The Indian Territory and the Indian Territories are terms that generally described an evolving land area set aside by the United States Government for the relocation of Native Americans who held aboriginal title to their land as a sovereign independent state. In general, the tribes ceded land they occupied in exchange for land grants in 1803. The concept of an Indian Territory was an outcome of the US federal government's 18th- and 19th-century policy of Indian removal. After the American Civil War (1861–1865), the policy of the US government was one of assimilation.
Pushmataha County is a county in the southeastern part of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 11,572. Its county seat is Antlers.
Muskogee County is a county located in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 70,990. The county seat is Muskogee. The county and city were named for the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. The official spelling of the name was changed to Muskogee by the post office in 1900.
Le Flore County is a county located along the eastern border of the U.S state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 50,384. Its county seat is Poteau. The county name honors a Choctaw family named LeFlore, which is part of the Fort Smith metropolitan area. The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma is the federal district court with jurisdiction in Le Flore County.
Haskell County is a county located in the southeast quadrant of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. As of the 2010 census, the population was 12,769. Its county seat is Stigler. The county is named in honor of Charles N. Haskell, the first governor of Oklahoma.
Stigler is a city in and county seat of Haskell County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 2,685 at the 2010 census, down from the figure of 2,731 recorded in 2000.
Muskogee is the eleventh-largest city in Oklahoma and the county seat of Muskogee County. Home to Bacone College, it lies approximately 48 miles (77 km) southeast of Tulsa. The population of the city was 39,223 as of the 2010 census, a 2.4 percent increase from 38,310 in 2000.
Antlers is a city in and the county seat of Pushmataha County, Oklahoma, United States. The population was 2,453 at the 2010 census, a 3.9 percent decline from 2,552 in 2000. The town was named for a kind of tree that becomes festooned with antlers shed by deer, and is taken as a sign of the location of a spring frequented by deer.
The Territory of Oklahoma was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from May 2, 1890, until November 16, 1907, when it was joined with the Indian Territory under a new constitution and admitted to the Union as the state of Oklahoma.
The State of Sequoyah was a proposed state to be established from the Indian Territory in the eastern part of present-day Oklahoma. In 1905, with the end of tribal governments looming, Native Americans of the Five Civilized Tribes—the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek (Muscogee), and Seminole—in Indian Territory proposed to create a state as a means to retain control of their lands. Their intention was to have a state under Native American constitution and governance. The proposed state was to be named in honor of Sequoyah, the Cherokee who created a writing system in 1825 for the Cherokee language.
Charles Nathaniel Haskell was an American lawyer, oilman, and politician who was the first governor of Oklahoma. As a delegate to Oklahoma's constitutional convention in 1906, he played a crucial role in drafting the Oklahoma Constitution and gaining Oklahoma's admission into the United States as the 46th state in 1907. A prominent businessman in Muskogee, he helped the city grow in importance. He represented the city as a delegate in both the 1906 Oklahoma convention and an earlier convention in 1905 that was a failed attempt to create a U.S. state of Sequoyah.
The Constitution of the State of Oklahoma is the governing document of the U.S. State of Oklahoma. Adopted in 1907, Oklahoma ratified the United States Constitution on November 16, 1907, as the 46th U.S. state. At its ratification, the Oklahoma Constitution was the most lengthy governing document of any government in the U.S. All U.S. state constitutions are subject to federal judicial review; any provision can be nullified if it conflicts with the U.S. Constitution.
The Curtis Act of 1898 was an amendment to the United States Dawes Act; it resulted in the break-up of tribal governments and communal lands in Indian Territory of the Five Civilized Tribes of Indian Territory: the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Muscogee (Creek), Cherokee, and Seminole. These tribes had been previously exempt from the 1887 General Allotment Act because of the terms of their treaties. In total, the tribes immediately lost control of about 90 million acres of their communal lands; they lost more in subsequent years.
The Muscogee (Creek) Nation, rebranded in May of 2021 as simply the Muscogee Nation, is a federally recognized Native American tribe based in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The nation descends from the historic Creek Confederacy, a large group of indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands. Official languages include Muscogee, Yuchi, Natchez, Alabama, and Koasati, with Muscogee retaining the largest number of speakers. They commonly refer to themselves as Este Mvskokvlke. Historically, they were often referred to by European Americans as one of the Five Civilized Tribes of the American Southeast.
Thlopthlocco Tribal Town is both a federally recognized Native American tribe and a traditional township of Muscogee Creek Indians, based in Oklahoma. The tribe's native language is Mvskoke, also called Creek.
The Sequoyah Constitutional Convention was an American Indian-led attempt to secure statehood for Indian Territory as an Indian-controlled jurisdiction, separate from the Oklahoma Territory. The proposed state was to be called the State of Sequoyah.
Hitchcock County was a proposed political subdivision created by the Sequoyah Constitutional Convention. The convention, meeting in Muskogee, Indian Territory in 1905, established the political and administrative layout of a prospective U.S. state it called the State of Sequoyah.
The Atoka Agreement is a document signed by representatives of the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indian Nations and members of the United States Dawes Commission on April 23, 1897, at Atoka, Indian Territory. It provided for the allotment of communal tribal lands of the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations in the Indian Territory to individual households of members of the tribes, who were certified as citizens of the tribes. Land in excess of the allotments could be sold to non-natives. Provisions of this agreement were later incorporated into the Curtis Act of 1898, which provided for widespread allotment of communal tribal lands.
An Organic Act is a generic name for a statute used by the United States Congress to describe a territory, in anticipation of being admitted to the Union as a state. Because of Oklahoma's unique history an explanation of the Oklahoma Organic Act needs a historic perspective. In general, the Oklahoma Organic Act may be viewed as one of a series of legislative acts, from the time of Reconstruction, enacted by Congress in preparation for the creation of a unified State of Oklahoma. The Organic Act created Oklahoma Territory, and Indian Territory that were Organized incorporated territories of the United States out of the old "unorganized" Indian Territory. The Oklahoma Organic Act was one of several acts whose intent was the assimilation of the tribes in Oklahoma and Indian Territories through the elimination of tribes' communal ownership of property.
Tams Bixby (1855-1922) was best known for his work on the Dawes Commission, which was formed to formally enroll members of the Indian tribes that were to be allotted portions of the tribal lands in what would become Oklahoma, and prepare for the abolition of the tribal governments before the territories could be accepted as a state. Named as a commission member in 1893, he was elevated to chairman after Senator Dawes' death in 1903. In that position, he was the official custodian of over two million of acres of land whose ownership was being transferred from the tribes to individual members. The organization he led numbered at least 500 people and occupied a large special-purpose building erected in downtown Muskogee. Decades later, a Muskogee reporter wrote that he was, "... arguably the most important figure in Indian Territory."
