The 1887 Dawes Act was designed to carve up reservations by allocating land plots to individual Indigenous people and creating a system to sell these plots to outsiders. This resulted in many reservations, including those in Minnesota, being reduced to “checkerboards” of individual plots of land. See this post for an explanation of the Dawes Act and civilizing/assimilating policies. (Nora’s article)
Congress later passed the Nelson Act of 1889, which set up allotment in Minnesota and attempted to move all Ojibwe outside Red Lake Reservation to White Earth Reservation. The main goals of the Nelson Act were ethnic cleansing and the opening up of Indigenous held forests to timber exploitation. The Nelson Act was only partially successful in achieving these goals due to multiple strategies of Indigenous resistance.
Allotment and Race
The Dawes Act had created a 25 year waiting period where the land was held in trust on behalf of the Indigenous owner before it could be sold. During this time, Ojibwe people of mixed descent had difficulties asserting their rights to their land plots, especially if they had become integrated into white society. However, Ojibwe people viewed culture and kinship as the requirements for being Ojibwe instead of blood quantum or descent. This issue came to a head in 1906 and 1907, when Congress added amendments to the allotment acts allowing unrestricted sale of allotments by adult “mixed-bloods” of the White Earth Reservation. Congress argued that white blood made mixed-race people better businessmen as an excuse to give more land to settlers. Lumber companies began hiring mixed descent men to purchase deeds for timbered lands and farms at low prices from impoverished Ojibwe who claimed partial white ancestry for the purposes of selling land.
The White Earth Tragedy
After the funds from selling allotments ran out, leading many Ojibwe landless and with no income, it developed into the White Earth Tragedy. Although the government was collecting the majority of the revenue from mineral rights on allotments held in trust, it was very poor at dealing with the White Earth Tragedy. Paul Buffalo reported that “that Indian’s over there, but that government administration is so damn slow it takes six months to a year before they give ‘im a piece of bread. He’s gotta eat right now. It’s cold!” Other reservations followed the same pattern as White Earth and by the 1930s, Indians owned less than 10% of the White Earth Reservation, 4% of the Leech Lake Reservation, and 7% of the Mille Lacs Reservation.
Resistance to the Nelson Act
During the White Earth Tragedy, some Ojibwe identified as staunch, full-blooded stringent followers of tradition in order to avoid being coerced into selling allotments. Most Ojibwe, such as the Mille Lacs Band, stayed put and refused to go to White Earth, even ignoring tribal leaders who attempted to convince them to move. As a result, they were able to hold on to parts of their reservations. Ne-quan-ah-quad, a Red Lake tribal leader, refused allotment completely on behalf of his tribe. The Red Lake Reservation was therefore not divided up, although they ended up ceding additional land after 1889.
Another form of resistance to allotment took place during the Battle of Sugar Point in 1898. This conflict began in part because of tribal jurisdiction for the extradition of Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig, but tensions over logging companies swindling Ojibwe on the Leech Lake Reservation also led to this skirmish. According to oral histories, a small force of 20 Ojibwe Pillagers defeated around 100 U.S. soldiers and Marshals who came to apprehend Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig at Sugar Point. After winning the battle, the Ojibwe won the peace by attracting national attention to their cause. Ojibwe elders successfully negotiated pardons from President McKinley and achieved reforms for the unfair logging practices, leading to the establishment of the Chippewa National Forest.
Sources:
An act to provide for the allotment of lands in severalty to Indians on the various reservations, and to extend the protection of the laws of the United States and the Territories over the Indians, and for other purposes, Public Law 119, U.S. Statutes at Large 24(1887): 388.
An act for the relief and civilization of the Chippewa Indians in the State of Minnesota, Public Law 24, U.S. Statues at Large 25(1889): 642.
Why Treaties Matter exhibit.
Duoos, Kayla. “On This Day in History: The Battle of Sugar Point.” Leech Lake News, October 5, 2020. https://www.leechlakenews.com/2018/10/05/on-this-day-in-history-the-battle-of-sugar-point/.
ELLINGHAUS, KATHERINE. “Fraud: The Allotment of the Anishinaabeg.” Essay. In Blood Will Tell: Native Americans and Assimilation Policy, 1–22. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 2017.
Roufs, Timothy G. “45. Treaties, Allotments, and Self-Government.” Essay. In When Everybody Called Me Gabe-Bines, “Forever-Flying-Bird”: Teachings from Paul Buffalo. Minneapolis, MN: Wise Ink, Incorporated, 2019.
Image Sources:
Brock and Company. “Map of Callaway Township.” Standard Atlas of Becker County, Minnesota : Including a Plat Book of the Villages, Cities and Townships of the County, Map of the State, United States and World : Patrons Directory, Reference Business Directory and Departments Devoted to General Information, Analysis of the System of U.S. Land Surveys, Digest of the System of Civil Government, Etc. Etc. . Chicago, Illinois: Brock and Company, 1929.
Caneff, Goforth, and Kistin. “Land Tenure-Leech Lake Reservation.” Geography 365 Course. St. Paul, Minnesota: Macalaster College, 2010.
