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Difficulty: MediumWestward Expansion and American Indians

"The public school system is the great agent of assimilation... If the Indians are to be incorporated into the national life, they must be educated... The tribal relation should be broken up, socialism destroyed, and the family and the home relation substituted in its place. The allotment of land in severalty... is a step in this direction."
��� Thomas Jefferson Morgan, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Annual Report, 1889

Which of the following was a major consequence of the federal policies advocated in the excerpt?

  1. A
    The legal protection of communal tribal landholdings from encroachment by white homesteaders.
  2. B
    The federal government's complete withdrawal of regulatory authority over western lands to maintain a laissez-faire economy.
  3. The division of communal tribal lands into individual plots and the loss of millions of acres of Native territory.Answer
  4. D
    The establishment of a state-funded program to record and preserve native languages and customs.

Answer

The division of communal tribal lands into individual plots and the loss of millions of acres of Native territory.
The correct answer is correct because the allotment policy, most notably executed under the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887, aimed to assimilate Native Americans by dividing communal tribal lands into individual private plots. A direct consequence of this policy was the erosion of tribal sovereignty and the loss of nearly two-thirds of reservation lands, which were deemed "surplus" and sold to non-Native homesteaders and corporations.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Analyze the provided primary source to identify its core argument.
The author advocates for the assimilation of Native Americans, the dissolution of tribal structures, and the allotment of land in severalty.
Understanding the ideological foundation of the document allows you to connect it to specific late nineteenth-century federal actions.
2
Associate the term 'allotment of land in severalty' with the corresponding historical policy.
This language directly refers to the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887.
Connecting the concepts in the text to real historical legislation is necessary to trace their consequences.
3
Determine the physical and social consequences of the Dawes Act.
The act divided reservation lands into individual plots, resulting in the transfer of millions of acres of communal Native American land to white settlers.
Identifying the correct outcome demonstrates a direct understanding of how assimilationist policies impacted Native populations.

Key Concept

Westward Expansion and American Indians
Estimated Time:1m 30s
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Westward Expansion and American Indians

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