Most Indian right group began as local organizations, formed to address
specific issues of that tribe.  Though they could be influential within
their own communities, these groups were too small to affect federal
government policy.  In 1944, the National Congress of American Indians
(NCAI) was established in Denver, Colorado, the first nationwide
organization for Native American rights that was run and founded by
Indians.  The NCAI became immediately involved in local, tribal concerns,
assisting the Alaska Native Brotherhood (pictured here) in 1946 in
disputes with the Department of the Interior and private firms over
fishing, trapping, and timber rights for Alaska Natives.  For the first
time, Indian groups could approach the federal government through a
centralized, powerful organization of their own., The NCAI became the most
important pan-Indian rights movement in the country.