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Treaty

Ponca at Washington, DC (1858)

In 1858 the Ponca ceded most of their land and kept a Niobrara reservation with a U.S. promise of protection.

Signed
March 12, 1858
Senate
Ratified
Land given up
about 1.3 million acres
Promises
1 of 1 broken or only partly kept
The land in this treaty’s record. Open on the map

What happened

On March 12, 1858, in Washington, Commissioner Charles E. Mix signed a treaty with six Ponca chiefs. The Ponca ceded "all the lands now owned or claimed by them" except a tract on the Niobrara and Ponca Rivers reserved for their future homes, where they agreed to move within a year of ratification. The United States agreed "to protect the Poncas in the possession of the tract of land reserved for their future homes," during good behavior, and to pay annuities for thirty years, starting at $12,000 a year.

The Encyclopedia of the Great Plains says the Ponca signed four treaties, including this one, and never fought the United States. It says the Ponca tried to farm the reservation, but the government's 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie ceded the entire Ponca Reservation to the Sioux, leaving them "trespassers on their own reservation."

According to the same source, the forced removal of the tribe to Indian Territory began in the spring of 1877, and the Ponca lost 158 of 730 people in two years. Standing Bear's 1879 trial in Omaha followed.

What was promised, and what happened

  • Broken

    The United States would protect the Ponca in possession of the tract reserved for their future homes. (Art. 2)

    Overnight, the Poncas found themselves trespassers on their own reservation. plainshumanities.unl.edu

Good to know. The Encyclopedia of the Great Plains says the reservation was lost when the 1868 Fort Laramie treaty ceded the entire Ponca Reservation to the Sioux; later Ponca treaties are not covered here.

Summarized with AI assistance from 3 sources and checked against their words; not yet reviewed by historians or by the nations. Report an error

What the sources say, and how this was checked

Well supported by the sources below.

  1. To protect the Poncas in the possession of the tract of land reserved for their future homesTreaty with the Ponca, 1858 (Oklahoma State University Tribal Treaties Database)
  2. Overnight, the Poncas found themselves trespassers on their own reservation.Poncas, Encyclopedia of the Great Plains
  3. the forced removal of the tribe commenced in the spring of 1877Poncas, Encyclopedia of the Great Plains

Research notes. The account of how the Ponca lost the reservation follows the Encyclopedia of the Great Plains, which attributes it to the 1868 Fort Laramie treaty; the Ponca's later treaties are not covered here. The treaty does not state an acreage. It was ratified March 8, 1859, and proclaimed April 11, 1859.

What the treaty did to the land

About 1.3 million acres given up. Each shape is a numbered area in the federal government’s 1899 record of land cessions.

What happened next

Everything the record holds about this land and this treaty, in order: what earlier agreements said, what this one did, and what the United States, the courts and the nations did afterwards.

  1. 1858

    This treaty

    About 1.3 million acres ceded to the United States by the Ponka

    In 1858 the Ponca ceded most of their land and kept a Niobrara reservation with a U.S. promise of protection.

  2. 1868

    Promise broken

    Ponca: 1858 treaty, the 1868 land error, 1877 removal and Standing Bear v. Crook (1879)

    An 1858 treaty promised Ponca protection on their land; the US removed them in 1877 and a third of the tribe died.

  3. 1879

    In court

    Standing Bear v. Crook

    In 1879 a federal judge held that an Indian is a "person" who may seek habeas corpus, and discharged Standing Bear and his companions.

The law behind it

The legal ideas behind the decisions, and related records without a date. Court cases and laws with a date are in what happened next, above.

  • Legal doctrine

    citizenship

    Elk v. Wilkins (1884) held the Fourteenth Amendment did not make Native people citizens at birth; Congress declared all remaining non-citizen Indians citizens in 1924.

  • Legal doctrine

    indian country

    Federal law defines 'Indian country' as reservations, dependent Indian communities and Indian allotments; the definition decides which government's laws apply.

  • Legal doctrine

    political status

    Morton v. Mancari (1974) held that the BIA's Indian hiring preference is political, based on tribal membership, not an impermissible racial classification.

Who is doing the work today

The nations connected to this treaty come first, then groups returning land and defending treaty rights. Support goes directly to them.

This history belongs to living nations. Start with them:

Native legal and land defense, nationally

Gifts go straight to each organization; this atlas takes nothing. Listing is not endorsement: how organizations are listed.

Sources

  1. treaties.okstate.edu/treaties/treaty-with-the-ponca-1858-0772reference work
    Treaty with the Ponca, 1858 Mar. 12, 1858. | 12 Stats., 997.

Shapes are approximate and are not legal descriptions of land, title or jurisdiction.