Blood Quantum

Blood quantum laws, also called Indian blood laws, are laws that define Native American status in the United States by fractions of Native American ancestry. They were enacted by the federal government and by state governments as a way to establish legally defined racial population groups; by contrast, many tribes do not include blood quantum as part of their own enrollment criteria. Blood quantum laws were first imposed by white settlers in the eighteenth century and the source lead states the topic remains controversial. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/