LAD #25: Dawes Severalty Act of 1877

The Dawes Act, approved on February , 1887, was enacted as a continuation of the policy or creating and populating Indian reservations. In order to carry out this goal, the government set up a set of procedures that would allot tracts of reservation land to families themselves for "ownership" while the lands still fall within the domain of the United States. The Dawes Act aimed to populate these reservations in a more cooperative manner by giving one-quarter section to each head of family (and descendants), one-eighth of a section for either any person over eighteen years of age or any orphan younger than eighteen, and one-sixteenth of any other person younger than eighteen who may have been born prior to the creation of Presidential allotment of lands for reservations. Many other beneficial aspects were enacted such as a set of grazing lands when an allotment became specified for that purpose. In order to keep the peace lines were to be drawn by those receiving the allotments along the specified boundaries, and if these were not drawn in four years and agent of the government would step in a etch the boundaries himself. Land purchases were not deemed final though, as the United States retained control over them in an event of need. Citizenship was granted to the Indians to ensure that they would not be discriminated against and held basic American rights despite being on these purchased reservations. This act however did not apply to all such as the many displaced nations under Jackson's administration as well as those from the Seneca Nation or within New York. Also, the act contains no protection of Indian lands from being traversed by railroads, telegraph lines, or other public uses as decreed by Congress.