Grant Grant's Indian Policies

[Jimbo_Poke]

Gold, Black Hills, and the Great Sioux War 1876. This is one thing amateur historians need to make sure they dig in and look at the actual documents, actual correspondence, and actual treaties. You have an BIA agent on the Gros Ventre land writing letters that a Sioux band are residing where they are not supposed to be, then you have an BIA agent on Sioux and Cheyenne lands saying no, no trouble but any trouble is because of x, y, z. Grant tries to placate all by saying remove the Sioux bands where they are not supposed to be, close and shut down the illegal Black Hills settlements and escort the settlers away, but tell the settlers don't worry the government is conducting operations (negotiations) to open the Black Hills to settlement anyway. (The Papers of Ulyses S Grant pages 126-129). Seems like a cluster of communications, conflicting reports, bureaucrats and Army officers at odds with each other in the midst of a rapidly deteriorating situation far removed from fast communication.

End point is the cause of the war was the Sioux making permanent residence in lands they were treaty bound not to. It wasn't to steal the gold, the U.S. was trying to negotiate like they did with the Beartooths and the Crow. Now what the Black Hills gold did do is make the Sioux treaty violations worth enforcing unlike during the Red Cloud War. You got moving pieces with multiple actors, and the Sioux had for some time been trying to expand their land west. They got a little of that by changing the Powder River Basin from Crow to unceded land with no permanent (only hunting) residence after the Red Cloud War. They won that war, and didn't realize the difference they would be facing fighting a foe who now thought the conflict was worth the cost compared to a viewing the conflict as a backwoods operation not worth the cost. That is how the Black Hills gold comes into play in my opinion.

Now I am not saying that the US government did not perform acts that helped start the conflict. The denial of sufficient rations, limiting firearms and ammo, and not squelching the illegal settlements certainly did not motivate Sioux and Cheyenne to stay on lands, but look at the documents and you will see the official reason for the war was to get Sitting Bull's camps and others back onto Sioux Lands. This is further evidenced by the battles of Rosebud and Little Big Horns occuring on what was then (and in LBH still is surrounded by) Crow land.

 

[Philip Leigh]

Gold, Black Hills, and the Great Sioux War 1876. This is one thing amateur historians need to make sure they dig in and look at the actual documents, actual correspondence, and actual treaties. You have an BIA agent on the Gros Ventre land writing letters that a Sioux band are residing where they are not supposed to be, then you have an BIA agent on Sioux and Cheyenne lands saying no, no trouble but any trouble is because of x, y, z. Grant tries to placate all by saying remove the Sioux bands where they are not supposed to be, close and shut down the illegal Black Hills settlements and escort the settlers away, but tell the settlers don't worry the government is conducting operations (negotiations) to open the Black Hills to settlement anyway. (The Papers of Ulyses S Grant pages 126-129). Seems like a cluster of communications, conflicting reports, bureaucrats and Army officers at odds with each other in the midst of a rapidly deteriorating situation far removed from fast communication.

End point is the cause of the war was the Sioux making permanent residence in lands they were treaty bound not to. It wasn't to steal the gold, the U.S. was trying to negotiate like they did with the Beartooths and the Crow. Now what the Black Hills gold did do is make the Sioux treaty violations worth enforcing unlike during the Red Cloud War. You got moving pieces with multiple actors, and the Sioux had for some time been trying to expand their land west. They got a little of that by changing the Powder River Basin from Crow to unceded land with no permanent (only hunting) residence after the Red Cloud War. They won that war, and didn't realize the difference they would be facing fighting a foe who now thought the conflict was worth the cost compared to a viewing the conflict as a backwoods operation not worth the cost. That is how the Black Hills gold comes into play in my opinion.

Now I am not saying that the US government did not perform acts that helped start the conflict. The denial of sufficient rations, limiting firearms and ammo, and not squelching the illegal settlements certainly did not motivate Sioux and Cheyenne to stay on lands, but look at the documents and you will see the official reason for the war was to get Sitting Bull's camps and others back onto Sioux Lands. This is further evidenced by the battles of Rosebud and Little Big Horns occuring on what was then (and in LBH still is surrounded by) Crow land.

Thanks for your substantive contribution.

If the tribes were at fault, why did the Supreme Court validate an award of $106 million in 1980 for their descendants?

Aside from the page numbers in the Grant papers, is there a specific volume that should be included in the citation?

 

[MattL]

Gold, Black Hills, and the Great Sioux War 1876. This is one thing amateur historians need to make sure they dig in and look at the actual documents, actual correspondence, and actual treaties. You have an BIA agent on the Gros Ventre land writing letters that a Sioux band are residing where they are not supposed to be, then you have an BIA agent on Sioux and Cheyenne lands saying no, no trouble but any trouble is because of x, y, z. Grant tries to placate all by saying remove the Sioux bands where they are not supposed to be, close and shut down the illegal Black Hills settlements and escort the settlers away, but tell the settlers don't worry the government is conducting operations (negotiations) to open the Black Hills to settlement anyway. (The Papers of Ulyses S Grant pages 126-129). Seems like a cluster of communications, conflicting reports, bureaucrats and Army officers at odds with each other in the midst of a rapidly deteriorating situation far removed from fast communication.

End point is the cause of the war was the Sioux making permanent residence in lands they were treaty bound not to. It wasn't to steal the gold, the U.S. was trying to negotiate like they did with the Beartooths and the Crow. Now what the Black Hills gold did do is make the Sioux treaty violations worth enforcing unlike during the Red Cloud War. You got moving pieces with multiple actors, and the Sioux had for some time been trying to expand their land west. They got a little of that by changing the Powder River Basin from Crow to unceded land with no permanent (only hunting) residence after the Red Cloud War. They won that war, and didn't realize the difference they would be facing fighting a foe who now thought the conflict was worth the cost compared to a viewing the conflict as a backwoods operation not worth the cost. That is how the Black Hills gold comes into play in my opinion.

Now I am not saying that the US government did not perform acts that helped start the conflict. The denial of sufficient rations, limiting firearms and ammo, and not squelching the illegal settlements certainly did not motivate Sioux and Cheyenne to stay on lands, but look at the documents and you will see the official reason for the war was to get Sitting Bull's camps and others back onto Sioux Lands. This is further evidenced by the battles of Rosebud and Little Big Horns occuring on what was then (and in LBH still is surrounded by) Crow land.

One must not also forget two other factors

1) The questionable nature in which many treaties were established. The US had a long standing policy of exploiting a treaty out of someone somehow, didn't matter if that person had the authority for all the people it was enforced against, didn't matter if the other side didn't understand the true terms or implications of the treaty (or straight out denied it). Tribes knew this history, that "US negotiation" mean basically creating any sort of documented legal justification whether it truly represented a fair and accurate negotiation. Let's not forget that the entire Cherokee Nation had been subjected to the trail of tears and removal on the signing of a treaty by tribal members that were not the official leaders. The official leader (John Ross) fought tooth and nail feeling confident the US wouldn't stick to a treaty so obviously not made with the Cherokee Nation, he overestimated the US. This was just one of many such circumstances.


2) US and US citizen violation of said treaties. The US as a Nation commonly violated treaties with Natives and many US citizen settlers went out and settled in all sorts of places and violated many different treaties quite commonly.

We should remember this since this was the general sense among the Native American tribes of the time. They knew the history that came before. The decades and generations of violations and the US government really not caring. Of Native exploitation.

"but look at the documents and you will see the official reason for the war was to get Sitting Bull's camps and others back onto Sioux Lands. "

Of course it was, but it's based on a bed of US violation and exploitation where the US only cared about their one sided enforcement of things when it benefited them. It's like a slave master cutting off the foot of a repeat runaway slave, pointing out that these were the rules that everyone agreed to.

 

[Jimbo_Poke]

Thanks for your substantive contribution.

If the tribes were at fault, why did the Supreme Court validate an award of $106 million in 1980 for their descendants?

Aside from the page numbers in the Grant papers, is there a specific volume that should be included in the citation?

As far as volume look at January 1-October 31 1876. I will read the actual decision and get back to you. I have some initial suspicions, but don't want to comment until I re-read and refresh my mind from the actual court documents. Needless to say USSC has gotten other decisions wrong before.

One must not also forget two other factors

1) The questionable nature in which many treaties were established. The US had a long standing policy of exploiting a treaty out of someone somehow, didn't matter if that person had the authority for all the people it was enforced against, didn't matter if the other side didn't understand the true terms or implications of the treaty (or straight out denied it). Tribes knew this history, that "US negotiation" mean basically creating any sort of documented legal justification whether it truly represented a fair and accurate negotiation. Let's not forget that the entire Cherokee Nation had been subjected to the trail of tears and removal on the signing of a treaty by tribal members that were not the official leaders. The official leader (John Ross) fought tooth and nail feeling confident the US wouldn't stick to a treaty so obviously not made with the Cherokee Nation, he overestimated the US. This was just one of many such circumstances.


2) US and US citizen violation of said treaties. The US as a Nation commonly violated treaties with Natives and many US citizen settlers went out and settled in all sorts of places and violated many different treaties quite commonly.

We should remember this since this was the general sense among the Native American tribes of the time. They knew the history that came before. The decades and generations of violations and the US government really not caring. Of Native exploitation.

"but look at the documents and you will see the official reason for the war was to get Sitting Bull's camps and others back onto Sioux Lands. "

Of course it was, but it's based on a bed of US violation and exploitation where the US only cared about their one sided enforcement of things when it benefited them. It's like a slave master cutting off the foot of a repeat runaway slave, pointing out that these were the rules that everyone agreed to.

What happened to one tribe means little to another. The Sioux and Cheyenne won the Red Cloud War, the Crow were the big losers. The Sioux and Cheyenne got just about everything they wanted short of being allowed permanent residence in the Powder River Basin. I know the U.S. government has a bad reputation with treaties with the various tribes, but in my corner of the woods you actually look at the various Fort Laramie treaties and the acts of the tribes and you will see in this neck of the woods (Powder River) the Sioux were the primary violators of those treaties.

To tie this back to Grant, there was a lot going on here in the Powder River area and I would place Grant pretty low on the causes of that war. Grant preferred the peace option in general in dealing with the tribes. If you want to nail Grant for the westward expansion during that time and harm to the the tribes I suggest finding a better example than the Sioux.

 

[MattL]

As far as volume look at January 1-October 31 1876. I will read the actual decision and get back to you. I have some initial suspicions, but don't want to comment until I re-read and refresh my mind from the actual court documents. Needless to say USSC has gotten other decisions wrong before.



What happened to one tribe means little to another. The Sioux and Cheyenne won the Red Cloud War, the Crow were the big losers. The Sioux and Cheyenne got just about everything they wanted short of being allowed permanent residence in the Powder River Basin. I know the U.S. government has a bad reputation with treaties with the various tribes, but in my corner of the woods you actually look at the various Fort Laramie treaties and the acts of the tribes and you will see in this neck of the woods (Powder River) the Sioux were the primary violators of those treaties.

To tie this back to Grant, there was a lot going on here in the Powder River area and I would place Grant pretty low on the causes of that war. Grant preferred the peace option in general in dealing with the tribes. If you want to nail Grant for the westward expansion during that time and harm to the the tribes I suggest finding a better example than the Sioux.

I completely disagree that what happened with one tribe effected the others. That's like saying say the Colony of Virginia upon becoming a State put no value on the history in the other colonies. By the late 19th century many of the tribes knew of the long multi-century history with Europeans and their descendants, including of the US deals and treaties. They didn't know all of the details of course but they certainly knew of a general history and the results and exploitations that happened. They also knew that the Europeans/US manipulated the tribal tensions between each-other, ultimately eating up more and more land with the only long time winner being the US. They weren't stupid, they knew very well that White people hadn't controlled the Eastern US and somehow the Whites just kept coming out on top over and over again in the end.

You can't look at an even in a void without the previous context. The previous context is everything.

Many violations in just about all the instances of Native treaties on the Native side had to do with the US finding anyone they could exploit to claim they had the authority to make said treaty. Often these were willfully and purposefully naive on the part of the US knowing they would just use it to justify force to enforce the treaty. The reality is many of the Natives that "violated" the treaties were never represented in the treaty process and simply saw themselves as a third party not bound by the treaty. There are countless examples of this, the biggest (or at least one of the biggest) of course being again the Cherokee and the deal made with Ridge and his group rather than the current Principal Chief of the Cherokee John Ross.

The reality is manifest destiny ruled the time from Jefferson on (and before really). They didn't care if the treaties were suspect. Whether they were made via bribes and with people that really didn't have the authority to make the call. They wanted the land and/or what was on it and when the motivation came they found a way.

Additionally I am skeptical of your proclamation about the Laramie treaties and the Sioux being the prime violatiors

United States v. Sioux Nation of Indians of 1980

----
In United States v. Sioux Nation of Indians (1980), the U.S. Supreme Court held that an 1877 act of Congress, by which the United States wrested control of the Black Hills of South Dakota from the Sioux Indian Nation, constituted a "taking" of property under the Fifth Amendment, giving rise to an obligation to fairly compensate the Sioux. The Court affirmed a prior decision of the court of claims, which had awarded the Sioux $17.1 million for the taking of the Black Hills, and further held that the tribe was entitled to interest on that amount from 1877. By the late 1990s, the amount due the Sioux had risen to more than $600 million–a payment that the tribe still refuses to accept, choosing instead to continue to seek the return of the land itself.

The 1980 decision represented the judicial culmination of more than sixty years of litigation and lobbying in the Court of Claims, the Indian Claims Commission, the U.S. Congress, and the Supreme Court, in which the Sioux sought retribution for more than a century's worth of bad faith and fraudulent dealings relating to the Black Hills.
----

Plenty of other cases

https://www.justice.gov/enrd/significant-indian-cases

http://users.humboldt.edu/ogayle/sed741/lakota.html


I find your summary lacking and one sided.

 

[Jimbo_Poke]

I completely disagree that what happened with one tribe effected the others. That's like saying say the Colony of Virginia upon becoming a State put no value on the history in the other colonies. By the late 19th century many of the tribes knew of the long multi-century history with Europeans and their descendants, including of the US deals and treaties. They didn't know all of the details of course but they certainly knew of a general history and the results and exploitations that happened. They also knew that the Europeans/US manipulated the tribal tensions between each-other, ultimately eating up more and more land with the only long time winner being the US. They weren't stupid, they knew very well that White people hadn't controlled the Eastern US and somehow the Whites just kept coming out on top over and over again in the end.

You can't look at an even in a void without the previous context. The previous context is everything.

Many violations in just about all the instances of Native treaties on the Native side had to do with the US finding anyone they could exploit to claim they had the authority to make said treaty. Often these were willfully and purposefully naive on the part of the US knowing they would just use it to justify force to enforce the treaty. The reality is many of the Natives that "violated" the treaties were never represented in the treaty process and simply saw themselves as a third party not bound by the treaty. There are countless examples of this, the biggest (or at least one of the biggest) of course being again the Cherokee and the deal made with Ridge and his group rather than the current Principal Chief of the Cherokee John Ross.

The reality is manifest destiny ruled the time from Jefferson on (and before really). They didn't care if the treaties were suspect. Whether they were made via bribes and with people that really didn't have the authority to make the call. They wanted the land and/or what was on it and when the motivation came they found a way.

Additionally I am skeptical of your proclamation about the Laramie treaties and the Sioux being the prime violatiors

United States v. Sioux Nation of Indians of 1980

----
In United States v. Sioux Nation of Indians (1980), the U.S. Supreme Court held that an 1877 act of Congress, by which the United States wrested control of the Black Hills of South Dakota from the Sioux Indian Nation, constituted a "taking" of property under the Fifth Amendment, giving rise to an obligation to fairly compensate the Sioux. The Court affirmed a prior decision of the court of claims, which had awarded the Sioux $17.1 million for the taking of the Black Hills, and further held that the tribe was entitled to interest on that amount from 1877. By the late 1990s, the amount due the Sioux had risen to more than $600 million–a payment that the tribe still refuses to accept, choosing instead to continue to seek the return of the land itself.

The 1980 decision represented the judicial culmination of more than sixty years of litigation and lobbying in the Court of Claims, the Indian Claims Commission, the U.S. Congress, and the Supreme Court, in which the Sioux sought retribution for more than a century's worth of bad faith and fraudulent dealings relating to the Black Hills.
----

Plenty of other cases

https://www.justice.gov/enrd/significant-indian-cases

http://users.humboldt.edu/ogayle/sed741/lakota.html


I find your summary lacking and one sided.

Mods this is going to get off topic in regards to Grant, could the above post and this one be moved to another thread?

You are confusing two things how the war ended and how it started. The Great Sioux War ended by individual bands surrendered and being sent to reservations over a period of time (some not until decades later after returning from Canada). There was not a formal treaty like following Red Cloud's War. You have Congress pass an act and there you have the basis for the Supreme Court Decision.

As for me being onesided, here are the actual document texts

1851 Treaty of Fort Laramie
https://www.ndstudies.gov/gr8/conte...boundaries/section-2-treaty-fort-laramie-1851

Here is a map that will help you understand the metes and bounds descriptions
https://www.loc.gov/item/2005630226/

Now go look at these docs and come back and tell me the Red Cloud War was not a war of expansion for the Sioux and Cheyenne.

 

[MattL]

Mods this is going to get off topic in regards to Grant, could the above post and this one be moved to another thread?

You are confusing two things how the war ended and how it started. The Great Sioux War ended by individual bands surrendered and being sent to reservations over a period of time (some not until decades later after returning from Canada). There was not a formal treaty like following Red Cloud's War. You have Congress pass an act and there you have the basis for the Supreme Court Decision.

As for me being onesided, here are the actual document texts

1851 Treaty of Fort Laramie
https://www.ndstudies.gov/gr8/conte...boundaries/section-2-treaty-fort-laramie-1851

Here is a map that will help you understand the metes and bounds descriptions
https://www.loc.gov/item/2005630226/

Now go look at these docs and come back and tell me the Red Cloud War was not a war of expansion for the Sioux and Cheyenne.

If you want to feel free to create a thread and throw me a link. I agree this is getting off topic.

 

[Jimbo_Poke]

Thank you mods. While the 1876 Sioux War is related to Grant, to really understand the 1876 war one needs to understand the Red Cloud War of 1866-68 and the changes from the 1851 to 1868 Fort Laramie treaties.

I wrote earlier that the Sioux were the primary treaty breakers in the Powder River region not the U.S. govt. I linked text to the 1851 Fort Laramie treaty above as well as a period map to help with the associated metes and bounds.

Article 1 of the treaty is that the tribes maintain peaceful relations with each other. This was not followed. The Sioux waged a campaign whose stated goal was to wipe out or at least drive out the Crow from their land. This campaign was halted by the Battle of Pryor Creek in Montana in 1861. That campaign was a clear violation of the treaty.

Next, per article 2 of the Fort Laramie 1851 treaty was that tribes accepted the right of the U.S. government to build roads and posts in their territory. Thus the Sioux had no basis per treaty to contest the Bozeman trail and accompanying forts although all the forts except Fort Fetterman (ironically the only fort not destroyed following the Red Cloud War) were not on Sioux land anyhow see below. And in actuality to protest and attack settlers on the trail are themselves treaty violations.

One could understand the above treaty violations more if the trail was going through the heart of Sioux territory, but it didn't. Note from the above link there is no mention of the Powder River in the Sioux territory metes and bounds, so if you are looking at a map and it shows Sioux Territory going to the Powder River (like the one on the Wiki page) it is wrong. Rather the boundary of recognized Sioux land was the high point between the Powder River and Cheyenne River drainages (considered a continuance of the Black Hills) from Red Butte to the modern notion of the Black Hills. Very small sections of the trail crossed the periphery of Sioux territory. The vast majority of the trail was on Crow Land. All in all the Sioux had no treaty based right in protesting the Bozeman Trail. This isn't tricky language, this is flat out certain Sioux bands ignoring and violating the treaty. There is a reason the U.S. Army did not have trouble finding auxiliaries from the Crow, Shoshone, Pawnee, Kiowa, and other tribes to fight the Sioux.

 

[Ole Miss]

"The strategic objective was to stabilize the situation in the northern great plains and remove the Indian problem once and for all. The strategic method was to accomplish this was to return or force the return of all Indians to the reservation that had left, and to use equal forceful measures to either convince those who had never been confined to do so or be destroyed. The overarching strategic reason was to open this area for westward expansion, and provided for a continued stability in the region. All very nicely stated in strategic terms but meaning submit or die. From these strategic objectives operational direction is derived." This statement was made by dear friend who is extremely knowledgeable about the subject of the Plains Indians and the treatment they received form the U.S. Government.

A little background information establishing the policy followed by President Grant and his subordinates.

1) November 3, 1875—At a secret White House meeting, President Grant and a few selected cabinet members and army generals made a decision to launch a war against the so-called Northern Sioux, those Indians not considered Agency Indians. LG Philip Henry Sheridan, commanding general of the Military Division of the Missouri, headquartered in Chicago, was assigned to command the military operation. George Crook was there.

2) December 1, 1875—From Z. Chandler, Secretary of the Interior, to Belknap, Secretary of War: "I have the honor to inform you that I have this day directed the Commissioner of Indian Affairs to notify said Indian, Sitting Bull, and the others outside their reservations, that they must return to their reservations before January 31, 1876; and that if they neglect or refuse so to move, they will be reported to the War Department as hostile Indians, and that a military Force will be sent to compel them to obey the order of the Indian Department." (The Commissioner of Indian Affairs was Edward P. Smith, but Chandler's actual order to Smith was dated December 3, 1875.)

3) February 10, 1876—Terry receives his official orders to commence operations against the hostile Sioux.

➢ COL John Gibbon was ordered, "to move eastward with all the troops that could be spared from the various garrisons in Montana… Gibbon was not to seek to destroy the power of the Sioux Nation unless an unusually favorable opportunity should present itself, but was to attempt to hold the Indians south of the Yellowstone and prevent them from crossing over to the north bank…" [Stewart, Custer's Luck, p. 84].

➢ "These instructions to Gibbon constitute a further illustration of a policy which was to be in evidence again and again throughout the subsequent months, to surround the Indians and keep them from running away. But, despite the fact that the white man did not seem to be able to comprehend it, the Sioux and the Cheyennes… had not the slightest intention of running away" [Stewart, Custer's Luck, p. 85].

➢ According to Gibbon, the original plan called for his column to move "directly on Fort C. F. Smith by what was called the Bozeman wagon-road, then to cross the Big Horn River and move eastward, with the expectation of striking any hostile camps which might be located in that vast region watered by the Little Big Horn, Tongue, and Rosebud…." (Gibbon, "Last Summer's Expedition…" American Catholic Quarterly Review, April 1877).
Regards
David

 

[Irishtom29]

What was the relationship of the Crows to the United States? Was the United States bound to protect them?

It seems to me that the popular knowledge of the Sioux and their leaders Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull leads many people to disregard victims of Sioux aggression such as the Crows, Pawnees and Kiowas. Though it must be said the Kiowas subsequently got some good licks in against the Texans.

 

[Ole Miss]

The Indians had forced other Indians out of home lands and then Whites got into the act. The Crows followed the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" concept. The Sioux outnumbered the Crow so they allied with the Army.

Everyone, from Indians to Whites followed the famous saying by Senator Hayakawa of California concerning the return to Panama of the canal "we stole it fair and square." Seems like mankind has been like that since the eviction out of the garden.
Regards
David

 

[Jimbo_Poke]

What was the relationship of the Crows to the United States? Was the United States bound to protect them?

It seems to me that the popular knowledge of the Sioux and their leaders Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull leads many people to disregard victims of Sioux aggression such as the Crows, Pawnees and Kiowas. Though it must be said the Kiowas subsequently got some good licks in against the Texans.

As far as bound to protect, I would say no more than protecting anyone within your borders facing such a threat. In 1861 the U.S. was somewhat preoccupied and the Sioux tried to take advantage of that opportunity not only against the Crow but also the Shoshone in the Wind River Valley. Interestingly enough both attempts failed. Additionally, the Crow got somewhat thrown under the bus in the 1868 Fort Laramie treaty when the Crow land located from the crest of the Bighorns to the Powder River became unceded Indian Lands with no permanent residence allowed. It was the reported Sioux bands permanently residing on this land (as well as Gros Ventre land to the north) that helped kick off the 1876 Sioux War.

The Indians had forced other Indians out of home lands and then Whites got into the act. The Crows followed the "enemy of my enemy is my friend" concept. The Sioux outnumbered the Crow so they allied with the Army.

Everyone, from Indians to Whites followed the famous saying by Senator Hayakawa of California concerning the return to Panama of the canal "we stole it fair and square." Seems like mankind has been like that since the eviction out of the garden.
Regards
David

Your last line sums it up nicely. I will add, in addition to the enemy of my enemy there was also the whose vassal would I rather be. Per Crow history, Plenty Coups had a dream that the conquest of the west by the U.S. was inevitable. That was a factor in him maintaining that the best outcome to ensure the survival of the Crow was to maintain peace with the U.S. In the meantime fighting your traditional enemies sure didn't hurt to persuade the rest of the tribe.