The Bureau of Ethnology was established by Congress in 1879. The purpose was to transfer archives and other materials related to Native Americans from the Interior Department to the Smithsonian Institution for safekeeping and further study. Within this bureau, it was decided to catalog and study the various tribes of the United States so that their history wouldn’t be lost. The Bureau of Ethnology changed its name to the Bureau of American Ethnology in 1897, and in 1965, the department merged with the Smithsonian’s Department of Anthropology.
As for the laws against interracial marriage, Oregon set some very strict guidelines. In 1866 a law was passed that read:
Be it enacted by the Legislative Assembly of the State of Oregon:
Section 1. That hereafter it shall not be lawful within this state for any white person, male or female, to intermarry with any negro, Chinese, or any person having one-fourth or more negro, Chinese or Kanaka [Pacific Islander Native] blood or any person having more than one-half Indian blood; and all such marriages or attempted marriages shall be absolutely null and void.1
These Oregon laws against interracial marriage weren’t repealed until 1951, sixteen years ahead of the United States Supreme Court’s repeal of all anti-interracial marriage laws in the United States.
And sadly, although the Fifteenth Amendment passed in 1870 and granted all US citizens the right to vote regardless of race, many states still refused that right to Native Americans. The Snyder Act (passed in 1924) admitted Native Americans born in the United States to full US citizenship. However, the Constitution left it up to individual states as to who had the right to vote. It took over forty years for all fifty states to allow Native Americans the right to vote. Utah was the last state to legalize voting for Native Americans in 1962.
1. This is taken from “The Act to Prohibit the Intermarriage of Races,” The Oregonian, November 2, 1866. For more information, visit https://oregonhistoryproject.org/articles/historical-records/act-to-prohibit-the-intermarriage-of-races-1866/#.Xnz1C4hKiUk