Why the Commission Was Created
Before 1946, a tribe that believed the United States had taken its land unfairly generally had no ordinary way to sue. It needed a special act of Congress for each claim, and few were passed. The Indian Claims Commission Act, signed in August 1946, created a single body to hear such claims. Congress’s reasons were mixed. Some supporters wanted to settle grievances fairly, and some wanted to clear the books so that federal policy toward tribes could move on. The termination policy of the 1950s grew in the same period, and the two are often discussed together.
The commission was meant to last about ten years. In practice it ran far longer and closed in 1978, with remaining cases passing to the Court of Claims.
What Could Be Claimed
A tribe or identifiable group could file a petition, within a filing deadline set in the act, on grounds such as:
- land taken without payment, or for a price that was unfairly low;
- breach of a treaty or agreement;
- unfair dealing by federal officials, including mismanagement of tribal property.
The first step in a land claim was often to show that the group had exclusive use and occupancy of a particular area for a long period before the loss, which is sometimes called aboriginal title. Later steps involved fixing the date of taking and the value of the land on that date, and then subtracting certain federal expenses, known as offsets.
Apache Groups and the Claims Process
Several Apache nations took part, alone or with others, through lawyers and expert witnesses. Because Apache groups moved across large areas and shared some country with neighbors, it was often hard to say whose land was whose. Anthropologists, historians and geographers prepared maps and reports about areas used by Western Apache groups, the Chiricahua and Warm Springs peoples, the Mescalero, the Jicarilla, the Lipan and the Plains Apache. Experts sometimes disagreed about where boundaries ran, and those disagreements affected the results.
The cases raise a point that readers should keep in mind. Apache societies were organized around local groups and kinship, not around sharply drawn tribal borders, so a method built on fixed territories fit uneasily. The reports produced for the cases, however, are now a rich source for historians of the Southwest, a subject discussed in the material on how Apache territory shrank, and they should be read with their purpose in mind.
The details of each Apache claim, such as docket numbers, areas and amounts, are better taken from the commission’s published decisions and from the nations’ own records than from a summary. This article does not give figures.
Why the Result Was Money, Not Land
The commission could award only money. Its statute did not allow it to order the return of land. That limit was central to how the process worked and why many communities were disappointed.
Several features shaped the results:
- Land was valued at its price when it was taken, often in the nineteenth century, and not at its present value. Interest was generally not added to the main award.
- Offsets reduced awards by what the government said it had spent on the tribe, in some cases including food, supplies and services.
- A final award generally ended the claim. The commission’s final judgments settled the matter for the lands in question.
- Awards went to the tribe or group that had filed, and decisions on how to use or share the money then fell to the nations and to Congress.
For many Native people, the idea that land of deep significance could be settled by a payment was painful. Some groups refused or resisted settlement, and a well-known dispute involving the Black Hills of the Sioux shows how strongly some communities felt. Others used the funds for community needs such as land purchase, education and tribal programs, and some Apache nations used awards to buy back land or to start programs. Decisions about use differed from nation to nation.
Lasting Effects
The commission left a mixed legacy. It produced a large body of historical research and an official record that a group had held a certain area. It also paid out compensation that, in many cases, was small compared to the land’s later value, and it closed many questions that a nation might otherwise have kept open. How a final judgment affects present-day claims, for example in disputes over sacred places, is a legal question that depends on the facts.
The commission also fits within a longer line of federal policy, from allotment to reorganization to the Indian Self-Determination Act, in which the United States first shrank tribal land holdings and later offered limited remedies. Disputes about places such as Oak Flat and Mount Graham, where Apache concern is about access and protection rather than purchase, show why land claims remain a live subject, and the article on Apache land claims takes up that story.
For current information about any nation’s claims funds, land base or settlements, readers should consult that nation’s official website. This site is independent and speaks for no Apache nation.