Medicine Lodge Treaty - Unratified

Unratified

The Treaty was immediately controversial and contested by both the members and other leaders of most of the involved tribal bands. Because most of the tribes were decentralized, acceptance of the treaty was contingent upon ratification by 3/4 of the adult males of each of the tribes. This condition was part of the treaty. The US never obtained sufficient votes for such ratification, and thus the treaty was never made valid or legal. Conflict over treaty terms continued for years.

The Medicine Lodge Treaty required the approval of 3/4 of the adult males on the reservation for any further cessions of land. In 1887 the Congress changed national policy on allotment of Native American lands by passing the Dawes Act, which promoted allotment of parcels to individual households (they thought 160 acres per household would be adequate for cultivation) to break up the communal land held by tribes, with the government authorized to sell the resulting "surplus". In the case of the southern Plains Indians, a commission was assigned to gain their agreement to such allotments and sales. The 1892 Jerome Agreement, although never ratified by the tribes, implemented the new allotment policy, effectively removing millions of acres from the reservation. The commission negotiating the agreement had evaded telling the Indians what the sale price would be. The Kiowa chief Lone Wolf sued the Secretary of the Interior on behalf of the entirety of the Kiowa, Comanche, and Apache tribes, based on their being defrauded by the government at the time.

The case, Lone Wolf v. Hitchcock, was ultimately decided by the US Supreme Court in 1903. In its ruling, the Court conceded that the Indians had not agreed to the land cessions. But, it concluded that the Congress had the "plenary power" to act unilaterally, so the circumstance did not matter. Its decision expressed the nineteenth-century attitude toward the Native Americans. Quoting from United States v. Kagama (1855) 118 U.S.375 in its ruling, the court reiterated the description of the Indian tribes as "wards of the nation... Dependent largely for their daily food... there arises the duty of protection, and with it the power."