P
and widely reproduced images of World War II.
(See also entry for JANUARY 23, 1955.)
1946The United States forms the Bureau of Land
Management (BLM).
The General Land Office and the Grazing Service
are merged to form the Bureau of Land Manage-
ment (BLM). As the agency charged with overseeing
the use of federal lands and its natural resources, the
BLM is given responsibility for dealing with Indians
on issues relating to reservation land, water rights,
and mineral rights.
The Fort Berthold Indian Defense
Association is founded.
In response to the Garrison Dam Act, members of
the Mandan, Arikara, and Hidatsa establish the Fort
“We did not want Garrison
Dam built. We pleaded with you
to find another place to build a
dam. It was not that we wished
to hamper progress. In fact, we
voluntarily offered some of our
other lands which were not so
vital to our life as a place to be
used to construct the dam. Our
prayers and pleas were fruitless.
The Government told us ‘Either
you agree to some terms, or
we’ll take the land without your
consent.’”
—Fort Berthold Reservation
chairman Carl Whitman Jr.
testifying before Congress in
1949 on Indian opposition to the
Garrison DamBerthold Indian Defense Association. The orga-
nization launches a campaign to stop the federal
government from constructing a dam across the
Upper Missouri River, which threatens to flood
275,000 acres of land on the tribes’ Fort Berthold
Reservation in North Dakota. Despite their efforts,
the government will proceed with the Garrison Dam,
which will profoundly disrupt reservation life.August 13Congress establishes the Indian Claims
Commission.
The Indian Claims Commission (ICC), formed by
an act of Congress, is charged with reviewing and re-
solving all outstanding land claims of Indians living
within the continental United States. The commis-
sion is meant to free the U.S. Court of Claims from
hearing Indian land claims. Since 1881 the court
has been inundated with more than 200 cases, only
35 of which it has been able to settle. In addition to
settling land disputes, the ICC is created to ad-
dress a need felt by many non-Indians, both inside
and outside of the government, to right the moral
wrongs committed by the United States in its un-
just treatment of Native Americans in the past. (See
also entry for SEPTEMBER 30, 1978.)1947The Mormons establish the Indian Student
Placement Program.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
initiates the Indian Student Placement Program,
with the goal of placing Native American children
in Mormon foster homes, where they can be trained
in the Mormon faith throughout the school year.
During the next 30 years, more than 20,000 Indian
students will participate in the program. Their In-
dian parents agree to the placements by signing a
consent form in English, a language many cannot
read. They are discouraged from visiting their chil-
dren, who are as young as eight when they are taken
from their homes.