When those barriers were overcome, they were overcome through exception — through the intervention of a man with sufficient power to set the technicality aside, not through a change in the underlying rule.

The rule remained in place for other Native Americans who did not have a friendship with the commanding general.

The Commissioner’s position, the highest Native person in the federal government, placed Parker inside a system that exercised coercive authority over his own people.

He worked to make that system more honest.

He was investigated, politically attacked, and ultimately forced out by the same forces of patronage and political self-interest that he had been trying to reform.

The investigation found, ultimately, that the most serious charges against him were not supported.