Charles curtis5/28/2023 “ enabled the dissolution of many tribal governments in Oklahoma on the path to Oklahoma becoming a state,” says Donald Grinde, a historian at the University at Buffalo who has Yamasse heritage. And in 1898, as a member of the Committee on Indian Affairs, he drafted what became known as the Curtis Act, extending the Dawes Act’s provisions to the so-called “ Five Civilized Tribes” of Oklahoma. He favored the Dawes Act of 1887, passed a few years before he entered Congress, which allowed the federal government to divide tribal lands into individual plots, which eventually led to the selling of their land to the public. Throughout his time in Congress, Curtis also consistently pushed for policies that many Native Americans today say were a disaster for their nations. In office, he was a loyal Republican and an advocate for women’s suffrage and child labor laws. He was just a popular kid.”Ĭurtis rose within the Republican Party that dominated Kansas and became a congressman, then senator, and eventually Senate majority leader. His personality wins people over-unfortunately, racists can like a person of color and still be a racist, and I think that’s kind of what happened with Charlie. “He’s light-complected, he’s not dark-skinned like a lot of Kanza. “The one thing that might have lightened the persecution of Curtis was that he was half white,” Brooks says. Kansas politician and newspaper editor William Allen White described him carrying books with the names of Republicans in each Kansas township, mumbling the names “like a pious worshiper out of a prayer book” so that he could greet each of them by name and ask about their family.ĭespite the racist treatment of the Kaw by white Kansans-which included land theft and murder-many whites were obviously willing to vote for Curtis. Contemporary accounts cite his personal charm and willingness to work hard served him well in politics. “No man or boy ever received better advice, it was the turning point in my life.”Ĭharles Curtis (left) sits with Herbert Hoover.Ĭurtis gained some fame as a talented horse rider, known on the circuit as “Indian Charlie.” But his grandparents on both sides encouraged him to pursue a professional career, and he became a lawyer and then a politician. “I took her splendid advice and the next morning as the wagons pulled out for the south, bound for Indian Territory, I mounted my pony and with my belongings in a flour sack, returned to Topeka and school,” Curtis later recalled, in a flourish of self-mythologizing. The adolescent Curtis wanted to move with his community, but, according to his Senate biography, his Kaw grandmother talked him into staying with his paternal grandparents and continuing his education. In 1873, the federal government forced the Kaw south to Indian Territory, which would later become Oklahoma. “He was just a very likeable person even early on when he was just a young boy in Topeka.” “He had a knack for conversation,” Brooks says. Mark Brooks, site administrator for the Kansas Historical Society’s Kaw Mission site, says Curtis was known for his personal charisma. Curtis grew up speaking Kanza and French before he learned English. Growing up, he spent time living with both his sets of grandparents and for eight years, he lived on the Kaw reservation. When he was young, Curtis’ mother died, and his father fought in the Civil War for the United States. The policies Curtis pursued in Congress and then as vice president, specifically those on Native issues, cloud his legacy today despite his groundbreaking achievements.Ĭurtis was born in 1860 to a white father from a wealthy Topeka family and a mother who was one quarter Kaw (a tribe also known as Kanza or Kansa). His rise also tells a broader story of how prominent Native Americans viewed how their communities should assimilate within a predominately white society and government. Prejudice against Native Americans was widespread and intense at the time, but Curtis’s ascent to the office speaks to his skillful navigation of the political system. That honor belongs to Charles Curtis, an enrolled member of the Kaw Nation who served as President Herbert Hoover’s veep for his entire first term from 1929 to 1933. But she won’t be the first person of color in the office. Next week, when she takes the oath of office, Senator Kamala Harris will make history as the first woman, first African American, and first person of South Asian heritage to become vice president of the United States.
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