Five Dollar Indians

Five Dollar Indians paid government agents under the table in order to reap the benefits that came with having Indian blood. Mainly Caucasian Men, white Latinos and Siberian native American mongoloids who had an appetite for land theft paid to register on the Dawes Rolls, earning fraudulent enrollment in tribes along with benefits inherited by generations to come, This is where the term $5 Indian comes from. “These were people who were more than happy to exploit the Dawes Commission—and government agents that allowed it, for $5, were willing to turn a blind eye to the graft and corruption.” The Dawes Commission, established in 1893 to enforce the General Allotment Act of 1887 (or the Dawes Act), was charged with convincing tribes to cede their land to the United States Corporation and divide remaining land into individual allotments. The commission also required Indians to claim membership in only one tribe and register on the Dawes Rolls, what the government meant to be a definitive record of individuals with Indian blood. The Curtis Act, passed in 1898, targeted the Five Civilized Tribes (Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek and Seminole), forcing them to accept allotments and register on the Dawes Rolls.