The Native American Church formalized the sacramental use of peyote cactus, containing mescaline, in night-long meetings with prayer, singing, and visions. Blending Indigenous and Christian elements, it spread among tribes post-reservation era for healing and unity. Legal protections emerged later. It mattered by preserving ecstatic traditions amid cultural suppression.

Peyote songs and visions inspired Native poets and influenced counterculture writers like Aldous Huxley and Allen Ginsberg, linking Indigenous mysticism to 20th-century poetic explorations of consciousness and resistance. It enriched multicultural themes in American literature.