American settlers were convinced was the “civilized” way to live, the Dawes General Allotment Act forced the division of communal tribal land into private allotments which were subsequently easier for white settlers to infiltrate and take over. Under the guise of providing Indigenous families up to 160 acres of land to farm and status as citizens, the Dawes Act drastically decreased Indigenous land holding from 138 million acres in 1887 to 48 million acres by 1934, when the allotment ended. This was done by giving the federal government the power to purchase any unclaimed land and sell it without restriction. While initially exempt from the Dawes Act’s policy of allotment, the Five Civilized Tribes (the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, and Seminole) were eventually encompassed by the Allotment Act as declared in the Curtis Act of 1898.

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