# Treaty of St. Peters (1837) — Ojibwe Land Cession **Also known as:** Treaty with the Chippewa, 1837 On July 29, 1837, the United States concluded a land cession treaty with Ojibwe (Chippewa) nations at St. Peters (Mendota), in present-day Minnesota. The treaty ceded Ojibwe pine lands in what is now northern Wisconsin and northern Minnesota, conveying timber and mineral rights to the United States. In exchange, the Ojibwe received annuity payments, goods, and — critically — a usufructuary reservation of rights that would remain contested for 160+ years. ## Key Terms - **Lands ceded**: Northern pine lands (present-day northern Wisconsin and parts of northern Minnesota); approximately 13 million acres (🔲 needs primary source confirmation) - **Usufructuary rights**: Ojibwe retained the right to hunt, fish, and gather on ceded lands "during the pleasure of the President of the United States" - **Annuities**: Annual payments in goods, money, and services; specific amounts 🔲 TBD - **Location**: Treaty signed at St. Peters (present-day Mendota, MN) — the same location as H.H. Sibley's AFC trading post ## WTFism Flag — The Mille Lacs Case The usufructuary rights clause was revoked by President Millard Fillmore in 1850 (executive removal order), triggering the forced removal attempts and the Sandy Lake tragedy (1850–1851) in which approximately 400 Ojibwe died. The 1837 usufructuary rights were the subject of *Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians* (1999), in which the U.S. Supreme Court held (5-4) that the 1837 Ojibwe treaty rights had **never been validly extinguished** — that the 1850 removal order and the 1855 treaty had not abrogated the 1837 usufructuary rights. The Ojibwe therefore retained valid treaty rights to hunt, fish, and gather on the 1837 cession lands. **[WTFism: The State of Minnesota spent 160 years asserting that these treaty rights had been extinguished. They hadn't. The SCOTUS ruled 5-4 in 1999 that Minnesota was wrong — the 1837 usufructuary rights were always valid. Minnesota contested the rights that its founding Organic Act-era governor had promised to honor.]** ## Connection to Toll-and-Immunity Architecture The 1837 Ojibwe cession transferred timber rights that fed the great pine logging economy of northern Minnesota (1860s–1900s). Stumpage revenues from Ojibwe-ceded pine lands flowed to the Permanent School Fund under state trustee administration — with documented underappraisal scandals (the "pine ring") in which state-set prices systematically undervalued timber to the benefit of insider logging interests. ## Primary Source Links - [Treaty of St. Peters, July 29, 1837 — 7 Stat. 536](https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/mn01.asp) - [Kappler's Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties, Vol. 2](https://digital.library.okstate.edu/kappler/Vol2/treaties/chi0491.htm) - [Minnesota v. Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, 526 U.S. 172 (1999)](https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/526/172/) - [UMN TRUTH Project](https://mn.gov/indian-affairs/assets/full-report_tcm1193-572488.pdf) - 🔲 TBD: Senate Executive Journal; treaty negotiation records (National Archives, RG 75) #Acts_Amendments_and_Antecedents