In the source text about settlers on the frontier and Native Americans in the West, what options did the U.S. government see for the future of native tribes?

What the question is really asking

You are being asked to name the broad policy choices U. S. officials discussed and acted on as settlers expanded west into lands already occupied by Native nations.

Option 1: Removal and confinement to reservations

A common federal solution was to take Native peoples off land wanted by settlers and concentrate them in designated areas.

• Treaties were used, and often broken or rewritten, to shrink Native landholdings.
• Tribes were relocated and then restricted to reservations under federal control.

Option 2: Assimilation into white American culture

Another path was to pressure Native Americans to give up tribal sovereignty and traditional lifeways.

• Policies promoted farming, private land ownership, and Christianity.
• Boarding schools and other programs aimed to replace Native languages and customs with English and Euro-American norms.

Option 3: Military defeat when resistance continued

When removal or reservation policies were resisted, the government also treated war as an answer.

• U. S. troops and state forces fought to suppress armed resistance.
• This often led to forced surrenders and further loss of land.

How these options fit together

These were not always separate choices. Reservation policy and assimilation efforts often happened at the same time, backed by the threat or use of military force.