Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans known as American Indians, Indigenous Americans and other terms, are the indigenous peoples of the United States, except Hawaii. There are over 500 federally recognized tribes within the US, about half of which are associated with Indian reservations; the term "American Indian" excludes Native Hawaiians and some Alaska Natives, while Native Americans are American Indians, plus Alaska Natives of all ethnicities. Native Hawaiians are not counted as Native Americans by the US Census, instead being included in the Census grouping of "Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander"; the ancestors of modern Native Americans arrived in what is now the United States at least 15,000 years ago much earlier, from Asia via Beringia. A vast variety of peoples and cultures subsequently developed. Native Americans were affected by the European colonization of the Americas, which began in 1492, their population declined precipitously due to introduced diseases as well as warfare, territorial confiscation and slavery.
After the founding of the United States, many Native American peoples were subjected to warfare and one-sided treaties, they continued to suffer from discriminatory government policies into the 20th century. Since the 1960s, Native American self-determination movements have resulted in changes to the lives of Native Americans, though there are still many contemporary issues faced by Native Americans. Today, there are over five million Native Americans in the United States, 78% of whom live outside reservations; when the United States was created, established Native American tribes were considered semi-independent nations, as they lived in communities separate from British settlers. The federal government signed treaties at a government-to-government level until the Indian Appropriations Act of 1871 ended recognition of independent native nations, started treating them as "domestic dependent nations" subject to federal law; this law did preserve the rights and privileges agreed to under the treaties, including a large degree of tribal sovereignty.
For this reason, many Native American reservations are still independent of state law and actions of tribal citizens on these reservations are subject only to tribal courts and federal law. The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 granted U. S. citizenship to all Native Americans born in the United States. This emptied the "Indians not taxed" category established by the United States Constitution, allowed natives to vote in state and federal elections, extended the Fourteenth Amendment protections granted to people "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States. However, some states continued to deny Native Americans voting rights for several decades. Bill of Rights protections do not apply to tribal governments, except for those mandated by the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968. Since the end of the 15th century, the migration of Europeans to the Americas has led to centuries of population and agricultural transfer and adjustment between Old and New World societies, a process known as the Columbian exchange.
As most Native American groups had preserved their histories by oral traditions and artwork, the first written sources of the conflict were written by Europeans. Ethnographers classify the indigenous peoples of North America into ten geographical regions with shared cultural traits, called cultural areas; some scholars combine the Plateau and Great Basin regions into the Intermontane West, some separate Prairie peoples from Great Plains peoples, while some separate Great Lakes tribes from the Northeastern Woodlands. The ten cultural areas are as follows: Arctic, including Aleut and Yupik peoples Subarctic Northeastern Woodlands Southeastern Woodlands Great Plains Great Basin Northwest Plateau Northwest Coast California Southwest At the time of the first contact, the indigenous cultures were quite different from those of the proto-industrial and Christian immigrants; some Northeastern and Southwestern cultures, in particular, were matrilineal and operated on a more collective basis than that with which Europeans were familiar.
The majority of Indigenous American tribes maintained their hunting grounds and agricultural lands for use of the entire tribe. Europeans at that time had patriarchal cultures and had developed concepts of individual property rights with respect to land that were different; the differences in cultures between the established Native Americans and immigrant Europeans, as well as shifting alliances among different nations in times of war, caused extensive political tension, ethnic violence, social disruption. Before the European settlement of what is now the United States, Native Americans suffered high fatalities from contact with new European diseases, to which they had not yet acquired immunity. Smallpox epidemics are thought to have caused the greatest loss of life for indigenous populations. William M Denevan, noted author and Professor Emeritus of Geography at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said on this subject in his essay "The Pristine Myth: The Landscape of the Americas in 1492".
Old World diseases were the primary killer. In many regions the tropical lowlands, populations fell by 90 percent or more in the first century after the contact. "Estimates of the pre-Columbian population of what today constitutes the U. S. vary ranging from William M Denevan's 3.8 million in his 1992 w
Esperanto
Esperanto is the most spoken constructed international auxiliary language. It was created in the late 19th century by a Polish-Jewish ophthalmologist. In 1887, he published a book detailing Unua Libro, under the pseudonym Dr. Esperanto. Esperanto translates to English as "one who hopes". Zamenhof's goal was to create an easy and flexible language that would serve as a universal second language to foster peace and international understanding, to build a community of speakers, as he inferred that one can’t have a language without a community of speakers, his original title for the language was the international language, but early speakers grew fond of the name Esperanto and began to use it as the name for the language in 1889. In 1905, Zamenhof published Fundamento de Esperanto as a definitive guide to the language; that year, he organized the first World Esperanto Congress, an ongoing annual conference, in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France. The first congress ratified the Declaration of Boulogne, which established several foundational premises for the Esperanto movement.
One of its pronouncements is that Fundamento de Esperanto is the only obligatory authority over the language. Another is that the Esperanto movement is a linguistic movement and that no further meaning can be ascribed to it. Zamenhof proposed to the first congress that an independent body of linguistic scholars should steward the future evolution of Esperanto, foreshadowing the founding of the Akademio de Esperanto, in part modeled after the Académie française, established soon thereafter. Since 1905, congresses have been held in various countries every year, with the exceptions of years during the World Wars. In 1908, a group of young Esperanto speakers led by Hector Hodler established the Universal Esperanto Association, in order to provide a central organization for the global Esperanto community. Esperanto grew both as a language and as a linguistic community. Despite speakers facing persecution in regimes such as Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union under Stalin, Esperanto speakers continued to establish organizations and publish periodicals tailored to specific regions and interests.
In 1954, the United Nations granted official support to Esperanto as an international auxiliary language in the Montevideo Resolution. Several writers have contributed to the growing body of Esperanto literature, including William Auld, who received the first nomination for the Nobel Prize in Literature for a literary work in Esperanto in 1999, followed by two more in 2004 and 2006. Esperanto-language writers are officially represented in PEN International, the worldwide writers association, through Esperanto PEN Centro. Esperanto has continued to develop in the 21st century; the advent of the Internet has had a significant impact on the language, as learning it has become accessible on platforms such as Duolingo and as speakers have networked on platforms such as Amikumu. With two million speakers, a small portion of whom are native speakers, it is the most spoken constructed language in the world. Although no country has adopted Esperanto Esperantujo is the collective name given to places where it is spoken, the language is employed in world travel, cultural exchange, literature, language instruction and radio broadcasting.
While its advocates continue to hope for the day that Esperanto becomes recognized as the international auxiliary language, an increasing number have stopped focusing on this goal and instead view the Esperanto community as a "stateless diasporic linguistic minority" based on freedom of association, with a culture worthy of preservation based on its own merit. Some have chosen to learn Esperanto due to its purported help in third language acquisition. Zamenhof had three goals, as he wrote in Unua Libro: "To render the study of the language so easy as to make its acquisition mere play to the learner." "To enable the learner to make direct use of his knowledge with people of any nationality, whether the language be universally accepted or not. "To find some means of overcoming the natural indifference of mankind, disposing them, in the quickest manner possible, en masse, to learn and use the proposed language as a living one, not only in last extremities, with the key at hand."According to the database Ethnologue, up to two million people worldwide, to varying degrees, speak Esperanto, including about 1,000 to 2,000 native speakers who learned Esperanto from birth.
The Universal Esperanto Association has more than 5500 members in 120 countries. Its usage is highest in Europe, East Asia, South America. Lernu! is one of the most popular on-line learning platforms for Esperanto. In 2013, the "lernu.net" site reported 150,000 registered users and had between 150,000 and 200,000 visitors each month. Lernu has 274,800 registered users, who are able to view the site's interface in their choice of 21 languages — Catalan, Chinese Danish, Esperanto, French, German, Hungarian, Norwegian, Portuguese, Serbian, Slovak and Ukrainian.
Native Sons of the Golden West
The Native Sons of the Golden West is a fraternal service organization founded in 1875, limited to native born Californians and dedicated to historic preservation, documentation of historic structures and places in the state, the placement of historic plaques and other charitable functions within California. In 1890 they placed the first historical marker in the state to honor the discovery of gold which gave rise to the state nickname "Golden State" and "Golden West." Former U. S. President Richard M. Nixon and former Chief Justice of the United States Earl Warren were both past presidents of the NSGW; the Native Sons of the Golden West was founded 11 July 1875 by General A. M. Winn, a Virginian, as a lasting monument to the men and women of the Gold Rush Days. General Winn lived in California during the Gold Rush and was impressed with the spirit and perseverance of the "Forty-Niners." In speaking of his object in organizing the Order General Winn said "For twenty years my mind had been running on some lasting style of monument to mark and perpetuate the discovery of gold I could not think of anything that would not perish in course of time.
At last it came to my mind that an Order composed of native sons would effect the object and be sustained by pride of parentage and place of nativity while it would be an imperishable memento an institution that would last through all time." The chief objects of the Order as set forth in its constitution were, "To perpetuate in the minds of all native Californians the memories of the days of'49 to encourage a lively interest in all matters and measures relating to the promotion of the national interests and to the upbuilding of the State of California." Today, the Native Sons of the Golden West is open to membership from any native-born, current or former resident of California origin. The Native Sons of the Golden West is a fraternal organization. Organized locally into "Parlors," the group is best known for the large number of commemorative markers it has placed throughout the state, they have the Native Daughters of the Golden West. The term Golden West is a common colloquialism for California, popularly known as the Golden State.
The Native Sons began as an organization "embracing only the sons of those sturdy pioneers who arrived on this coast prior to the admission of California as a state." In the 1920s, the Native Sons took two different stances. In 1920, then-Grand President William P. Canbu of the Native Sons wrote that “California was given by God to a white people, with God’s strength we want to keep it as He gave it to us.” The Native Sons opposed Chinese and Japanese immigration and waged an unsuccessful legal battle for Japanese-Americans to be disenfranchised during World War II. However, by contrast, the Native Sons fought for California Native American rights. "The Commonwealth Club of San Francisco was looking into the matter of Indian rights under the 18 treaties as early as 1909. This resulted in a special section on Indian Affairs for the purpose of making a complete study of the rights and present condition of California Indians in 1924; the Native Sons was one of the groups, active in this area. Study committees were formed and publicity as to the needs of the California Indians appeared in its magazine, the California Grizzly Bear.
In 1922 and again in 1925, there were articles of real importance in arousing public opinion. In Nevada City, Native Sons Hydraulic Parlor No. 58 "aided the American Indians and succeeded in having the land set aside for native inhabitants. In April 1913, Indian agent C. H. Ashbury came from Reno to determine if the Indian land claims was valid and to conduct the proceedings, calling neighbors, city trustees, member of the Native Sons and Daughters to testify..."Today, the Native Sons welcome native Californians of all races. The current organization has many Asian Americans, Hispanic Americans and African American members, some of whom have served in the order's highest offices. Throughout its history, members of the Native Sons have safeguarded many of the landmarks of California's pioneer days and rehabilitating them and donating them to the State or local governments. Sutter's Fort, Sacramento: By 1888 the once proud fort built by John Sutter was abandoned and deteriorating and the City of Sacramento sought to demolish it.
C. E. Grunsky of Native Sons of the Golden West Sunset Parlor #26 in Sacramento led the fight to purchase and restore this most important symbol of California's pioneer history. After two years of fundraising, the Native Sons bought the historic Central Building and turned the land and building over to the State of California for further restoration. San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, San Francisco: The Grace Quan is a reproduction of a 19th-century Chinese shrimp fishing junk; the replica was built in 2003 by the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park and all of the wood for construction was donated by Native Sons, Redwood Parlor #66. Rancho Petaluma Adobe, Petaluma: In 1910, Native Sons of the Golden West, Petaluma Parlor #27 purchased what remained of General Mariano G. Vallejo's vast adobe ranch house. Over half of the building had succumbed to the forces of nature. In 1932 it was registered as California State Historical Landmark #18. After years of work and fundraising, the restored historic site was turned over to the State of California in 1951.
San Pasqual Battlefield State Historic Park, Escondido: San Pasqual Battlefield State Historic Park honors the soldiers who fought in the 1846 Battle of San Pasqual, the bloodiest battle in California during the Mexican–American War. The Native Sons of the Golden West were instrumental in raising
Mexico
Mexico the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States. Covering 2,000,000 square kilometres, the nation is the fifth largest country in the Americas by total area and the 13th largest independent state in the world. With an estimated population of over 120 million people, the country is the eleventh most populous state and the most populous Spanish-speaking state in the world, while being the second most populous nation in Latin America after Brazil. Mexico is a federation comprising 31 states and Mexico City, a special federal entity, the capital city and its most populous city. Other metropolises in the state include Guadalajara, Puebla, Tijuana and León. Pre-Columbian Mexico dates to about 8000 BC and is identified as one of five cradles of civilization and was home to many advanced Mesoamerican civilizations such as the Olmec, Teotihuacan, Zapotec and Aztec before first contact with Europeans. In 1521, the Spanish Empire conquered and colonized the territory from its politically powerful base in Mexico-Tenochtitlan, administered as the viceroyalty of New Spain.
Three centuries the territory became a nation state following its recognition in 1821 after the Mexican War of Independence. The post-independence period was tumultuous, characterized by economic inequality and many contrasting political changes; the Mexican–American War led to a territorial cession of the extant northern territories to the United States. The Pastry War, the Franco-Mexican War, a civil war, two empires, the Porfiriato occurred in the 19th century; the Porfiriato was ended by the start of the Mexican Revolution in 1910, which culminated with the promulgation of the 1917 Constitution and the emergence of the country's current political system as a federal, democratic republic. Mexico has the 11th largest by purchasing power parity; the Mexican economy is linked to those of its 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement partners the United States. In 1994, Mexico became the first Latin American member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, it is classified as an upper-middle income country by the World Bank and a newly industrialized country by several analysts.
The country is considered both a regional power and a middle power, is identified as an emerging global power. Due to its rich culture and history, Mexico ranks first in the Americas and seventh in the world for number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Mexico is an ecologically megadiverse country, ranking fourth in the world for its biodiversity. Mexico receives a huge number of tourists every year: in 2018, it was the sixth most-visited country in the world, with 39 million international arrivals. Mexico is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the G8+5, the G20, the Uniting for Consensus group of the UN, the Pacific Alliance trade bloc. Mēxihco is the Nahuatl term for the heartland of the Aztec Empire, namely the Valley of Mexico and surrounding territories, with its people being known as the Mexica, it is believed to be a toponym for the valley which became the primary ethnonym for the Aztec Triple Alliance as a result, although it could have been the other way around.
In the colonial era, back when Mexico was called New Spain this territory became the Intendency of Mexico and after New Spain achieved independence from the Spanish Empire it came to be known as the State of Mexico with the new country being named after its capital: the City of Mexico, which itself was founded in 1524 on top of the ancient Mexica capital of Mexico-Tenochtitlan. Traditionally, the name Tenochtitlan was thought to come from Nahuatl tetl and nōchtli and is thought to mean "Among the prickly pears rocks". However, one attestation in the late 16th-century manuscript known as "the Bancroft dialogues" suggests the second vowel was short, so that the true etymology remains uncertain; the suffix -co is the Nahuatl locative, making the word a place name. Beyond that, the etymology is uncertain, it has been suggested that it is derived from Mextli or Mēxihtli, a secret name for the god of war and patron of the Mexica, Huitzilopochtli, in which case Mēxihco means "place where Huitzilopochtli lives".
Another hypothesis suggests that Mēxihco derives from a portmanteau of the Nahuatl words for "moon" and navel. This meaning might refer to Tenochtitlan's position in the middle of Lake Texcoco; the system of interconnected lakes, of which Texcoco formed the center, had the form of a rabbit, which the Mesoamericans pareidolically associated with the moon rabbit. Still another hypothesis suggests that the word is derived from Mēctli, the name of the goddess of maguey; the name of the city-state was transliterated to Spanish as México with the phonetic value of the letter x in Medieval Spanish, which represented the voiceless postalveolar fricative. This sound, as well as the voiced postalveolar fricative, represented by a j, evolved into a voiceless velar fricative during the 16th century; this led to the use of the variant Méjico in many publications in Spanish, most notably in Spain, whereas in Mexico and most other Spanish–speaking countries, México was the preferred spelling. In recent years, the Real Academia Española, which regulates the Spanish l
Alta California
Alta California, known sometimes unofficially as Nueva California, California Septentrional, California del Norte or California Superior, began in 1804 as a province of New Spain. Along with the Baja California peninsula, it had comprised the province of Las Californias, but was split off into a separate province in 1804. Following the Mexican War of Independence, it became a territory of Mexico in April 1822 and was renamed "Alta California" in 1824; the claimed territory included all of the modern US states of California and Utah, parts of Arizona, Wyoming and New Mexico. Neither Spain nor Mexico colonized the area beyond the southern and central coastal areas of present-day California, small areas of present-day Arizona, so they exerted no effective control in modern-day California north of the Sonoma area, or east of the California Coast Ranges. Most interior areas such as the Central Valley and the deserts of California remained in de facto possession of indigenous peoples until in the Mexican era when more inland land grants were made, after 1841 when overland immigrants from the United States began to settle inland areas.
Large areas east of the Sierra Nevada and Coast Ranges were claimed to be part of Alta California, but were never colonized. To the southeast, beyond the deserts and the Colorado River, lay the Spanish settlements in Arizona. Alta California ceased to exist as an administrative division separate from Baja California in 1836, when the Siete Leyes constitutional reforms in Mexico re-established Las Californias as a unified department, granting it more autonomy. Most of the areas comprising Alta California were ceded to the United States in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo that ended the Mexican–American War in 1848. Two years California joined the union as the 31st state. Other parts of Alta California became all or part of the U. S. states of Arizona, Utah and Wyoming. The Spanish explored the coastal area of Alta California by sea beginning in the 16th century and prospected the area as a domain of the Spanish monarchy. During the following two centuries there were various plans to settle the area, including Sebastián Vizcaíno's expedition in 1602–03 preparatory to colonization planned for 1606–07, canceled in 1608.
Between 1683 and 1834, Jesuit and Franciscan missionaries established a series of religious outposts from today's Baja California and Baja California Sur into present-day California. Father Eusebio Kino missionized the Pimería Alta from 1687 until his death in 1711. Plans in 1715 by Juan Manuel de Oliván Rebolledo resulted in a 1716 decree for extension of the conquest which came to nothing. Juan Bautista de Anssa proposed an expedition from Sonora in 1737 and the Council of the Indies planned settlements in 1744. Don Fernando Sánchez Salvador researched the earlier proposals and suggested the area of the Gila and Colorado Rivers as the locale for forts or presidios preventing the French or the English from "occupying Monterey and invading the neighboring coasts of California which are at the mouth of the Carmel River." Alta California was not accessible from New Spain: land routes were cut off by deserts and hostile Native populations and sea routes ran counter to the southerly currents of the distant northeastern Pacific.
New Spain did not have the economic resources nor population to settle such a far northern outpost. Spanish interest in colonizing Alta California was revived under the visita of José de Gálvez as part of his plans to reorganize the governance of the Interior Provinces and push Spanish settlement further north. In subsequent decades, news of Russian colonization and maritime fur trading in Alaska, the 1768 naval expedition of Pyotr Krenitsyn and Mikhail Levashev, in particular, alarmed the Spanish government and served to justify Gálvez's vision. To ascertain the Russian threat, a number of Spanish expeditions to the Pacific Northwest were launched. In preparation for settlement of Alta California, the northern, mainland region of Las Californias was granted to Franciscan missionaries to convert the Native population to Catholicism, following a model, used for over a century in Baja California; the Spanish Crown funded the construction and subsidized the operation of the missions, with the goal that the relocation and enforced labor of Native people would bolster Spanish rule.
The first Alta California mission and presidio were established by the Franciscan friar Junípero Serra and Gaspar de Portolá in San Diego in 1769. The following year, 1770, the second mission and presidio were founded in Monterey. In 1773 a boundary between the Baja California missions and the Franciscan missions of Alta California was set by Francisco Palóu; the missionary effort coincided with the construction of presidios and pueblos, which were to be manned and populated by Hispanic people. The first pueblo founded was San José in 1777, followed by Los Ángeles in 1781. By law, mission land and property were to pass to the indigenous population after a period of about ten years, when the natives would become Spanish subjects. In the interim period, the Franciscans were to act as mission administrators who held the land in trust for the Native residents; the Franciscans, prolonged their control over the missions after control of Alta California passed from Spain to independent Mexico, continued to run the missions until they were secularized, beginning in 1833.
The transfer of property never occurr
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States federal government's official list of districts, buildings and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance. A property listed in the National Register, or located within a National Register Historic District, may qualify for tax incentives derived from the total value of expenses incurred preserving the property; the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act in 1966 established the National Register and the process for adding properties to it. Of the more than one million properties on the National Register, 80,000 are listed individually; the remainder are contributing resources within historic districts. For most of its history the National Register has been administered by the National Park Service, an agency within the United States Department of the Interior, its goals are to help property owners and interest groups, such as the National Trust for Historic Preservation, coordinate and protect historic sites in the United States.
While National Register listings are symbolic, their recognition of significance provides some financial incentive to owners of listed properties. Protection of the property is not guaranteed. During the nomination process, the property is evaluated in terms of the four criteria for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places; the application of those criteria has been the subject of criticism by academics of history and preservation, as well as the public and politicians. Historic sites outside the country proper, but associated with the United States are listed. Properties can be nominated in a variety of forms, including individual properties, historic districts, multiple property submissions; the Register categorizes general listings into one of five types of properties: district, structure, building, or object. National Register Historic Districts are defined geographical areas consisting of contributing and non-contributing properties; some properties are added automatically to the National Register when they become administered by the National Park Service.
These include National Historic Landmarks, National Historic Sites, National Historical Parks, National Military Parks, National Memorials, some National Monuments. On October 15, 1966, the Historic Preservation Act created the National Register of Historic Places and the corresponding State Historic Preservation Offices; the National Register consisted of the National Historic Landmarks designated before the Register's creation, as well as any other historic sites in the National Park system. Approval of the act, amended in 1980 and 1992, represented the first time the United States had a broad-based historic preservation policy; the 1966 act required those agencies to work in conjunction with the SHPO and an independent federal agency, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, to confront adverse effects of federal activities on historic preservation. To administer the newly created National Register of Historic Places, the National Park Service of the U. S. Department of the Interior, with director George B.
Hartzog Jr. established an administrative division named the Office of Archeology and Historic Preservation. Hartzog charged OAHP with creating the National Register program mandated by the 1966 law. Ernest Connally was the Office's first director. Within OAHP new divisions were created to deal with the National Register; the division administered several existing programs, including the Historic Sites Survey and the Historic American Buildings Survey, as well as the new National Register and Historic Preservation Fund. The first official Keeper of the Register was an architectural historian. During the Register's earliest years in the late 1960s and early 1970s, organization was lax and SHPOs were small and underfunded. However, funds were still being supplied for the Historic Preservation Fund to provide matching grants-in-aid to listed property owners, first for house museums and institutional buildings, but for commercial structures as well. A few years in 1979, the NPS history programs affiliated with both the U.
S. National Parks system and the National Register were categorized formally into two "Assistant Directorates." Established were the Assistant Directorate for Archeology and Historic Preservation and the Assistant Directorate for Park Historic Preservation. From 1978 until 1981, the main agency for the National Register was the Heritage Conservation and Recreation Service of the United States Department of the Interior. In February 1983, the two assistant directorates were merged to promote efficiency and recognize the interdependency of their programs. Jerry L. Rogers was selected to direct this newly merged associate directorate, he was described as a skilled administrator, sensitive to the need for the NPS to work with SHPOs, local governments. Although not described in detail in the 1966 act, SHPOs became integral to the process of listing properties on the National Register; the 1980 amendments of the 1966 law further defined the responsibilities of SHPOs concerning the National Register.
Several 1992 amendments of the NHPA added a category to the National Register, known as Traditional Cultural Properties: those properties associated with Native American or Hawaiian groups
Mission Indians
Mission Indians are the indigenous peoples of California who lived in Southern California and were forcibly relocated from their traditional dwellings and homelands to live and work at 15 Franciscan missions in Southern California and the Asisténcias and Estáncias established between 1796 and 1823 in the Las Californias Province of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. Spanish explorers arrived on California's coasts as early as the mid-16th century. In 1769 the first Spanish Franciscan mission was built in San Diego. Local tribes were relocated and conscripted into forced labor on the mission, stretching from San Diego to San Francisco. Disease, over work and torture decimated these tribes. Many were baptized as Roman Catholics by the Franciscan missionaries at the missions. Mission Indians were from many regional Native American tribes. For instance, the Payomkowishum were renamed Luiseños after the Mission San Luis Rey and the Acjachemem were renamed the Juaneños after the Mission San Juan Capistrano.
The Catholic priests forbade the Indians from practicing their native culture, resulting in the disruption of many tribes' linguistic and cultural practices. With no acquired immunity to the new European diseases and changed cultural and lifestyle demands, the population of Native American Mission Indians suffered high mortality and dramatic decreases in the coastal regions where population was reduced by 90 percent between 1769 and 1848; when Mexico gained its independence in 1834, it assumed control of the Californian missions from the Franciscans, but abuse persisted. Mexico secularized the missions and transferred or sold the lands to other non-Native administrators or owners. Many of the Mission Indians worked on the newly established ranchos with little improvement in their living conditions. Around 1906 Alfred L. Kroeber and Constance G. Du Bois of the University of California, Berkeley first applied the term "Mission Indians" to Southern California Native Americans as an ethnographic and anthropological label to include those at Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa and south.
On January 12, 1891 the U. S. Congress passed "An Act for the Relief of the Mission Indians in the State of California" which further sanctioned the original grants of the Mexican government to the natives in southern California and sought to protect their rights while giving railroad corporations a primary interest. In 1927, Sacramento Bureau of Indian Affairs Superintendent Lafayette A. Dorrington was instructed by Assistant Commissioner E. B. Merritt in Washington D. C. to list tribes in California. As part of the 1928 California Indian Jurisdictional Act enrollment, Native Americans were asked to identify their “Tribe or Band.” The majority of applicants supplied the name of the mission that they knew their ancestors were associated with. The enrollment was part of a plan to provide reservation lands promised but never fulfilled by 18 non-ratified treaties made in 1851-1852; because of the enrollment applications and the native American's association with a specific geographical location associated with the Catholic missions, the bands of natives became known as the "mission band" of people associated with a Spanish mission.
Some bands occupy trust lands—Indian Reservations—identified under the Mission Indian Agency. The Mission Indian Act of 1891 formed the administrative Bureau of Indian Affairs unit which governs San Diego County, Riverside County, San Bernardino County, Santa Barbara County. There is one Chumash reservation in the last county, more than thirty reservations in the others. Los Angeles, San Luis Obispo, Orange counties do not contain any tribal trust lands. But, resident tribes, including the Tongva in the first and the Juaneño-Acjachemen Nation in the last county continue seeking federal Tribal recognition by the U. S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Eleven of the Southern California reservations were included under the early 20th century allotment programs, which broke up communal tribal holdings to assign property to individual households, with individual heads of household and tribal members identified lists such as the Dawes Rolls; the most important reservations include: the Agua Caliente Reservation in Palm Springs, which occupies alternate sections with former railroad grant lands that form much of the city.
These and the tribal governments of fifteen other reservations operate casinos today. The total acreage of the Mission group of reservations constitutes 250,000 acres; these tribes were associated with the following Missions, Asisténcias, Estáncias: Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa, in San Luis Obispo Mission La Purísima Concepción, northeast of Lompoc Mission Santa Inés, in Solvang Mission Santa Barbara, in Santa Barbara Mission San Buenaventura, in Ventura Mission San Fernando Rey de España, in Mission Hills Mission San Gabriel Arcángel, in San Gabriel Mission San Juan Capistrano, in San Juan Capistrano Mission San Luis Rey de Francia, in Oceanside Mission San Diego de Alcalá, in San Diego Santa Ysabel Asistencia, founded in 1818 in Santa Ysabel San Antonio de Pala Asistencia, founded in 1816 in eastern San Diego County San Bernardino de Sena Estancia, founded in 1819 in Redlands Santa Ana Estancia, founded in 1817 in Costa Mesa Las Flores Estancia, founded in 1823 in Camp Pen
