Dawes Act - Wow, I'm motivated to do this early!

The Dawes Severalty Act was a detailed act that described how to regulate land use and organization of Native Americans in reservations. It gave certain amounts of land to certain groups of Native Americans - the most going to the head of a family. It also basically gave all control over the land on the reservation to the government.

Another interesting thing about it was that if for any reason a Native American was not living on a reservation yet wanted some land on the frontier, they had to be given the land in the same manner as if they were on the reservation.

The Dawes Severalty Act went on to narrow down more and more specifically the terms of use for the land and who exactly had the right to regulate it (usually the Secretary of the Interior). It concluded by saying that even though these lands were being given to the Native Americans, Congress still had the power (and the 'right') to use these lands for telegraphs, railroads, or whatever they saw fit.