Loss of Cherokee Control
After the Civil War, the United States required a new peace treaty (see Reconstruction Treaties) with the people of the Cherokee Nation due to their alliance with the Confederacy: The new treaty (ratified on July 19, 1866) allowed the United States government to dispose of the land in the Cherokee Outlet: "The United States may settle friendly Indians in any part of the Cherokee country west of 96°... to be paid for to the Cherokee Nation..."
The settlement of several tribes in the eastern part of the Cherokee Outlet (including the Kaw, Osage, Pawnee, Ponca, and Tonkawa tribes) separated it from the Cherokee Nation proper and left them unable to use it for grazing or hunting. After the Civil War, Texans began driving their cattle across the Outlet to markets in Kansas. Soon other European-American ranchers began using the land for grazing. In the early 1880s, with the support of the Cherokee, the ranchers using the land got organized and began fencing off individual claims. The Cherokees believed such organization would help them collect rents due them for land use.
In 1883, the cattlemen finally incorporated – under the laws of Kansas – as The Cherokee Live Stock Association. They negotiated a five-year lease for the entire outlet for $100,000 per year, payable semi-annually in advance. At the end of the five years, the Cherokee Nation Tribal Council put the lease up for bid, hoping to get a better price. The Cherokee Live Stock Association eventually got the bid for $200,000 per year, but it was not completed.
During the 1880s, Bill McDonald, acting as deputy U.S. Marshal for the Southern District of Kansas and the Northern District of Texas, cleared the Cherokee Strip of cattle thieves and train robbers, who had taken to hiding out in what they thought was a kind of "no-man's land". He was the future captain of the Texas Rangers
The Organic Act of 1890 incorporated the Unassigned Lands into the new Oklahoma Territory. In 1907 Oklahoma became the 46th state.
Read more about this topic: Cherokee Outlet
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