Collection Native Americans and the White House
Native Americans hold a significant place in White House history. For thousands of years, Indigenous peoples, including the Nacotchtank and...
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A Complex History
How Long? 11 minutes
President Calvin Coolidge’s relationship with Native Americans is frequently summarized by a passing reference to his signing of the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, if it is mentioned at all.1
Coolidge’s interest in Native Americans was not only political but also personal. Coolidge claimed he was descended from Native Americans, alleging in his published autobiography that his father’s side of the family included a “marked trace of Indian blood.”2
Calvin Coolidge is joined at the White House by Ruth Muskrat and the Committee of One Hundred on December 13, 1923.
Library of CongressIn 1923, President Coolidge met with members of the Committee of One Hundred, formally titled the Advisory Council on Indian Affairs. This group had been created earlier in the year by Secretary of the Interior Hubert Work, who served under the previous administration of President Warren Harding and continued under Coolidge. In addition to creating the advisory Committee of One Hundred, Work reorganized the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the principal federal government agency responsible for treaty negotiations and implementing policies affecting Native Americans.4
The Committee of One Hundred consisted of scholars, activists, and policy specialists (both Native American and non-Native American) who advised the federal government on critical issues facing Indigenous peoples. During the White House visit, a young Native American poet and Mount Holyoke junior named Ruth Muskrat addressed President Coolidge and presented him with a copy of The Red Man in the United States, a book describing the adverse economic, educational, religious, and cultural challenges facing Native Americans. In her speech, she spoke frankly to President Coolidge, beginning with this pointed question that framed her speech:
Mr. President, there have been so many discussions of the so-called Indian Problem. May not we, who are the Indian students of America, who must face the burden of that problem, say to you what it means to us?
Muskrat continued her speech, providing an answer her own question:
The old life has gone. A new trail must be found, for the old is not good to travel farther. We are glad to have it so. But these younger leaders who must guide their people along new and untried paths have perhaps a harder task before them than the fight for freedom our older leaders made. Ours must be the problem of leading this vigorous and by no means dying race of people back to their rightful heritage of nobility and greatness. Ours must be the task of leading through these difficult stages of transition into economic independence, into a more adequate expression of their art, and into an awakened spiritual vigor… We want to become citizens of the United States, and to have our share in the building of this great nation, that we love. But we want also to preserve the best that is in our own civilization.5
President Coolidge and First Lady Grace Coolidge were moved by Muskrat’s poignant words and subsequently invited her to dine with them at the White House for lunch. The New York Times described the delivery of her speech as exhibiting “force and clarity.”6
The December 1923 Native American visit to the White House and Ruth Muskrat’s speech may have influenced Coolidge to support and sign the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act on June 2. He was also likely inspired by the recent military service of thousands of Native Americans in World War I.7
Although the 1924 legislation conferred citizenship on all Native Americans born within the territorial borders of the United States, voting rights for Native Americans remained contested. Even after the enactment of the 1924 legislation, many Native American populations were denied suffrage, frequently subjected to state-imposed poll taxes and literacy tests. In this sense, Native Americans were treated as “second-class citizens,” much like African Americans and Chinese Americans at that time.11
Calvin Coolidge meets with Native Americans from the Plateau region of the United States in 1925.
Library of CongressTo commemorate the enactment of the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act, President Coolidge hosted several delegations of Native Americans at the White House in 1925. On February 18, 1925, Coolidge hosted a Native American delegation from the Plateau region of the northwestern United States.16
In 1926, Secretary of the Interior Hubert Work commissioned a study from the Institute for Government Research (now the Brookings Institution) to analyze the social and economic conditions of American Indians living on reservations. The report, led by Lewis Meriam, was issued on February 21, 1928. It was formally titled “The Problem of Indian Administration” but became known as the “Meriam Report.”20
Calvin Coolidge meets with members of the Sioux Indian Republican Club of the Rosebud Reservation at the White House on March 10, 1925.
Library of CongressIn 1927, the Coolidge family vacationed in South Dakota for several months, living at the State Game Lodge in Custer State Park that served as the “Summer White House.” In July and August, Coolidge met with tribal leaders at a variety of locations, including at the State Game Lodge and at an off-reservation Native American boarding school.21
Calvin Coolidge on vacation in Black Hills, South Dakota in 1927.
Library of CongressAfter his induction to the Lakota tribe on August 4, 1927, Coolidge attended the dedication of the Mount Rushmore site in the Black Hills, located on Lakota Sioux land that the federal government had seized from Indigenous people.26
On August 17, 1927, President Coolidge traveled to the southwestern corner of South Dakota to visit a Lakota tribal reservation called Pine Ridge, located in the Black Hills. Lakota leaders understood the significance of the event, as this was the first time in history that a sitting President of the United States visited a Native American reservation. An elder of the tribe, Black Horn, greeted President Coolidge and began a processional that included five hundred Lakota who sang, danced, and played the drums. During the visit, Sioux National Council tribal leaders asked Coolidge to assist with their disputed land claim concerning the Black Hills. Coolidge addressed the Lakotas and spoke of the Indian Citizenship Act and other policies geared at assimilation, such as land allotment, boarding schools, and English literacy. Coolidge also publicly criticized Native American policy, describing its administration as convoluted and problematic due to often contradictory federal laws, state laws, treaties, decisions, and court cases, and regulations. According to Coolidge, the situation ultimately resulted in “injustice to the Indians.”28
President Coolidge speaks at the dedication of the Mount Rushmore Memorial on August 10, 1927.
U.S. National Parks Service, Charles D'EmeryThroughout his presidency, Coolidge demonstrated an “unusual interest” in Native American affairs but not all his activity was welcomed by Native Americans.31
Coolidge understood that the media landscape was changing, and the American presidency was rapidly becoming an office heavily reliant upon a cultivated image and press coverage.33
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