Whether the American political and legal system will ultimately engage with this logic in ways that produce a different outcome than it has so far produced is a question that the history cannot answer.

The Continuing Presence Of The Claim

There is a practice among Lakota people that has been reported across various accounts of the Black Hills dispute: the regular public restatement of the claim itself.

At gatherings, at political meetings, at ceremonial occasions, in public testimony before congressional committees, in interviews with journalists — across decades and across generations — Lakota leaders and community members have continued to say: the Black Hills are not for sale.

We want the land back.

The claim is still alive.