This is John Batchelor, a conversation with Nick Parker of the University of Wisconsin at

Madison about a program over several hundred years initiated by the US government towards the Native Americans,

the indigenous people, and their land.

In this instance, it's fractionated land.

Nick describes it very carefully, fractionated land. Nick describes it very carefully, fractionated land. The end result is the Native American

indigenous peoples are not able to use their own land.

There's so much abuse here that it's astonishing. The thing that most compels me to say, what is the U.S. Government's Bureau of Indian Affairs

Doesn't know who all the owners are doesn't know after 150 years of administering it as the Guardian. Here's Nick Parker, University of

Wisconsin at Madison on fractionated land. More of this later this week.

Proctionated ownership is messy and it applies to roughly 25% of the stems from the General Allotment Act of 1887,

and that was the act that was set

to privatize land on American Indian reservations,

so it subdivided some reservations and then allotted the land to

individuals. Over time, some were declared competent and capable, some weren't. Some lands were not allotted. Others were. But the point of that legislation, at least the recorded purpose was to help Native Americans become farmers and assimilate into

mainstream culture and private ownership was the way to help them do that.

But it was a rocky program and over time observers were noting that a lot of land was flowing out of Native American ownership and a lot of Native Americans who had allotted land were not becoming farmers.

And so the position of the federal government changed, started to change in the 1920s.

So that 30 years after the program was initiated.

And eventually allotment was terminated.

That was in 1934 with the Indian Reorganization Act. And so, well, what are you going to do with the land that had been allotted, but the owner hadn't been declared competent and capable

so it never been released into private ownership.

Well for that land, it's remained in federal trusteeship,

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