THE SIX NATIONS OF NEW YORK:
MOHAWK, ONEIDAS, ONONDAGAS,
CAUGAS, SENECAS,
TUSCARORARAS: THE 1892 EXTRA
CENSUS BULLETIN. With an
introduction by Robert W.
Venables. Ithaca, NY: Cornell
University Press (Sage House, 512 E
State Street, 14850), 1995 (c1892).
Paperbound. 89 Pp. ISBN Number 0-
8014-8317-4. $15.95.
Originally published in 1892 by the U.
S. Census Office, “The Six Nations of
New York” is a detailed sociopolitical
study of the six nations of the Iroquois
Confederacy. The Confederacy,
founded long before the arrival of the
Europeans to this continent, was
one of the few Indian bodies exempt to
the provisions of the 1887 General
Allotment Act, the ultimate goal of
which was to force the Indian to give
up his own cultural identity (and the
special privileges that were held as a
result of it) and enter mainstream non-
Indian America. This goal was to be
accomplished through the division
of tribally held land into individual
parcels. The breaking of communal
ownership of these lands and putting
them into individual ownership would
increase the probability of those lands
subsequently being sold to non-
Indians, one parcel at a time. Once
divided, the Indian people would lose
cultural continuity and no longer be
able to claim the exemption of living on
a federally-recognized reservation.
The previous tax-exempt Indian people
would thereafter be subject to federal
income taxes Although specifically
exempt from the General Allotment Act,
the Iroquois were not overlooked by
the U.S. Government. The report
found in “The Six Nations” was
designed to investigate both the
applicability of provisions which could
be implemented that would be similar
to those of the General Allotment Act
and to ascertain Iroquois susceptibility
to assimilation into mainstream non-
Indian culture. This new facsimile
of “The Six Nations” report by Cornell
University Press includes a twenty page
introduction by Robert W. Venables,
Senior Lecturer in the American Indian
Program at Cornell. Venable explores
the state of affairs in the country at the
time of the writing of “The Six Nations”.
He details political issues and the
views of the Iroquois in the late
nineteenth century. The original report
of “The Six Nations” outlines legal
issues of the time and provides
statistical information on births,
deaths, longevity, religious
preferences, education, occupation,
and material holdings of the Iroquois
people. It includes numerous maps
and is completely indexed.
Anita Cheek Moon, Member
Reviewers’ Consortium