From 1969 to 1974, the Richard Nixon administration made important changes to United States policy towards Native Americans through legislation and executive action. President Richard Nixon advocated a reversal of the long-standing policy of "termination" that had characterized relations between the U.S. federal government and American Indians in favor of "self-determination." The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act restructured indigenous governance in Alaska, creating a unique structure of Native Corporations. Some of the most notable instances of American Indian activism occurred under the Nixon Administration, including the Occupation of Alcatraz and the Occupation of Wounded Knee.
Termination policy Before the 1950s, Native American tribes were considered semi-autonomous nations with complete governance over their own territory. Such autonomy allowed tribes to organize a tribal government, legislate and adjudicate, determine tribal membership, levy and collect taxes, enforce tribal laws, and control development of tribal resources.Terminating the Indian Termination Policy, Michael C. Walch, Stanford Law Review Vol. 35, No. 6 (Jul., 1983), pp. 1181-121, p. 1182. However, the United States' Indian policy gradually shifted over the course of the twentieth century. The federal government began to take a more involved role in the affairs of previously autonomous Indian tribes, and total assimilation of the Indians became the government's new policy line. In 1934, Congress passed the Indian Reorganization Act which sought to reorganize tribal systems of governance into forms foreign to Indians. Simultaneously, under the Indian Reorganization Act, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) began to gain approval power over Indian constitutions, resource development, and cultural activities. A new era of assimilation characterized relations between the United States and Indians. This evolution of policy was formally codified into law with the passage of House Concurrent Resolution 108 and Public Law 280 in 1953.
House Concurrent Resolution 108 House concurrent resolution 108 ( H. Con. Res. 108) is often perceived as the formal codification of the termination policy of the United States. Passed by the 83rd Congress on August 1, 1953, the resolution sought to abolish tribal autonomy and subject Indians to the same laws as citizens of the United States. Furthermore, House Concurrent Resolution 108 opened the sale of tribal lands to non-Indians.
Whereas it is the policy of Congress as rapidly as possible, to make the Indians within the territorial limits of the United States subject to the same laws and entitled to the same privileges and responsibilities as are applicable to other citizens of the United States, and to grant them all of the rights and prerogatives pertaining to American citizenship; and whereas the Indians within the territorial limits of the United States should assume their full responsibilities as American citizens.Documents of United States Indian Policy, House Concurrent Resolution 108, ed. Francis Paul Prucha, University of Nebraska Press, 2000.
Public Law 280 Public Law 280 (PL-280), which passed on August 15, 1953, supplemented the tenets and policies outlined in H. Con. Res. 108. Public Law 280 sought to transfer criminal jurisdiction over crimes committed by Indians in "Indian Country" to certain state governments. Previously, "Indian Country" was under the jurisdiction of the federal criminal code. Congress gave six states (California, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oregon, Wisconsin, and Alaska) extensive authority to prosecute most crimes that occurred in Indian country. Between 1953 and 1968, numerous other states exercised expanded jurisdiction in Indian country. Not only did PL-280 strip the federal government of jurisdiction in Indian country, but it also nullified traditional tribal systems of internal justice.United States Attorney's Office of Minnesota, Public Law 208
Efforts towards repeal under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson The federal government's policy of termination was met with staunch opposition from Indian populations. What had been initiated as an attempt at assimilation into American society had evolved into a systematic removal of Indian autonomy. Upon taking office in 1961, President John F. Kennedy sought to gradually repeal the termination policy of the 1950s due to problems surrounding multiple ancestral land ownership patterns. Kennedy scaled back the tenets of the termination era through a series of legislative actions.Reyser, Rudolph C., Indigenous Nations and Modern States The Political Emergence of Nations Challenging State Power, Routledge: NY, 2012, pp. 1-289, p. 58. Public Law 87-273, approved on September 22, 1961, increased to $7.5 million the annual authorization to carry out a vocational training program for American Indians residing on or near Indian reservations.JFK Presidential Library, Legislative Summary: Indians Public Law 88-168, approved on November 4, 1963, established a $900,000 revolving loan fund for the Secretary of the Interior to make loans to Indian tribes for the services of expert researchers and witnesses in prosecuting their cases before the Indian Claims Commission. S. 1049, passed by the Senate on October 11, 1963, provided the Secretary of the Interior with the authority to reduce the rapidly increasing number of Indian allotments in multiple ownership.
President Lyndon B. Johnson furthered Kennedy's efforts to end the policy of termination. In an address to Congress on March 6, 1968, President Johnson emphasized the necessity of self-determination and improved living conditions for Indians in the United States.Lyndon B. Johnson: Special Message to the Congress on the Problems of the American Indian: "The Forgotten American." March 6, 1968. The American Presidency Project. However, Johnson's program to provide Indians with equal standards of living to Americans quickly lost traction in Congress. Johnson's reform efforts did reap some substantial results. In 1968, the National Council on Indian Opportunity was established to encourage and coordinate the rise of federal programs to benefit the American Indian population, appraise the impact and progress of such programs, and to suggest ways to improve the programs to meet the needs and desires of the Indian population. The National Council on Indian Opportunity was terminated in 1974.
The Nixon years (1969–1974)
The Nixon administration Richard Nixon took office as president in 1969. It was under his administration that Washington state Senator Henry M. Jackson and Senate Subcommittee on Indian Affairs aide Forrest J. Gerard were most active in their reform efforts. The work of Jackson and Gerard mirrored the demands of Indians for "self-determination." Nixon called for an end to termination and provided a direct endorsement of "self-determination."
Special message to Congress on Indian Affairs In a 1970 address to Congress, Nixon articulated his vision of self-determination. He explained, "The time has come to break decisively with the past and to create the conditions for a new era in which the Indian future is determined by Indian acts and Indian decisions." Nixon continued, "This policy of forced termination is wrong, in my judgment, for a number of reasons. First, the premises on which it rests are wrong. Termination implies that the federal government has taken on a trusteeship responsibility for Indian communities as an act of generosity toward a disadvantaged people and that it can therefore discontinue this responsibility on a unilateral basis whenever it sees fit." Nixon's overt renunciation of the long-standing termination policy was the first of any President in the post-World War II era.
Henry M. Jackson and Forrest J. Gerard In 1971, Senator Henry M. Jackson, Chairman of the Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, hired Forrest J. Gerard. Gerard was born on Montana's Blackfeet Reservation in 1925, served in the United States Air Force in World War II, and received a college education on the G.I. Bill. Following college, he worked for agencies in Montana and Wyoming before moving to Washington, D.C. to work for the Indian Health Service. Eventually, Gerard would work for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Health and Human Services. Gerard would provide Jackson with the experience and network of relationships with tribal leaders necessary for serious policy reform.
Together, Jackson and Gerard worked hard to put the policies of self-determination outlined by Kennedy and Johnson into action. Beginning with Jackson's call for a Senate resolution to reverse House Concurrent Resolution 108, they embarked on an ambitious legislative agenda to reform Indian affairs in the United States. The legislation regarding Indian Affairs that bears the authorship of Senator Jackson and Gerard, and the sponsorship of Senator Jackson includes:
Senate Concurrent Resolution 26, enacted in 1971 to reverse the federal policy of termination and develop a government-wide commitment to enable Indians to determine their own future, protect Indian property and identity, raise the social and economic level of Indians, and assist urban Indians. Indian Health Care Improvement Act (IHCIA), enacted in 1976 to address the deplorable living conditions in Indian Country. Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act, enacted in 1975, it authorized the secretaries of the Interior, Health, and Education to enter into contracts under which the tribes themselves would assume responsibility for the administration of federal Indian programs. Sub-Marginal Lands Act, enacted in 1975 to declare that certain submarginal land of the United States, purchased in the 1930s, be held in trust for certain Indian tribes and be made a part of the reservation for said Indians. Indian Finance Act, passed in 1975 with the sponsorship of Senator Jackson, was a proposal of President Nixon's to lend money to tribes via a revolving fund.
Alaskan Native claims In 1959, Alaska became the 49th U.S. state. However, prior to and after the passage of the Alaska Statehood Act, indigenous claims were seen as contrary to goals of development. The 1968 discovery of North Slope oil was a dramatic development that demanded immediate conflict resolution over Indian land claims. However, the Alaska Statehood Act provided the new State with the entitlement to pursue land grants. Furthermore, the state and federal government embarked on a project to create a pipeline to transport oil from the North Slope fields. The vast majority of Alaskan Natives did not live on reservations but rather in scattered villages. As the State of Alaska began to select lands pursuant to the Statehood Act, native villages protested to the Secretary of the Interior that the lands chosen were occupied and used for aboriginal purposes.