The Indians on reservations in 1909 were chiefly those on Colville Reservation (1,297,000 acres unallotted), in the N.E.
The chiefs of the clans, with a few sub-chiefs having hereditary rights, formed the King's Council, and the king, unless of exceptionally strong character, often exercised less power than the council of chiefs, each of whom kept his little court, making a profuse display of barbaric pomp. Land is held in common by the tribes, lands unallotted being attached to the office of head chief or king and called "stool lands."
So far as concerns the residue of powers unallotted to the central or federal authority, the separate states retain unimpaired their individual sovereignty, and the citizens of a federation consequently owe a double allegiance, one to the state, and the other to the federal government.
The reservation Indians in 1909 were chiefly members of the Uinta, Uncompahgre and White River Ute tribes on the Uinta Valley reservation (179,194 acres unallotted) in the north-eastern part of the state.