Inconsistent government policies towards American Indian landholdings have created jurisdictional chaos on South Dakota's Sioux reservations. Although the Sioux had occupied the area of South Dakota since the seventeenth century, white settlers began to move into the territory in the 1840's. Despite treaties, the federal government began convincing the Indians to trade large tracts of their land for small reservations and occasionally even reduced the size of the reservations. By the 1880's, South Dakota contained six distinct Sioux reservations: Crow Creek, Lower Brule, Standing Rock, Rosebud, Cheyenne River, and Pine Ridge. The government frequently took the land separating them, thus weakening family and intertribal ties. After 1889 the Indians gained title to some reservation land through the allotment system, but they lost land when the government opened unallotted tribal lands to white homesteaders. They lost more land when the government began forcing them to accept full title to allotted lands in 1917. Although attempts to reconstitute tribal landholdings in South Dakota began as early as the 1890's, the area still has no coherent land ownership patterns and remains a confused mix of land ownership. Chances for true autonomy seem remote. Appended are maps of South Dakota illustrating the settlement of the Sioux (1800's to present). (SB)