682
Opinion of the Court
ervation but acquired by the United States for the operation of the Oahe Dam and Reservoir.
I
In 1868, the Fort Laramie Treaty, 15 Stat. 635, established the Great Sioux Reservation, which comprised most of what is now western South Dakota and part of North Dakota. Article II of the treaty provided that the reservation was to be held for the "absolute and undisturbed use and occupation" of Sioux Tribes and that no non-Indians (except authorized government agents) would "ever be permitted to pass over, settle upon, or reside in" the Great Sioux Reservation. Id., at 636. The Act of Mar. 2, 1889, ch. 405, 25 Stat. 888, removed a substantial amount of land from the reservation and divided the remaining territory into several reservations, including the Cheyenne River Reservation, which is located in north-central South Dakota. The 1889 Act preserved those rights of the Sioux under the Fort Laramie Treaty that were "not in conflict" with the newly enacted statute. § 19, 25 Stat. 896. The land designated for the Cheyenne River Reservation was held in trust by the United States for the benefit of the Tribe. 949 F. 2d 984, 987 (CA8 1991).
The 1889 Act also authorized the President to allot parcels of land within the reservation to individual Indians. § 8, 25 Stat. 890. Some of these allotted lands were subsequently acquired by persons not members of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe. Non-Indians also acquired fee title to some of the unallotted and "surplus" lands on the reservation pursuant to the Indian General Allotment Act of 1887, ch. 119, 24 Stat. 388, and the Act of May 29, 1908, ch. 218, 35 Stat. 460. The Indian General Allotment Act allowed surplus lands to be sold to non-Indians; the Act of 1908 authorized the Secretary of the Interior to open for non-Indian settlement more than 1.6 million acres previously held in trust by the United States. These enactments vastly reduced the amount of
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