Due to the policy of allotment, many Indians and sometimes entire tribes have become landless. In particular, the existence of smaller tribes are threatened by the effects of allotment. It was often the case that all the lands of these smaller tribes were allotted to individuals. As land passes out of Indian ownership, the tribe could eventually find itself homeless and vulnerable to poverty, assimilation, and termination by the U.S Federal Government as has happened in the past. Even on larger reservations, the General Allotment Act did not provide land to those not yet born on the reservation but only small land interests they might inherit from their relatives. The problem of the landless generations on reservations was a main impetus behind the discontinuation of the allotment system. In many instances where the tribe still has control of some land, “assignments” are made to landless Indians and revert to the tribes when it is no longer used. However, for tribes whose reservations were entirely allotted and do not own tribal land, there is no land to provide their members.

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