An economic relief program aimed specifically at helping Native American communities during the Great Depression, the legislation marked a sharp U-turn in federal policy toward Indigenous peoples.
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In a major reversal of federal policy toward Native Americans, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signs the Indian Reorganization Act into law on June 18, 1934. Also known as the IRA, the Indian New Deal and the Wheeler-Howard Act, the act granted a new degree of autonomy to Native Americans in the United States, giving them greater control over their lands and allowing them to form legally recognized tribal governments.
In the early 1900s, federal policy toward Native Americans had promoted assimilation, pressuring tribes to leave reservations, move to cities and give up their traditional ways of life. After World War I, in gratitude toward Native Americans who had served in the military, Congress commissioned a study of conditions on Indian reservations across the U.S. The resulting report detailed the impoverished and unhealthy conditions in which many American Indians lived, finding a “vicious circle” in which economic opportunities were rare.
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Be a Seed for Change 