 The Cheyenne River Act of 1908 gave the Secretary of Interior power “to sell and dispose of” of the Cheyenne River Sioux reservation to non-Indians for settlement.The profit of the sale was to go to the United States Treasury as a “credit” for the Indians to have tribal rights on the reservation (465 U.S. 463).In 1979, Sioux tribe member John Bartlett was charged by the State of South Dakota with attempted rape.