Route 16 winds slowly through South Dakota's Black Hills, meandering leisurely toward the Pine Ridge reservation and Wounded Knee. The road is the same one that Sitting Bull traveled on his way to Canada in the 1880s, and it goes through some of the most scenic land in the United States.

Today, tourists flock to the Black Hills to see its beauty and commune with nature at one of the many campgrounds located in the Hills. For most Americans, Paha Sapa-the Indian name for the Black Hills-remains a place to go for a summer vacation, a "must" stop when the family decides to show the kids the U.S.A.

But for American Indians, Paha Sapa was the center of the world. As the first settlers moved west, they pushed the Indians back to the Black Hills, and it was there that the Indian wars began in earnest, highlighted by the battle known as Custer's Last Stand.

After the Civil War, the U.S. government sent a treaty commission to Fort Laramie in the Dakota Territory, now Wyoming. The commission was headed by Newton Edmunds, governor of the Territory, well-known for his ability to swindle the Indians.

Edmunds and the other members of the commission tried to persuade the Indians to allow the Federal government to build roads across the Indian country. The government was particularly interested in fortifying the Bozeman Trail, which ran along the Powder River and was the only route from Fort Laramie to Montana.

The Indian tribes in the area blockaded the Trail, and throughout the next three years (1865-1868), the Indian chief Red Cloud, an Oglala Sioux, spearheaded a running battle with the U.S. cavalry for control of the Powder River area.

The treaty commission never intended to accept a compromise with the Indians, and only Red Cloud's resistance forced the government to abandon its plans for the Powder River country. The numerous peace commissions-three in two years-that arrived at Fort Laramie always sought Red Cloud's signature, and the great Sioux leader was willing to meet with the commissions.

But too often, military outfits accompanied the peace commissions to the negotiations, and although some Indian tribes agreed to give up the Powder River country in exchange for ammunition, blankets and other supplies, Red Cloud withheld his endorsement.

The treaty commission, however, pretended that the agreement was in effect, and the U.S. cavalry built forts along the Powder River. Red Cloud, angered by the white man's presumptuousness, defended his territory from the bluecoated invaders, setting off a series of skirmishes that included some of the cavalry's worst defeats.

Red Cloud's personal war in defense of the Powder River ended in 1868, when he signed the Laramie treaty on November 6. The treaty ended hostilities, but more importantly, it gave the Black Hills to the Indians permanently. The U.S. government was not being generous-it considered the Paha Sapa a worthless piece of land.

The Federal government soon regretted that treaty. Four years later, a white man discovered gold in the Black Hills, and a flood of white men descended onto Indian land, armed with a gleam in their eyes and a total disregard for the 1868 treaty.

The Federal government curses that treaty even now. The members of the militant American Indian Movement who occupied the historic site of Wounded Knee made the 1868 treaty-the critical pact of what they term a long "trail of broken treaties"-their rallying cry.

Under the terms of the 1868 agreement, the Black Hills belong exclusively to the Sioux. The treaty makes the Federal government responsible for keeping white men out of the Black Hills.

Article 2 states: "no persons except those designated herein...and except officers, agents, and employees of the government may be authorized to enter upon the Indian reservation."

In the 1870s, the government made token attempts to discourage gold seekers while simultaneously pursuing expansionist land policies. When the Indians protested the presence of "white men made crazy by yellow metal," the government's response was another treaty commission. The government wanted the Paha Sapa, but it took Custer's Last Stand to get it.