What is "indian reservation"

n. a reservation set aside for the use of indians

An Indian reservation is a legal designation for an area of land managed by a Native American tribe under the US Bureau of Indian Affairs, rather than the state governments of the United States in which they are physically located. Each of the 326 Indian reservations in the United States are associated with a particular Nation. Not all of the country's 567 recognized tribes have a reservation—some tribes have more than one reservation, some share reservations, while others have none. In addition, because of past land allotments, leading to some sales to non-Native Americans, some reservations are severely fragmented, with each piece of tribal, individual, and privately held land being a separate enclave. This jumble of private and public real estate creates significant administrative, political, and legal difficulties.

The collective geographical area of all reservations is , approximately the size of Idaho. While most reservations are small compared to US states, there are 12 Indian reservations larger than the state of Rhode Island. The largest reservation, the Navajo Nation Reservation, is similar in size to West Virginia. Reservations are unevenly distributed throughout the country; the majority are west of the Mississippi River and occupy lands that were first reserved by treaty or ' granted' from the public domain.

Because tribes possess tribal sovereignty, even though it is limited, laws on tribal lands vary from the surrounding area. These laws can permit legal casinos on reservations, for example, which attract tourists. The tribal council, not the local or federal government, generally has jurisdiction over reservations. Different reservations have different systems of government, which may or may not replicate the forms of government found outside the reservation. Most Native American reservations were established by the federal government; a limited number, mainly in the East, owe their origin to state recognition.

The name "reservation" comes from the conception of the Native American tribes as independent sovereigns at the time the U.S. Constitution was ratified. Thus, the early peace treaties (often signed under duress) in which Native American tribes surrendered large portions of land to the U.S. also designated parcels which the tribes, as sovereigns, " reserved" to themselves, and those parcels came to be called "reservations." The term remained in use even after the federal government began to forcibly relocate tribes to parcels of land to which they had no historical connection.

A majority of Native Americans and Alaska Natives live somewhere other than the reservations, often in big western cities such as Phoenix and Los Angeles. In 2012, there were over 2.5 million Native Americans with about 1 million living on reservations.

"Indian Reservation (The Lament of the Cherokee Reservation Indian)" is a song written by John D. Loudermilk. The song was first recorded by Marvin Rainwater in 1959 and released on MGM as "The Pale Faced Indian", but that release stayed unnoticed. The first hit version was a 1968 cover by Don Fardon, a former member of The Sorrows, that reached #20 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #3 on the UK Singles Chart.

In 1971 Paul Revere & the Raiders recorded the song on the Columbia Records label, and it topped the Hot 100 on July 24. The RIAA gold certification followed on 30 June 1971 for selling over a million copies. It was later certified platinum for selling an additional million copies. The song was the group's only #1 US Billboard hit, and their final Top Twenty song.