The movement that distributed land from the government to Native Americans in the 19th century was known as the Dawes Act, or the General Allotment Act of 1887. This legislation aimed to assimilate Native Americans into American society by allotting individual plots of land to families, encouraging farming, and providing a path to citizenship. The Act sought to dismantle tribal sovereignty and communal landholdings, leading to significant land losses for Native American groups. The policy was detrimental to many tribes and resulted in the loss of millions of acres of land to white settlers, furthering the U.S. government's agenda of westward expansion and cultural assimilation.