TRUTH: PART I

Towards Recognition and University-Tribal Healing (TRUTH)

The TRUTH Project is a grassroots collaboration between the 11 recognized Tribal Nations within the geographic boundaries of Minnesota, the Minnesota Indian Affairs Council (MIAC), and the Office of American Indian and Tribal Nations Relations at the University of Minnesota. Born out of a growing national outcry for decolonization and justice, the TRUTH Project began after High Country News’ 2020 publication of the first ever analysis of the 1862 Morrill Act, written from an Indigenous perspective. The Morrill Act called for the establishment and endowment of land-grant (or land-grab) universities, like the University of Minnesota, via the sale of 11 million acres of land acquired through the dispossession of almost 250 Indigenous Nations across over half of the continental United States.¹ Soon after the publication of this article, MIAC released a series of resolutions calling on the University of Minnesota to be a better relative to Indigenous peoples. In response, the TRUTH Project was established and assembled a team of Native scholars who would produce the first ever Indigenous-researched and Indigenous-written report on the past, present, and future of University-Tribal relations. In revealing these truths, we hope to begin the process of recognizing the atrocities the University of Minnesota and the State of Minnesota have imposed on Indigenous peoples and to create much needed space for forging better relationships in the future.

Brief History of University-Tribal Relations

Land, and the commodification of humans and non-human relatives, is the basis of Western wealth and the wealth of the University of Minnesota

Since its founding in 1851, the University of Minnesota has been the beneficiary of multiple land-grabs which ultimately provided the University with 186,791 acres through the dispossession of Indigenous nations.² In 1851, the soon-to-be University Regents scouted Indigenous lands in what was then the Territory of Minnesota, inventoried the land for resources, and decided which parcels they wanted to acquire to found the University of Minnesota.³ Regent Henry Sibley, then, successfully lobbied the U.S. federal government and received Congressional authorization to secure land “to which the Indian title has been or may be extinguished.”⁴ The Regents’ final task, to extinguish Indigenous rights to the land, occurred just six months later when Henry Sibley, Alexander Ramsey, and several other founding Regents were present at Mendota for the deceptive signing of the 1851 Treaty of Traverse de Sioux in which the Dakota were uncompensated for more than 35,000 square miles.⁵ Over the next decade, the founding Board of Regents sold 46,000 acres of Dakota land for the University, mismanaged the profits, and drove the University into financial ruin.⁶

In 1851 Congress authorized the University’s Board of Regents:

“To set apart and reserve from sale, out of any of the public lands within the Territory of Minnesota to which the Indian title has been or may be extinguished, and not otherwise appropriated, a quantity of land not exceeding two entire townships, for the use and support of a university in said Territory.”⁷

In 1862, the passage of the Morrill Act presented a rich solution to the University’s financial woes.⁸ This Act was passed just months before the Dakota War of 1862, during which time Minnesota Governor and Regent Alexander Ramsey authorized, and Brigadier General and Regent Henry Sibley enforced, the sustained starvation, rape, murder, and exile of many Dakota, Cheyenne, and Ho-Chunk peoples.⁹ After the war, and prior to revoking the Dakota treaties and expelling the Dakota bands from Minnesota, President Lincoln authorized the hanging of 38 Dakota men for their involvement.¹⁰ Not five weeks later, Governor Ramsey claimed Minnesota’s Morrill land grant.¹¹ The University of Minnesota Regents were then able to use the Morrill Act to obtain and sell Dakota lands to create “the Minnesota Windfall.”¹² The expropriated Dakota lands provided more land (830,000 acres) and funded more universities (35) than any other Morrill Act land grab.¹³ From the sale of Dakota lands obtained through the Morrill Act of 1862, the University of Minnesota’s return on investment was 25,000%, more than any other university.¹⁴

Through the University of Minnesota, the founding and subsequent Regents laundered lands and resources expropriated from Indigenous peoples.¹⁵ Early University Regents strategically selected lands based on the lucrative resources found there and used any means necessary to remove Indigenous people.¹⁶ Those lands or resources were then sold to the highest bidder—often the Regents’ friends and relatives in the timber, mining, and railroad industries.¹⁷ For example, when a geologist thought he discovered gold on the Bois Forte Band’s Lake Vermillion reservation in 1866, Regents Sibley, Rice, and Ramsey participated in the treaty negotiations that resulted in the dispossession and removed the Band to a much smaller land base at Nett Lake.¹⁸ Similarly, through the expropriation of Anishinaabeg Akiing (Ojibwe lands) in the Treaty of 1854, the University gained mineral rights from which it still collects mining royalties today.¹⁹ The early Regents thus established the wealth of the University of Minnesota—and their own fortunes—through a series of violence-backed land cessions.

Violent acts by the University of Minnesota against Indigenous peoples continued throughout the 20th century and to the present day:

• The University conducted medical research on young children of the Red Lake Nation in the 1960s for a disease that was easily treated with penicillin.²⁰
• University Extension reported on the “abnormally high birth rate of Indian babies” in Wisconsin in the 1970s, around the same time that Indigenous women were subject to forced sterilization. We have not uncovered evidence that the University of Minnesota committed any of these procedures; however, the fact that the University was contributing to the intellectual conversation is highly disturbing.²¹
• Relocation programs managed by the University of Minnesota Extension, throughout the 20th century, removed Indigneous peoples from their lands and into urban settings without access to resources, housing, community, or the kinship networks that sustained our Tribes for generations.²²
• The University and its researchers, like anthropologist Albert Jenks, stole Indigenous ancestral remains, sacred items, knowledge, and cultures which the University has only recently begun the process to repatriate, after public outrage.²³
• The University has silently omitted Indigenous perspectives and narratives to create a whitewashed version of its history as a land grant institution.²⁴
• The University has continued to undervalue and make invisible Indigenous students, staff, and faculty; Indigenous history, culture, and land; and Indigneous oral stories, epistemologies, ontologies, methodologies, and community knowledge systems.²⁵

A moral and legal responsibility 

The federal trust responsibility, broadly speaking, is a Moral and Legal Obligation a government entity has to support Tribal sovereignty, self-governance, and economic prosperity, to protect lands and Indigenous peoples’ rights to use those lands, and to provide medical, dental, educational, housing, and other social services. This trust responsibility originates from the unique relationship between the United States and Tribes and has been enshrined in treaties, statutes, court precedent, and prior conduct. Importantly, the trust responsibility “‘transcends specific treaty promises’ and imposes a duty to promote tribal sovereignty and economic self-sufficiency.”²⁶

The University of Minnesota has a greater obligation to Indigenous peoples than other land grant institutions because of its trust responsibility as a quasi-governmental body and former federal institution. When the University was founded, the Regents accepted “full legal indebtedness of the territorial institution.”²⁷ Because of this agreement, and subsequent actions taken by the early Regents, when the University briefly closed due to financial mismanagement, the University of Minnesota is bound by the federal trust responsibility to support Tribal Nations.²⁸ At the bare minimum, the University of Minnesota has an obligation to consult and partner with Tribal governments to ensure Tribal sovereignty and the trust responsibility are upheld. The University of Minnesota has never upheld this trust responsibility, despite inheriting all the lands and financial resources associated with it. Instead, the University has acquired more lands, knowledge, ancestors, and artifacts to accumulate wealth at the expense of Indigenous peoples.

Citations & Notes

1. Robert Lee and Tristan Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities: Expropriated Indigenous Land is the Foundation of the Land-Grant University System,” High Country News, March 30, 2020, https://www.hcn.org/issues/52.4/indigenous-affairs-education-land-grab-universities. 
2. Danielle Fuecker, Audrianna Goodwin, Henry Paddock, and Madeline Titus, “Center for Urban and Regional Affairs (CURA) TRUTH Capstone: Permanent University Fund, Mineral Rights & University Comparison,” (presentation, Towards Recognition and University Tribal Healing (TRUTH) Project Symposium, Minneapolis, May 17, 2022).
3. William Watts Folwell Papers [incoming correspondence: Isaac Atwater, November 11, 1887, August 16, 1890; William R. Marshall, 1870s–1890s; Henry H. Sibley, 1876–1882; Orland C. Merriman, May 25, 1871; Cyrus Northrop, 1890s–1920s; John S. Pillsbury, April 25, 1876], 1856–1929, Collection no. 965, Box 4 of 11, University Archives, Elmer Andersen Library, University of Minnesota, https://archives.lib.umn.edu/repositories/14/resources/1686; Fuecker et al., “CURA TRUTH Capstone”; Regents of the University of Minnesota [meeting minutes], 1860–1889, Board of Regents Volumes I and II, University Archives, Elmer Andersen Library, University of Minnesota; Daniel W. Sprague Papers [The University of Minnesota A History of the University Land Grants, ca. 1908], 1900–1910, Collection no. 785, Box 1 of 1, University Archives, Elmer L. Andersen Library, University of Minnesota, https://archives.lib.umn.edu/repositories/14/archival_objects/750890.
4. Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].
5. “1851 Dakota Land Cession Treaties,” Why Treaties Matter, http://treatiesmatter.org/treaties/land/1851-Dakota. 
6. Regents of the University of Minnesota [meeting minutes]; “A Report Made by the Standing Committee of the Senate and House [Heaton Report],” in Regents’ Report 1860 (1860), 10–18, University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/102317; Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].
7. Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants], (emphasis added).
8. Lee and Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities.”
9. Jamie Edwards and Government Affairs (Interns Ben Yawakie, An Garagiola-Bernier, and Laura Paynter), “Mille Lacs MIAC Resolution on the University of Minnesota Tribal Partnership,” email to Melanie Benjamin, Chief Executive of Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, June 22, 2020, https://mn.gov/indianaffairs/miacresolutions.html; Minnesota Historical Society, “The US-Dakota War of 1862,” Historic Fort Snelling, https://www.mnhs.org/fortsnelling/learn/us-dakota-war.
10. Lee and Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities.”
11. Lee and Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities.”
12. Lee and Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities.”
13. Lee and Ahtone, “Land-Grab Universities.”
14. Center for Urban and Regional Affairs (CURA) and Resilient Communities Project, “Towards Recognition and University-Tribal Healing (TRUTH): A strategic analysis of the Morrill land grab in Minnesota,” https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/d402092609d44ab7bac2ead074e7f9c5.
15. Folwell Papers [incoming correspondence]; Fuecker et al., “CURA TRUTH Capstone”; Regents of the University of Minnesota [meeting minutes]; Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].
16. John Sargent Pillsbury Papers [original selections GrocStone, 1875], 1858 and 1867–1915, Collection no. 769, Pillsbury Box 1 of 1, University Archives, Elmer L. Andersen Library, University of Minnesota, https://archives.lib.umn.edu/repositories/14/resources/1487; Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].
17. Folwell Papers [incoming correspondence]; Fuecker et al., “CURA TRUTH Capstone”; Regents of the University of Minnesota [meeting minutes]; Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].
18. “1866 Treaty with the Chippewa—Bois Forte Band,” Why Treaties Matter, https://treatiesmatter.org/treaties/land/1866-ojibwe; David A. Walker, “Lake Vermillion Gold Rush,” Minnesota History 44, no. 2 (summer 1974): 42–54, http://collections.mnhs.org/MNHistoryMagazine/articles/44/v44i02p042-054.pdf. 
19. Resilient Communities Project, “Towards Recognition and University-Tribal Healing (TRUTH): A Strategic Analysis of the Morrill Land Grab in Minnesota,” Vimeo video, 32:23, December 21, 2021, https://vimeo.com/659137616. 
20. Edwards et al., “Mille Lacs MIAC Resolution”; Ryan Faircloth, “Land seizures, ‘unethical’ research: University of Minnesota confronts troubled history with tribal nations,” Star Tribune, April 3, 2021, https://www.startribune.com/land-seizures-unethical-research-university-of-minnesota-confronts-troubled-history-with-tribal-nati/600041972/; Sandra Spier and Sam Skoog, “First Our Land, Now Our Health,” Science for the People 6, no. 2 (September 1974): 26–29, https://archive.scienceforthepeople.org/vol-6/v6n5/first-our-land-now-our-health/.
21. University of Minnesota Extension Records [Red Lake Reservation 1969, 1969], 1858–1996 and 2003, Collection no. 935, Box 146 of 165, University Archives, Elmer L. Andersen Library, University of Minnesota. https://archives.lib.umn.edu/repositories/14/archival_objects/313443
22. University of Minnesota Extension Records [Red Lake Reservation 1969].
23. Edwards et al, “Mille Lacs MIAC Resolution”; Faircloth, “Land seizures, ‘unethical’ research”; Minnesota Indian Affairs Council (MIAC), “University of Minnesota Repatriation,” Resolution, June 26, 2020, https://mn.gov/indianaffairs/Resolutions/U%20Of%20M%20Repatriation%20Resolution.pdf; Becca Most, “Weisman Art Museum faces criticism after delaying repatriation of Native American objects for 30 years,” The Minnesota Daily, October 20, 2020, https://mndaily.com/263187/news/weisman-art-museum-faces-criticism-after-delaying-repatriation-of-native-american-objects-for-30-years/. 
24. For example, resolutions written by Indigenous leaders with MIAC have articulated some of these same concerns, see: Edwards et al., “Mille Lacs MIAC Resolution”; Minnesota Indian Affairs Council (MIAC), “A Resolution Calling upon the University of Minnesota to Fulfill Its Obligations to the Eleven American Indian Tribal Governments within the State of Minnesota,” Resolution, June 26, 2020, https://mn.gov/indianaffairs/Resolutions/U%20Of%20M%20Tribal%20Partnership%20Resolution.pdf. 
25. For example, resolutions written by Indigenous leaders with MIAC have articulated some of these same concerns, see: Edwards et al., “Mille Lacs MIAC Resolution”; MIAC, “Resolution Calling upon the University of Minnesota.”
26. Stephen L. Pevar, The Rights of Indians and Tribes, 4th ed.(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 33.
27. Annual Report of the Board of Regents 1862 [annual report to the Minnesota legislature], 1862, University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/102318. 
28. Annual Report of the Board of Regents 1861 [report to the Minnesota legislature], 1861, University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/96601; Annual Report of the Board of Regents 1862 [report to the Minnesota legislature]; “A Report Made by the Standing Committee of the Senate and House [Heaton Report]”; Sprague Papers [History of University Land Grants].