ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author provides a model the behavior of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) in order to understand the performance of irrigation projects on Indian reservations and, more broadly, to understand Indians' relationship with the federal government. The reasons that the BIA's irrigation policy worked badly for Indians are interesting in their own right. But this subject also touches the broader issue of the relationship of Indian tribes to the federal government. The criticism of irrigation projects in the 1920s coincided with increased criticism of all aspects federal Indian policy. Congress first appropriated funds for an irrigation project on an Indian reservation in 1867 and made regular annual appropriations for irrigation projects on Indian reservations after 1893. Projects on Indian reservations were also tarred with the same brush, and it became hard for the BIA to get Congress to authorize new projects. It is not hard to see why such organizations are often inefficient in developing reservation resources.
