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Indian Reorganization Act of 1934

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The Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, also known as the Wheeler Howard Act or the IRA, had a major impact on the everyday lives of Native American Tribes that were scattered across the United states. The Indian Reorganization Act provided the means and tools for tribes to form their own governments and constitutions. The IRA stopped the general allotment act that was put into effect by the Dawes of 1887. The Indian Reorganization Act granted the Secretary of Interior a tremendous amount of power over Native American affairs ranging from land, livestock, employment, government, etc. According to the reorganization plan, after a tribe or nation voted to accept the IRA, it would draw up a constitution and bylaws, submit it to a referendum, have the Secretary of the Interior certify the results, and then start operating as a corporate tribal council. Of the 181 tribes accepting the Indian Reorganization Act between 1934 and 1945, only ninety-six adopted a tribal constitution, and only seventy-three tribes ever received corporate business charters. Seventy-seven tribes with a population of 86,365 members rejected the Act outright. Several of these were large reservation groups, such as the Klamath Indians of Oregon and the Crows of Montana. An especially bitter blow to Collier was the rejection of the IRA by the Navajo Nation. With 98 percent of the eligible Navajo voting, the tribe rejected the Act by 419 votes. The Navajo had not forgiven the Collier administration for its drastic livestock reduction program on the reservation, carried out ostensibly to protect the land against over-grazing, that had reduced many of the small herding families to destitution (Talbot, 2011). New criticism of the IRA incorporates the views of traditional Indians, many of whom opposed the IRA and the Indian New Deal from its very beginnings. The traditional Indian movement has historically

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