Series 2: Subject Files, Subseries 3: Legislation (1851-1994) consists of correspondence, articles, memoranda, and Congressional bills, resolutions, reports, and testimony relating to a wide variety of legislative and administrative issues of concern to the AAIA. These are embodied in sometimes voluminous subject files and an extensive series of memoranda containing synopses of governmental activities impinging on Native Americans. The bulk of the latter were prepared for general circulation by the AAIA's general counsel. The scope of this subseries reflects the importance the AAIA attached to effecting change in Washington, be it in a supportive or an adversarial role. Leaders of the Association such as President Oliver La Farge, General Counsel Richard Schifter, and Executive Director William Byler took an interest in everything from the implications of Alaskan statehood to the protection and repatriation of Indian remains and artifacts to the transfer of civil and criminal jurisdiction from federal to state authorities. Attention was given to measures affecting every tribe, such as the far-reaching Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975, which sought to give Native Americans a meaningful say in programs intended for their benefit, as well as to localized initiatives, such as the resolution politicizing the superintendency of the Five Civilized Tribes in Oklahoma in 1935.

Some matters, of course, received more attention than others. Files such as "Pueblo Lands," which documents the formative struggle of the AAIA, then known as the Eastern Association on Indian Affairs, to safeguard the dwindling land base of New Mexico's Pueblo Indians in the 1920s, and "Indian Child Welfare Act," a major focus of concern in the 1970s and 1980s, are remarkable for their depth. Such files illustrate the significant role played by the AAIA in influencing Congressional action not only through detailed critiques but through the submission of draft legislation. Although other files, such as those addressing issues of economic development, juvenile alcohol and drug abuse, law enforcement, and sanitation, are not as large, they, too, shed light on the sometimes subtle, sometimes explicit pressures exerted by the AAIA when policymakers considered laws and regulations affecting Native Americans.

Not only does this subseries chronicle many decades of public debate over the proper scope and direction of federal Indian policy, but it offers insights into the internal discussions which determined the nature and tone of the AAIA's position in this volatile arena. In either case, the stakes were large, for if these files make one thing plain, it is that the federal government has exercised enormous influence for good and ill in the lives of Native Americans. Indeed, their very survival as tribal entities has, at times, hung in the balance. Even when legislation favorable to them has been enacted, as in the case of the groundbreaking Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, there has been no guarantee that it would not be repealed or emasculated in a subsequent session of Congress. From the struggle over Indian religious freedom to the struggle over the termination of federal responsibilities, it is clear from this subseries that the AAIA has played a significant role in safeguarding fundamental Native American interests through legislative and administrative action.