American Indian Movement (AIM) Founded
The American Indian Movement (AIM), a militant Native-American rights advocacy group, was organized on this day in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Reportedly, Minneapolis police officers patrolled the streets outside the meeting. The most prominent AIM leaders included Dennis Banks and Clyde Bellecourt.
In 1971, AIM members briefly occupied Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota. AIM held its first national conference in 1972, where delegates adopted the Trail of Broken Treaties declaration, on October 31, 1972. See also the subsequent AIM protest in Washington, D.C. on November 2, 1972.
The first important step in the struggle for the rights of Native Americans was passage of the Indian Citizenship Law on June 2, 1924 granting all American citizenship to all Native Americans in the country.
Visit the AIM web site: http://www.aimovement.org/
Learn more: Dennis Banks and Richard Erdoes, Ojibwa Warrior: Dennis Banks and the Rise of the American Indian Movement (2004)
Learn more about the history of AIM here
Read more: Troy Johnson, Red Power: The Native American Civil Rights Movement (2007)