American Indian Movement Research Paper

The American Indian Movement is an organization in the United States that attempts to bring attention to the injustice and unfair treatment of American Indians. Aside from that, the AIM works for better protection and care for the American Indians and their families. They have been changing the American perception of Indians since the late 1960’s, as well as aiding our awareness of their existence.

The history and the establishment of various Indian tribes in America took the path of revolution by human civil rights institutions. The Indian American citizen had to form a movement whose main aim was demand for their rights from the Native Americans and the government by sorting for cultural independent protection, advocating of their human rights and restoration of economic rights. Independence of the human race do not always come as an easy task but is involves a sequence of efforts against the violation of rights by their native colonies.

action and protest from Native American groups such as the National Congress of American Indians

In 1830, the Jackson administration instated the Indian Removal Act. This act removed the Native Americans from their ancestral lands to make way for an increase of additional American immigrants. This act forced many Native American tribes from their homes including five larger tribes, Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Creek, and Seminole. These tribes had populations were estimated to be around 65,000 people strong that lived in North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Mississippi. (Foner, 2012) The American Indians fought for their rights and beliefs through the American court system. Their other objective other than fighting for their rights was but in the end, they were forced out of their homes to move

This paper will briefly cover how the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) treated the Native Americans, during the American Indian Movement (AIM) focusing more in the 1960s-1970s. What initially helped push for the AIM and the end result of it.

The Indians were ridiculed and manipulated because of many different bills passed in the 1800’s and their land was decreasing in size and amount of food sources and land. The effects of the Indian Removal Act, Westward expansion, and the Dawes Act on the Native Americans in the 1800’s were abundant.

In summary, The Indian Health Service was established as an operational division agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHA), which is responsible for providing medical and health care services for federally recognized Indian and Alaskan Native American tribes within the United States. The main objective of this governmental health care organization is to provide Native American and Alaskan Indians with health care services, and to help the Indian tribes assimilate to general population without discrimination. Although these healthcare services are of great

Although Clicktivism significantly changed Indigenous struggles over land and resources through protest and activism it is not responsible for introducing new concepts of the self and identity. The first true Native American nationalist movement was led by American Indian Movement in the 1960s and struck a different cord to the National Congress of American Indians. The first successful pan-Indian movement was the Society of American Indians (SAI) which stressed unity ignoring tribal affiliation as a factor causing division among Native Americans. Ironically this organization set up by and for Native Americans was in part caused by the education of Indian children in government run boarding schools to assimilate them. It had the reverse effect causing members of disparate tribes to become friends and allies and many of the leaders of the SAI came from these boarding schools.

The Indian removal act of 1830 significantly impacted the Native American Indians negatively because of the false promise that was made about the relocation, The death’s of many Indians, and The US telling lies about their new home.

Indians helped America in the War of 1812, then got kicked off their land. American leaders weren’t thinking at all! The Cherokees, an indian tribe that lives in Georgia, were asked to move out by Americans, but they didn’t want to; thus, The Indian Removal Act of 1830 was created. Some people were even about to start a war just to get the indians out. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 wasn’t justified for many reasons including that the Cherokees were there first, they saw other indian tribes getting treated badly, and that the supreme court sided with the Cherokees.

The American Indian Movement, AIM, was founded in 1968 by Russell Means, Dennis Banks, and other Native American leaders. AIM was founded as a militant political and civil rights organization for the Native Americans. AIM members occupied Alcatraz Island off San Francisco from November 1969 to June 1971, because they said the treaty granted them permission to unused federal land. AIM occupied the Bureau of Indian Affairs in Washington, D.C. in November 1972 to protest the controlling reservation development.

Native Americans have felt distress from societal and governmental interactions for hundreds of years. American Indian protests against these pressures date back to the colonial period. Broken treaties, removal policies, acculturation, and assimilation have scarred the indigenous societies of the United States. These policies and the continued oppression of the native communities produced an atmosphere of heightened tension. Governmental pressure for assimilation and their apparent aim to destroy cultures, communities, and identities through policies gave the native people a reason to fight. The unanticipated consequence was the subsequent creation of a pan-American Indian identity

One of the most celebrated protests happened February 1973 at Wounded Knee, South Dakota. This was the site of the 1890 massacre of the Sioux Indians murdered in cold blood by American federal troops. AIM occupied and seized the town of Wounded Knee for about two months, demanding changes in their administration and asking the government to honor their treaty obligations that were said to be forgotten. Only one Indian was killed during this protest and another one wounded. The Indian civil rights movement, like most other civil rights movements of their times did not win full justice and equality for their people. The principal goal to some Native Americans was to defend, and protect their rights as Native Americans. As to other Native Americans it was equality. Native Americans wanted to win a place in society as an equal to all groups that made up Americans. However, there is no single Indian culture or tradition in America, so the movement to unite all Native American tribes failed. The Indian civil rights movement, for all the limitations it had endured, did accomplish winning a series of brand new legal rights and protections, which gave them a much stronger position in the twentieth century. (Brinkley, 2012 page

Since the 1950s conditions for Native people were very difficult and had moved beyond the conditions of the early half of the century in which Native people had to struggle to simply survive, or prove that they were worthy of adaptation into white society. The Termination policy of the 1950s, which sought to end federal recognition and support of Indian tribes and relocate Indians to urban areas, continued a pattern of breaking up tribal customs and dislocating Native people from reservations. Thus far with the changing political climate of the 1960s, which included the rise of the American Indian Movement also known as the Native American Renaissance, its attempts to increase awareness of Native American struggles due to discrimination and

Grading the effectiveness of any civil rights movement can be a difficult affair. The criteria of a successful civil rights movement often include a list of concrete changes to policy. The American Indian Movement’s success should not be diagnosed in this way. The self-empowering culture and spiritual revival that the American Indian Movement (AIM) produced is enough to consider it a success. A young American Indian activist Clyde Warrior stated in a paper he wrote: “Programs must Indian creations, Indian choices, Indian experiences. Even the failures must be Indian experiences because only then will Indians understand why a program failed and not blame themselves for some personal inadequacy.” (Smith and Warrior, 55) The American Indian Movement