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The start of American Indian Movement:1968
A group of 200 Native Americans met in Minneapolis to found the American Indian Movement, which is known as AIM. Growing out of the late 1960s civil rights era, its objective is to protect the rights of urban Indians. The U.S. government considers the group to be radical. -
President Johnson signs the Indian Civil Rights Act: 1968
President Lyndon Johnson calls for “termination” to be replaced by Indian “self-determination.” Congress passes the Indian Civil Rights Act to ensure that the American Indian is afforded the broad constitutional rights secured to other Americans in order to protect individual Indians from arbitrary and unjust actions of tribal governments. Highly controversial law due to it authorizes federal courts to intervene in intra-tribal disputes,left many Indians to bitterly resent the development. -
Division of Indian Health elevated to bureau: 1968
Under the President Lyndon Johnson’s administration, there is major reorganization of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and the U.S. Public Health Service. The Division of Indian Health is then elevated to bureau status in 1968. -
‘Indians of All Tribes’ group occupies Alcatraz Island: 1969
78 Natives calling their selves Indians of All Tribes, land on Alcatraz Island and begin to occupy it in a demonstration for the rights of American Indians. this was a way for them to show that they needed a cultural center of their own. The were afraid that the old Native ways were going to be lost. -
Termination era ends; self-determination proposed: 1970
President Richard Nixon denounces the Eisenhower-era policy of terminating Indian nations and announces a policy under which “the Indian future is determined by Indian acts and Indian decisions.” Although this speech created no new conditions on reservations, it points federal policy in a new direction and demonstrates to American Indian leaders that the administration is listening to calls for self-determination. -
U.S. settles Alaska Native land claims: 1971
U.S. ceases claim of Alaska Native land to aboriginal lands.Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act revokes all but one of the reserves and reservations in the state.In return, Alaska Natives are granted 1/9th of the state or 40 million acres to be divided among them and with a shared payment of $462,500,000. allows Alaska Native corporations, including 13 regional corporations, local village corporations, receive shares payment and begin developing local economies to benefit Alaska Native people. -
Association of American Indian Physicians established: 1971
way to improve the health of American Natives and Alaska Natives, there was 14 Native physicians who organized the Association of American Indian Physicians. The founding board members includes Everett R. Rhoades, Kiowa; Beryl B. Spruce, Ohkay Owingeh/Laguna; Lional de Montigny, Turtle Mountain Chippewa; and Linwood Custalow, Mattaponi. -
NASA brings telemedicine to Tohono O’odham: 1971
NASA launches the first ever satellite dedicated to telemedicine. NASA partners with the Indian Health Service to develop an innovative telemedicine project called Space Technology Applied to Rural Papago Advanced Health Care, in collaboration with the Papago which today is know as Tohono O’odham. what this project is, is a modified recreational vehicle travels among reservation villages and beams patients’ x-rays to doctors hundreds of miles away. -
Native Hawai‘i movement protests eminent domain: 1971
Native Hawaiian residents of Kalama Valley, resist eviction to protest the condemnation of their land for residential and commercial development. This protest launches the Native Hawai‘i movement, modeled on the U.S. civil rights movement. It seeks Native Hawaiian recognition, lands, and rights. Ed Michael, the executive who carried out orders to evict Native Hawaiian residents of Kalama Valley and raze their homes, declared: “In today’s modern world, the Hawaiian lifestyle should be illegal.” -
Reuben A. Snake Jr. leads American Indian Movement: 1972
Winnebago tribal leader Reuben A. Snake Jr. who serves as the national chairman of the American Indian Movement. His advocacy is instrumental in the passage of legislation for Native American rights through the 1990s. He is known throughout Indian Country as “Your Humble Serpent.” He advocates strongly to protect the religious use of peyote by Native American church members through amendments to the American Indian Religious Freedom Act. -
‘Trail of Broken Treaties’ raises environmental health concerns" 1972
Native leaders and activists organize a nonviolent protest to bring attention to issues affecting Natives. More than 600 people travel in the “Trail of Broken Treaties” to Saint Paul, Minnesota. There, Hank Adams, an Assiniboine activist, writes the Twenty Points, one of which states that lack of sanitary sewers and clean drinking water on reservations is killing American Indian children. The meeting in which the activists plan to present these points to President Richard Nixon never occurs. -
Center for study, preservation of Native languages established:1972
Alaska state legislature establishes the Alaska Native Language Center to research and document the state’s 20 Native languages. -
The Indian Education Act empowers parents; funds student programs: 1972
The Indian Education Act allows for the Office of Indian Education and the National Advisory Council on Indian Education, and it
provides federal funds for the American Natives and Alaska Natives education for all the grade levels. This also allows American Native and Alaska Native parents to form advisory boards for federally operated boarding schools and for public schools that have programs for American Native students. -
American Indian Movement occupies Wounded Knee: 1973
The members of the American Indian Movement occupy a trading post at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The conflict started as an attempt to impeach the chairman of the Oglala Lakota Tribe. But as the tribe split up into armed camps, tribal police and government, federal law enforcement, and other outside parties became involved. The siege lasted 71 days, resulted in the deaths of two Indians, and captured national media attention. -
The Bans on Native Hawaiian healing traditions overturned:1973
The Hawaiian Native healers, which are known as the kahuna, are once again allowed to practice legally. The increasing Native Hawaiian rights movement, which seeks to revive the cultural practices, spurs this legal shift. State of Hawai‘i Penal Code, Title 37, Chapter 773 overturrns state policies that outlaw Native Hawaiian healing practices. -
The families with the sanitary sewer, clean water are healthier: 1974
Comptroller General reported to Congress that the Native Americans and Alaska Native families who live in healthful homes, with sanitary sewage disposal and safe piped water, placed fewer demands on the Indian Health Service's primary health care delivery system than the other families living in the unhealthful conditions. The families with sanitary services and clean water require about 25% less of health care than the ones living in the unsatisfactory environmental conditions. -
Study finds American Indian women forcibly sterilized: 1974
A independent study by Dr. Connie Pinkerton-Uri, Choctaw/Cherokee, finds that one in four American Indian women had been sterilized without their consent. -
The Lakota's leader, Frank Fools Crow prays for U.S. Senate: 1975
On September 5 of 1975, the Lakota's healer Frank Fools Crow became the first American Indian holy man to lead the opening prayer for a session of the U.S. Senate. -
The Native American medical students organization: 1975
The Association of Native American Medical Students throughout the U.S. and Canada, is founded. Its members are enrolled in schools of medicine, dentistry, veterinary medicine, optometry, podiatry, and pharmacy. -
Indian self-determination becomes the law of the land: 1975
“We took charge of our own destinies. We are now capable of meeting our communities’ needs more effectively than any other government. We know our people and are sensitive to their cultural traditions and realities. Our people take comfort in knowing that their governments—not the state or federal government—are making decisions on their behalf.” —W. Ron Allen, chairman of the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe in Washington State -
First annual Indian arts and crafts festival held:1976
The Miccosukee invite artists from the Cherokee, Haudenosaunee Six Nations, the Mississippi Choctaw, Navajo, Puebloan, and Ho-Chunk nations to spend the week at the Miccosukee's reservation in the Florida Everglades to celebrate traditional skills and teaching and experiences. -
The Alaska Native high school students sue Alaska State:1976
Two teenage girls Molly Hootch and Anna Tobeluk sue Alaska for failing to provide local high schools in predominantly Alaska Native villages. They argue that the state is discriminating against Alaska Native students and contributing to dropout rates. Later In October, the signing of the Tobeluck Consent Decree commits the state to provide high schools in Alaska Native villages. Eventually 105 high schools opened. -
The Government admits to forced sterilization of Indian Women:1976
A study by the U.S. General Accounting Office finds that 4 of the 12 Indian Health Service regions sterilized 3,406 American Indian women without their permission between 1973 and 1976. The GAO finds that 36 women under age 21 had been forcibly sterilized during this period despite a court-ordered moratorium on sterilizations of women younger than 21. -
President Ford signs Indian Health Care Improvement Act: 1976
Congress passes a $1.6-billion Indian Health Care Improvement Act. Which authorizes the Indian Health Service to bill Medicare and Medicaid for services rendered to qualifying beneficiaries. It also proposes the need for tribal-specific health plans to investigate Native perceptions of health problems and culturally acceptable solutions. -
Safe Drinking Water program created in Hawai‘i: 1977
Hawaii established safe drinking water program in 1977 -
The Congress passes the Indian Child Welfare Act: 1978
The law seeks to “protect the best interests of Indian children and to promote the stability and security of Indian tribes and families,” states the National Indian Child Welfare Association. -
American Indian freedom of religion legalized: 1978
The American Indian Religious Freedom Act legalizes traditional spirituality and ceremonies, overturning local and state regulations still on the books banning American Indian spiritual practices. The American Indians are the only Americans whose religious practice is covered by a law other than the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. -
‘Longest Walk’ draws attention to American Indian concerns: 1978
Several hundred American Indian activists and supporters march for five months from San Francisco to Washington, D.C., to protest threats to tribal lands and water rights. The was intended to symbolize forced removal of American Indians from their homelands and to make aware of the problems of the people and their communities and to expose backlash movement against Indian treaty rights that was gaining strength around the country and in Congress.
