The Sacred Buffalo Vision by Robert J. Juneau and Robert C. Juneau pg.155

Honest tribal councilmen pointed to the “rat hole” of the Indian preference clause in the tribal constitution, written by Interior Department lawyers, which allowed elected Blackfeet tribal council members “preference” to obtain oil and grazing leases from the tribe for the benefit of outside oil interests and against the Indians beneficial interests. One oil tract produced $3,000,000 in oil revenue for the white man who had acquired the mineral rights by crooked deals with the tribal council and agency superintendent. Tribal councilmen who were ranchers used their powers to lease tribal grazing lands to themselves, and sub-lease the lands to white ranchers. The tribal council hired and fired tribal judges and tribal police officials. The Blackfeet Tribe now had an “in-house Indian ring” controlling the finances of the tribe. Tribal political families controlled the tribe.

Chairman Sharp cited Louis Hill, of the Great Northern Railway Co. who was one of the major lessees through his lobbyists in Washington D.C. and who corrupted Indian Bureau officials in Washington D.C, who had approved his oil lease over the protests of the tribal council. Louis Hill was able to get the entire Milk River Anticline, a major oil structure on the reservation patented, thereby removing federal protection and trusteeship of the minerals underlying the tribal lands. Taxes and liens of white men were used to acquire allotted oil lands by tax deeds issued by the county attorney and county courts.
-The Sacred Buffalo Vision by Robert J. Juneau and Robert C. Juneau  
pg.155