²ÝÁñÉçÇø

With the steady stream of outsiders coming into ²ÝÁñÉçÇø, demand and competition for land continued to increase. Miners could claim land under the 1884 District Act, non-Natives could claim a home site under the 1891 Townsite Act or a homestead under the 1898 Homestead Act.  Churches sought land and acquired it through the Missions Act of 1900, which allowed a religious denomination to acquire up to one square mile of land in ²ÝÁñÉçÇø.  Disputes over land, particularly between miners, resource developers, and ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native people arose. A string of court cases concerning ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native land rights began, and continued up to the settlement of the ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Claims Act in 1971. There were contradictory decisions in these court cases, but two early cases in particular held that non-Natives could not acquire land from Indian people without the consent of the federal government. In other words, ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native people had an aboriginal claim to land that only the U.S. government could settle. The first such case, United States v. Berrigan (1905) was heard by Judge James Wickersham, and involved a dispute over land near Salcha. The second was United States v. Cadzow (1914), involving a dispute over ownership of a cabin in Fort Yukon. 

In 1906, Congress adopted the first land grant to ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native people through ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Allotment Act. The Act entitled ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Natives to restricted land entitlements of up to 160 acres of unappropriated, non-mineral land. While only 80 Allotments were approved between 1906 and 1960, today there are some 13-15 thousand Native Allotments in ²ÝÁñÉçÇø. They are primarily located around the villages and in hunting and fishing use areas. 

Townsite Acts were the way the cities in ²ÝÁñÉçÇø first got land from the federal government. Congress passed the second land grant to ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native people through the 1926 ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsite Act, which was a special type of Townsite designed to give ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Natives small lots under their homes in villages in a restricted status. There was no payment for lots and they were to be nontaxable and inalienable, meaning they could not be taken away or sold without approval of the federal government. Some 106 ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsites were created. Some of the Native villages moved off of their townsites due to flooding and other issues, and most of the 229 federally recognized tribes in ²ÝÁñÉçÇø are not located on ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native townsites. 

Neither the 1906 ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Allotment Act, nor the 1926 ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsite Act, was a settlement of the much larger aboriginal claim to land in ²ÝÁñÉçÇø. Today, however, both Native allotments and restricted ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsite lands are likely Indian country for the purpose of tribal jurisdiction because of their restricted status. Acquiring new Native allotments was terminated by the ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Claims Settlement Act in 1971, without a specific exception by Congress. The ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsite Act was terminated in 1976 by the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA), stopping the creation of new ²ÝÁñÉçÇø Native Townsites.

 

 

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