Between 1851 and 1852, the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

forced California's tribes to sign 18 treaties that relinquished each tribe's rights to their traditional lands in exchange for reservations. Due to pressure from California representatives, the Senate repudiated the treaties and ordered them to remain secret. In 1896 the

Bureau of American Ethnology The Bureau of American Ethnology (or BAE, originally, Bureau of Ethnology) was established in 1879 by an act of Congress for the purpose of transferring archives, records and materials relating to the Indians of North America from the Interior D ...

report on major native American Indian interactions with the United States Government was the first time the treaties were made public. The report, '' Indian Land Cessions in the United States (book)'', compiled By Charles C. Royce, includes the 18 lost treaties between the state's tribes and a map of the reservations. Below is the California segment of the report listing the treaties. The full report covered all 48 states' tribal interactions nationwide with the U.S. government.

California Indian Reservations and Cessions

The following database is an extraction of all the United States' formal actions between 1851–1892 with California Indians documented by the

in its Eighteenth annual report to the Smithsonian Institution in 1896.

History

Upon becoming a state in 1850, California was required by law to allow the United States government to conduct all formal relationships with tribal communities. Because California's previous Mexican government had no formal relationships with the Indians following the 1833 Secularization Act that closed the Spanish era's Catholic Missions, most of the 150,000 surviving tribal people either became servants for the

Ranchos of California The Spanish and Mexican governments made many concessions and land grants in Alta California (now known as California) and Baja California from 1775 to 1846. The Spanish Concessions of land were made to retired soldiers as an inducement for ...

owners or migrated east to the Sierra Mountains or to the north where they mixed with other non-Mission tribes that had been left alone by Mexico. California's farmers and gold miners demanded that Indians and other "aliens" be heavily taxed or removed from the gold fields. In 1851, at the same time that the United States was setting up the

Public Land Commission The California Land Act of 1851 (), enacted following the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the admission of California as a state in 1850, established a three-member Public Land Commission to determine the validity of prior Spanish and Mexican la ...

as required by the 1848

Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ( es, Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo), officially the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits, and Settlement between the United States of America and the United Mexican States, is the peace treaty that was signed on 2 ...

with the Republic of Mexico to verify the legality of the

Land Grants given California citizens prior to 1846, the government also set up a commission with military support that resulted in 134 of the state's 300-plus Indian tribes signing 18 treaties that gave away their sovereign rights in exchange for 7.4 million acres of "reservation" lands spread across the state. 1896 California Map Smithsonian Institute Report

1896 California Map Smithsonian Institute Report

Between 1851 and 1865, California carried out the wishes of its citizens: the removal of tribal communities from their ancestral lands by military force across California. The United States went along with these actions, rather than using its resources to stop the state from this period of

California Genocide The California genocide was the killing of thousands of indigenous peoples of California by United States government agents and private citizens in the 19th century. It began following the American Conquest of California from Mexico, and the ...

that was legitimized by the 1850 Indian Protection Act and numerous bond and financing actions that went t
finance dozens of state militias
that hunted down and killed tribal members. During the first years between 1851 and 1852,

John Frémont John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second E ...

, a U.S. Senator for the state of California, organized the

Mariposa Battalion Mariposa Battalion was a California State Militia unit formed in 1851 to defeat the Ahwahnechee and Chowchillas in the Mariposa War, a part of the California genocide. After a force under Mariposa County Sheriff James Burney was found unequal to ...

to round up tribal representatives who were living on his Mariposa Rancho. Frémont pushed for federal troops and three Indian Commissioners who obtained treaty agreements from tribal representatives to abandon their lands in exchange for what would be the first round of reservations for land actions in California. The state, however, refused to even allow these massive land takeaways, resulting in th
treaties' initial failure
and by a Senate order their very existence was hidden from the public for over 45 years. One of the three appointed commissioners, Oliver M. Wozencraft, reported that the government's action would lead to a "war of extermination" against the state's tribal peopl
on May 31, 1852
even going public b
publishing a pamphlet
laying out the impacts, but for speaking out he wa
relieved of his duties
by September of the same year. The U.S.

Bureau of Indian Affairs The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), also known as Indian Affairs (IA), is a United States federal agency within the Department of the Interior. It is responsible for implementing federal laws and policies related to American Indians and A ...

, which was originally part of the

U.S. War Department The United States Department of War, also called the War Department (and occasionally War Office in the early years), was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army, a ...

, eventually set up four reservations as prescribed by Congress, followed later by additional tracts of lands ceded to various

Mission Indians Mission Indians are the indigenous peoples of California who lived in Southern California and were forcibly relocated from their traditional dwellings, villages, and homelands to live and work at 15 Franciscan missions in Southern California and ...

located mostly in Southern California. In 1896, the Smithsonian Institution produced a report documenting all historic actions by date and tribe of lands taken from or reservations created by the U.S. Larisa Miller documented how the Northern California Indian Association (NCIA) petitioned President Roosevelt in 1903 to buy federal lands for thousands of homeless Indians across the state because "title and ownership to this beautiful land have never been extinguished." Their campaign led to the rediscovery of the 18 Treaties that were signed by 134 bands of Californians and the removal of the senate's order of secrecy on January 18, 1905. 1896 California Map 2 Smithsonian Institute Report

1896 California Map 2 Smithsonian Institute Report

The United States Bureau of American Ethnology produced annual reports to the Smithsonian Institution on various Native American (First Nation) subjects. In their 18th annual, two-volume report, they published a complete list of all U.S. takings (cessions), treaties and reservations prior to 1896. The report was compiled By Charles C. Royce, with a 122-page introduction by Cyrus Thomas documenting legal claims for the actions the United States had based its actions on, with a focus on U.S. Supreme Court's 1823

Discovery doctrine The discovery doctrine, or doctrine of discovery, is a disputed interpretation of international law during the Age of Discovery, introduced into United States municipal law by the US Supreme Court Justice John Marshall in ''Johnson v. M'Intosh ...

decision. It was Thomas' following statement that set the tone for the introduction: "Its extent afforded an ample field for the ambition and enterprise of all, and the character, low culture-status, and religious beliefs of the aborigines afforded an apology for considering them a people over whom the superior genius of Europe might rightfully claim an ascendancy. The sovereigns of the Old World therefore found no difficulty in convincing themselves that they made ample compensation to the natives by bestowing on them the benefits of civilization and Christianity in exchange for control over them and their country." The report included color maps for each state, two for California, with numbered areas (also in color) to identify each cession or reservation. These can be used to locate the land.

Indian Land Cessions in the United States

The spreadsheet section in part 2, pages 781 – 948 is titled " Indian Land Cessions in the United States." The data are extracted from the U.S. government's treaties, reservations and land cessions with California's tribal people in the years 1851–1896. The California instances in the spreadsheet include page references to legal citation and historic materials. All links embedded in the spreadsheet, including the names identifying particular "Mission Indian" Tribes, have been added to make the original report clearer. Some sections on individual tracts in the

Public Land Survey System The Public Land Survey System (PLSS) is the surveying method developed and used in the United States to plat, or divide, real property for sale and settling. Also known as the Rectangular Survey System, it was created by the Land Ordinance of 1 ...

were omitted from the original. Note that the below database identifies the land involved in each transaction with a number that can be located on the above maps. Later transactions are located on the 2nd map or "Ca-2", plus the appropriate number. The first 18 entries, described below as unratified treaties, were not listed as such in the 1896 Smithsonian report, but as stated lands ceded in exchange for tracts of land.

Notes

References

External links

O.M. Wozencraft [1851], "To the People Living and Trading Among the Indians in the State of California".

* ttp://calindianhistory.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Temecula_Treaty_K_permission.pdf Digital copy of January 5th 1852 Treaty K
1920 Congressional subcommittee on Indian Affairs – 18 treaties and their congressional history

National Park Service link to state by state tribal naming variations.

List of Federally Recognized Tribes in California

The Journal of George W. Barbour, May 1, to October 4, 1851: Part I

The Journal of George W. Barbour, May 1, to October 4, 1851: Part 2
{{DEFAULTSORT:Native American Tribes in California reserv

Native American law Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and enterta ...

reserv Former American Indian reservations United States and Native American treaties