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SouthwestTreaty

Treaty of Bosque Redondo (Fort Sumner) with the Navajo, 1868

The 1868 Fort Sumner treaty ended the Navajo captivity at Bosque Redondo and set a reservation on the Navajo homeland.

Signed
June 1, 1868
Senate
Ratified
Land given up
about 24 million acres
Land set aside for the nations
about 3.3 million acres
Promises
0 of 1 broken or only partly kept
The land in this treaty’s record. Open on the map

What happened

On June 1, 1868, at Fort Sumner, New Mexico, Lieutenant General William T. Sherman and Colonel Samuel F. Tappan signed a treaty with the Navajo Nation, represented by its chiefs and headmen. The Supreme Court says that in the years of war before it, "the United States forcibly moved many Navajos from their original homeland to a relatively barren area in New Mexico known as the Bosque Redondo Reservation."

Article 1 provided that "all war between the parties" would cease. Article 2 set apart a reservation bounded on the north by the 37th parallel of north latitude. It was to include the whole of Canon de Chelly. Article 12 set aside $50,000 for the cost of removing the tribe from Bosque Redondo, and money to buy 15,000 sheep and goats. In Article 9 the Navajo agreed to relinquish "all right to occupy any territory outside their reservation," while keeping the right to hunt on unoccupied adjoining lands. In Article 13 they agreed to make the reservation their permanent home.

In Arizona v. Navajo Nation (2023), the Court noted that the new reservation "would be on the Navajos' original homeland, not the Bosque Redondo Reservation," and that it spans some 17 million acres today. It held that the treaty reserved the water needed for the reservation but did not require the United States to take affirmative steps to secure water for the Tribe.

What was promised, and what happened

  • Kept

    Set apart a Navajo reservation on the homeland, including Canon de Chelly, for the tribe's use and occupation. (Art. 2)

    the reservation would be on the Navajos’ original homeland, not the Bosque Redondo Reservation law.cornell.edu

Good to know. The 17 million acres is the Supreme Court's description of the reservation today, not a figure in the 1868 treaty.

Summarized with AI assistance from 5 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. the United States forcibly moved many Navajos from their original homeland to a relatively barren area in New Mexico known as the Bosque Redondo ReservationArizona v. Navajo Nation, 599 U.S. 555 (2023)
  2. they will relinquish all right to occupy any territory outside their reservationTribal Treaties Database (Oklahoma State University): Treaty with the Navaho, 1868
  3. The actual cost of the removal of the tribe from the Bosque Redondo reservation to the reservation, say fifty thousand dollarsTribal Treaties Database (Oklahoma State University): Treaty with the Navaho, 1868
  4. the reservation would be on the Navajos’ original homeland, not the Bosque Redondo ReservationArizona v. Navajo Nation, 599 U.S. 555 (2023)
  5. did not require the United States to take affirmative steps to secure water for the TribeArizona v. Navajo Nation, 599 U.S. 555 (2023)

Research notes. The 1868 treaty text does not state an acreage; the 17 million acres is the Court's description of the reservation today. The 'pressure' label rests on the Court's description of the forced move that preceded the treaty, not on any statement in the treaty text.

What the treaty did to the land

About 24 million acres given up. about 3.3 million acres recognized, kept or set aside for the nations. 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. 1864

    Promise broken

    Navajo: the Long Walk and Bosque Redondo (1864-1868), ended by the 1868 treaty

    In 1864 the Army forced the Navajo to Bosque Redondo; an 1868 treaty ended their captivity and set apart a reservation.

  2. 1868

    This treaty

    About 24 million acres ceded to the United States by the Navaho. About 3.3 million acres set aside as a reservation for the Navaho

    The 1868 Fort Sumner treaty ended the Navajo captivity at Bosque Redondo and set a reservation on the Navajo homeland.

  3. 1908

    In court

    Winters v. United States

    In 1908 the Court held that the agreement creating the Fort Belknap Reservation impliedly reserved enough Milk River water for irrigation.

  4. 1959

    In court

    Williams v. Lee

    In 1959 the Court held an Arizona court could not hear a non-Indian trader's suit against Navajos over a reservation debt.

  5. 1973

    In court

    McClanahan v. Arizona State Tax Commission

    Arizona could not tax the income of a Navajo living and earning her income on the Navajo Reservation.

  6. 1978

    In court

    United States v. Wheeler

    A tribe prosecuting its own member acts as a separate sovereign, so a tribal conviction does not bar a federal trial, the Court held.

  7. 2016

    Related history

    Bears Ears National Monument Proclamation (Obama)

    Proclamation 9558 in December 2016 created Bears Ears National Monument on about 1.35 million acres and a commission of five tribes.

  8. 2017

    Related history

    Bears Ears reductions and restoration (2017 and 2021)

    Bears Ears was cut by about 1.15 million acres in 2017 and restored to about 1.36 million acres in 2021.

  9. 2017

    Related history

    Bears Ears National Monument (2016-2026): designation, reductions, restoration and the July 2026 action (context, not a treaty claim)

    Bears Ears was set at 1.35 million acres in 2016, cut in 2017, enlarged in 2021, cut in 2026.

  10. 2023

    In court

    Arizona v. Navajo Nation

    The 1868 Navajo treaty reserved water for the reservation but did not require the United States to take steps to secure more.

  11. 2023

    Promise broken

    Navajo water: the 1868 treaty reserves water but creates no duty to secure it (Arizona v. Navajo Nation, 2023)

    The 1868 treaty reserved water for the Navajo Nation, but in 2023 the Court held the United States need not secure it.

  12. 2026

    Related history

    Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante Proclamations (Trump)

    July 2026 proclamations cut Bears Ears to 121,096 acres and Grand Staircase-Escalante to 181,541 acres, and ended the tribal commission.

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

    claims

    The 1946 Indian Claims Commission let tribes press land and treaty claims against the United States for money, as in the Sioux case.

  • Legal doctrine

    reserved water rights

    Under the Winters doctrine (1908), creating a reservation implicitly reserves enough water for its purposes; Arizona v. California set the measure.

  • Legal doctrine

    trust doctrine

    The 1831 'ward and guardian' description became a trust relationship that courts enforce for damages mainly where a statute or regulation creates the duty.

  • Legal doctrine

    canons of construction

    Courts read ambiguous treaties in favor of tribes and as the Indians would have understood them, rules the Supreme Court has repeated for more than a century.

  • Legal doctrine

    reserved rights

    Treaties are 'a grant of right from' tribes, not to them: reserved hunting and fishing rights survived cessions, statehood and even termination.

  • Legal doctrine

    preemption

    Federal law displaces state law in Indian country when state action conflicts with federal and tribal interests, under White Mountain Apache v. Bracker (1980).

  • Legal doctrine

    state jurisdiction

    The Supreme Court has swung between shielding reservations from state law in Worcester and Williams v. Lee, and allowing state prosecutions in Castro-Huerta.

  • Legal doctrine

    taxation

    States cannot tax reservation Indians' reservation income, but tribes and states can both tax non-Indian oil producers on a reservation.

  • Legal doctrine

    criminal jurisdiction

    Who may prosecute a crime in Indian country depends on who the offender and victim are and where it happened.

  • Legal doctrine

    dual sovereignty

    Because tribes and the United States are separate sovereigns, Wheeler (1978) allowed a federal trial after a tribal conviction for the same incident.

  • Legal doctrine

    inherent sovereignty

    Tribes' powers of self-government predate the Constitution and are not delegated by Congress, though the Supreme Court says Congress can limit or end them.

  • Legal doctrine

    civil jurisdiction

    Tribal civil power is strongest over members; Williams v. Lee (1959) protected it, and Montana (1981) limited it over non-members.

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:

Working with these nations

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. digitreaties.org/treaties/treaty/6172856reference work
Research notes

Acreage (, not entered); Kappler page.

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