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This page lists selected books from history and other fields that might interest a student of Indian or tribal law.
The links lead to catalog records, so you can find or request each book. We only link to one record per book, but many books are available in more than one edition (e.g., an ebook as well as a print book). Check the catalog.
For legal treatises, practice guides, and study aids, see the "Secondary Sources" sections under Federal Indian Law and Tribal Law, above.
Selected Books
The American Indian in Western Legal Thought by Publication Date: 1992Available online through Proquest
American Indians, Time and the Law by Publication Date: 1987
American Indian Treaties: The History of a Political Anomaly by Publication Date: 1994
Blood Struggle: The Rise of Modern Indian Nations by Publication Date: 2006
Framing Chief Leschi: Narratives and the Politics of Historical Justice by Publication Date: 2014Available online through Proquest
The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians by Publication Date: 19842 volumes. (Also available in a 1-volume abridged edition.)
Ray Allen Billington Prize (Organization of American Historians), 1985.
The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians by Publication Date: 1986Abridged ed.
Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and A Great American Land Grab by Publication Date: 2015Recommended by Mary Whisner, reference librarian (Dec. 2015): Lively writing, compelling stories, and a big swath of history (of which I was sadly quite ignorant).
Like a Loaded Weapon: The Rehnquist Court, Indian Rights, and the Legal History of Racism in America by Publication Date: 2005Available online through Project Muse
Linking Arms Together: American Indian treaty vVsions of Law and Peace, 1600-1800 by Publication Date: 1997
Messages from Frank's Landing by Publication Date: 2000
Nation to Nation : Treaties Between the United States & American Indian Nations by Publication Date: 2014Ebook. Also print
Essays and interviews, published by the National Museum of the American Indian in association with Smithsonian Books
The Oxford Handbook of American Indian History by Call Number: (online)Publication Date: 2016Available online through Oxford Handbooks
The People Are Dancing Again: The History of the Siletz Tribe of Western Oregon by Publication Date: 2010Available online through Project Muse
The Si'lailo Way: Indians, Salmon, and Law on the Columbia River by Publication Date: 2006Coauthored by Prof. Bill Rodgers.
Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession on Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory by Publication Date: 2020
Native Americans
An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873 by Publication Date: 2016Los Angeles Times Book Prize - History, 2016
The Beginning and End of Rape: Confronting Sexual Violence in Native America by Publication Date: 2015Also available as an online access
Best First Book Award from the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association, 2015
American Political Association’s Victoria Schuck Award, 2016
Labriola Center’s American Indian National Book Award, 2015
Border Law: The First Seminole War and American Nationhood by Publication Date: 2015Bancroft Prize, 2016
Litleton-Griswold Prize, 2016
The Great Father: The United States Government and the American Indians by Publication Date: 19842 volumes. (Also available in a 1-volume abridged edition.)
Ray Allen Billington Prize (Organization of American Historians), 1985
Pulitzer Prize - History (Finalist), 1985
Grounded Authority by Publication Date: 2017Available as an ebook
Association for Political and Legal Anthropology Book Prize (Honorable Mention), 2018
The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present by Publication Date: 2019
How the Indians Lost Their Land: Law and Power on the Frontier by Publication Date: 2005Also available as an ebook
John Phillip Reid Book Award (Honorable Mention), 2006
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by Publication Date: 2017Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction & Nonfiction - 2018 finalist.
Also available as audiobook
Available online through UW Libraries .
Making Indian Law: The Hualapai Land Case and the Birth of Ethnohistory by Publication Date: 2007John Phillip Reid Book Award, 2008
Available as an ebook
The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America by Publication Date: 2016National Book Award Finalist - Nonfiction, 2016
Bancroft Prize, 2017
The Relentless Business of Treaties: How Indigenous Land Became US Property by Publication Date: 2018Available as an ebook
Friends of St. Paul Library Minnesota Book Award
Terrible Justice: Sioux Chiefs and U.S. Soldiers on the Upper Missouri, 1854-1868 by Publication Date: 2012Spur Award - Best Western Nonfiction Historical, 2013
