University:
Arizona State University
Course:
HST 200 | Historical Themes
Academic year:

2024
Views:

348

Pages:

2
Author:

Thuyoul US

ASU HST 200 (Historical Themes) Westward Expansion, 1840-1900 Americanization Opinion in the east was divided throughout the 1870s and early 1880s Indian Wars. A growing number of American reformers, who would later form the core of the Progressive Era, began to criticize the violence, arguing that the government should help the Native Americans through an Americanization policy aimed at assimilating them into American society. Many believed, as General Philip Sheridan (appointed in 1867 to pacify the Plains Indians) allegedly said, that "the only good Indian was a dead Indian." The pillars of this new attack on Native life and culture were individual property ownership, Christian worship, and child education. Assimilation of Native Americans into American society was a goal shared by social workers, government representatives, and clergy starting in the 1880s. Native American children were forcibly removed from their homes and the cultural influence of their families by the government, who assisted reformers in placing them in boarding schools like the Carlisle Indian School, where they were expected to give up their tribal customs and adopt Euro-American social and cultural norms. These educational institutions integrated Native American males and females, offering vocational instruction to the males and domestic science lessons to the ladies. Native students attending boarding schools were encouraged to give up their language, attire, and social mores in favor of a more Euro-American way of life. Land reform was an essential component of the assimilation process. The government has acknowledged Native American communal land ownership during previous talks. The tribe owned the land, even if many of them acknowledged that individual families had usage rights to certain areas of it. Reformers wanted legislation to replace this idea with the widely accepted Euro-American conception of real land ownership and independence as part of their goal to "Americanize" the tribes. The Dawes Severalty Act of 1887 was one such statute, and it was named for a Massachusetts senator and reformer. The Dawes Act allowed the federal government to split any tribe's territory and award 160 acres of farmland or 320 acres of grazing area to each head of family, with smaller amounts going to singles and others. This act was basically a revised version of the original Homestead Act. The Dawes Act gave the federal government permission to hold a Native American's newly acquired land in trust for 25 years, acknowledging the paternal relationship that White people held towards Native Americans, much like how the treatment of enslaved African Americans was justified in the past. They wouldn't get full title and the citizenship privileges that came with owning property until then. Not until 1924 will all Native Americans receive official citizenship. The most barren, worthless land was given to Native Americans under the Dawes Act, while White settlers received the "surplus" acreage. Up to 80 million acres of Native American land were sold by the government to White American immigrants.