Brave in ceremonial beads, buckskin, war bonnets and ermine tails, six elder statesmen of Montana's Flathead Indian tribe ranged themselves one day last week behind the polished Washington desk of Secretary of the Interior Harold Le Clair Ickes. It was a great & grave occasion— the signing of the first tribal constitution under the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 (TIME, June 25, 1934). Secretary Ickes and Commissioner of Indian Affairs John Collier were as solemn as the Indians. Just as cameras were about to record the event for posterity a horrified...
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