Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA)

What happened

The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA), signed by President Nixon on December 18, 1971, settled Alaska Native claims to land that had been unresolved since the United States bought Alaska from Russia in 1867. The Congressional Research Service calls it the largest land claims settlement in U.S. history at the time.

Congress stated its aims in the law. It said there was an immediate need for a fair and just settlement of all claims by Natives and Native groups of Alaska based on aboriginal land claims, and that the settlement should be accomplished rapidly, with certainty, and without litigation.

Under the settlement, the CRS reports, ANCSA extinguished Alaska Native claims to over 360 million acres. Alaska Natives received approximately 45 million acres, most of it divided among more than 200 village corporations and 12 regional corporations. The regional corporations, along with a 13th for Alaska Natives who were nonpermanent residents, shared a payment of approximately $962.5 million.

This is a different legal arrangement from reservations in the lower 48 states. The CRS explains that these corporations are business entities organized under Alaska law, unlike tribal governments, and that once one receives title the land is private property. It is not a treaty and not a transfer to tribes.

Good to know. This settlement gave land to Native-owned corporations, not to tribes or reservations; the land became corporate private property. Totals are often given as 44 or 45 million acres.

Summarized with AI assistance from 4 sources and checked against their words; not yet reviewed by historians or by the nations. Report an error