154 years onward, the Treaty of Fort Laramie still matters

Pictured above: Tribal leaders and US officials, including General William Tecumseh Sherman, gather at Fort Laramie, Wyoming in 1868 for treaty negotiations. Image credits to the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.

On this day in 1868, the Fort Laramie Treaty was signed. Today, we acknowledge that this treaty (which recognized the Black Hills as part of the "Great Sioux Reservation" and intended for the exclusive use of the Lakota People) was later broken by the US Government.
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Forged in the wake of massacres conducted by the US Army against Indigenous peoples, increased movement of settlers along the Bozeman Trail, and successful Native resistance during Red Cloud's War, the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 defined land boundaries for the Oceti Sakowin (Lakota, Dakota, and Nakota) as well as the Crow, Northern Arapaho and Northern Cheyenne, protecting the tribes' sovereignty over much of their traditional lands. However, the treaty also instituted several assimilationist policies on behalf of the US government, policies which contributed to a loss of cultural lifeways that continues to impact Native communities up to the present day.

When gold was discovered in the Black Hills in the 1870s, the US government reneged on the treaty, overtaking tribal land that had been protected under the 1868 articles and confining tribes to small reservations. In response to this violation of treaty terms, the tribes of the Oceti Sakowin entered into legal proceedings against the federal government in the early 20th century. The case culminated in a 1980 decision by the Supreme Court declaring the US seizure of the Black Hills illegal and offering tribes $100 million for the land. The tribes of the Oceti Sakowin have continually rejected this offer and have asserted that the sacred lands were never for sale.
Activists today continue to push the federal government to honor the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 and all treaties between tribal nations and the United States.

This post is a part of our Reconciliation through Education series. To learn more about this and other issues related to the Tipi Raisers mission, please email mackenzie@thetipiraisers.org to sign up for our newsletter.

Sources include: Resources from the National Museum of the American Indian, Indian Country Today, Smithsonian Magazine, and Wyoming PBS.