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5331.8 (CII, 41)

HARVARD COLLEGE
APR 3 1899

CAMBRIDGE, MASE

Dept. of the Intervi

THIRTIETH ANNUAL REPORT

OF THE

BOARD OF INDIAN COMMISSIONERS.

WASHINGTON, D. C., January 10, 1899.

SIR: We have the honor to submit the Thirtieth Annual Report of the Board of Indian Commissioners.

No change in the membership of the board has occurred during the last year, and no serious trouble among the Indians has been reported except the conflict with the Pillager band of Chippewas on Bear Island in Leech Lake, Minnesota-a conflict which resulted in the death of Maj. M. C. Wilkinson and six soldiers. The number of Indians slain is not known. The death of Major Wilkinson is deeply deplored. He was a gallant officer, having served in the civil war, in the Nez Perce campaign with General Howard, and in the recent Spanish war. Не had been a lifelong friend of the Indians, and when detailed for the Indian school service organized the Forest Grove Industrial School, removed since to Chemawa, Oreg. He had almost reached the age for retirement, and was hoping to engage again in benevolent work for Indians.

The causes of the sudden and deplorable Chippewa outbreak are found in a long series of abuses and frauds in the management, or mismanagement, of their timber lands, and in harsh, if not unjust, treatment in connection with prosecutions for whisky sales to Indians.

The beginning of the trouble relating to lands and timber dates back to the act of Congress approved January 14, 1889, entitled "An act for the relief and civilization of the Chippewa Indians in the State of Minnesota." The purpose and intent of the act appears to be just and fair, but in its execution it has proved to be not an act for the relief, but for impoverishing and robbing the Indians.

We are aware that the Secretary of the Interior is doing all in his power to correct the abuses long in vogue, and he affirms that "no complaints have been made of the undervaluation of timber by the present corps of examiners." Still, we greatly fear that interested parties will combine to thwart the good intentions and efforts of the Department under the existing law.

In our judgment, that act should be at once repealed, or at least so amended as to put a stop to the current method of appraising and selling the pine lands of the Indians, which has hitherto been characterized by scandalous unfairness and waste of the Indians' moneys. A much better system was inaugurated by Lieutenant Mercer and continued by his successor, Captain Scott, of the La Pointe Agency, Wis., by which the Indians receive a fair price for their timber, earn good wages in the lumber camps and in the mills, and, what is more important, are learning daily lessons in practical industry and civilized home life. We see no reason why the same common-sense system can not be put in practice in Minnesota.

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THE NEW YORK INDIANS.

We have given much attention to the affairs of the Seneca Indians of the Allegany and Cattaraugus reservations in the State of New A very unsettled and unsatisfactory condition of things exists there. Large tracts of land have been leased to railroad companies and many town lots to private parties in the villages that have grown up about several railroad stations, and the Indian people complain that the rents collected are appropriated by a few leading men to their own private use, and that the people receive no benefit whatever.

Mr. G. B. Pray, special United States Indian agent, after a careful investigation, reports that "the affairs of this nation are very loosely and irregularly managed; that the officers use the power of the place for the purpose of perpetuating themselves, and it is openly charged that the money of the nation is used for the same purpose." He further says: "It is a fact that I do not think they will dispute that the body of the people have not received from its officers a single dollar of income from leases during the last four or five years." (Senate Ex. Doc. No. 190, Fifty-fifth Congress, second session.) The Indians have petitioned Congress for redress of those wrongs, and early last winter a bill (S. 2888) was introduced "to regulate the collection and disbursement of moneys arising from leases made by the Seneca Nation of New York Indians." Though approved, we are assured by the Secretary of the Interior and the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, this bill, which passed the Senate, has not passed and is still pending in the House. We earnestly urge its speedy passage. At our meeting at Mohonk Lake, October 11, 1898, the matter was considered and the following resolutions were adopted:

Resolved, That this board is convinced that the system of administration of their affairs at present in vogue with the Senecas of the Allegany and Cattaraugus reservations encourages corrupt practices and is fraught with injustice and great disadvantages to the Indians.

Resolved, That we believe the time is ripe for breaking up the New York reservations and allotting the land to the individual Indians.

Resolved, That until this is done we respectfully urge on the Government the importance of placing the collection of their rentals and other income with some agency that will secure a proper accounting and distribution of the money.

METLAKAHTLA.

The romantic story of the heroic life and work of Mr. William Duncan in British Columbia and Alaska is so generally known that we need not repeat it. After raising the Tshimshean tribe of Indians from the lowest grade of barbarism to a high state of Christian civilization, Mr. Duncan, to escape oppressive acts of the white people of British Columbia, determined to remove his Indians from that province and to seek protection under the flag of the United States. Annette Island, on the coast of Alaska, was selected for their future home. To this lonely, rocky, and densely wooded island they came in the year 1887, abandoning their comfortable houses, their mills, their church, and all their improvements for conscience sake.

In 1891 the island was, by act of Congress, "set apart as a reservation for the use of the Metlakahtla Indians, and those people known as Metlakahtlans who have recently emigrated from British Columbia to Alaska, and to such other Alaskan natives as may join them." There they have lived eleven years in peace. By hard work, equal to that of early pioneers in our Western States, they have cleared away the forest, built a village of about 200 frame houses, erected a salmon can

nery capable of packing 20,000 cases of salmon per annum and a sawmill which can cut 10,000 feet of lumber per day. They have built a town hall which will seat 400 people, a schoolhouse large enough for 200 children, and a church capable of accommodating 800 people, the largest church in Alaska. They have constructed a pipe line, 2 miles in length, from a lake over 800 feet in elevation, which supplies good drinking water for the village and abundance of power for the cannery and the sawmill. They have organized a local government, with rules strict enough to satisfy the most rigid of our Puritan fathers. In short, the Metlakahtlans are a sober, industrious, self-supporting Christian community. They are no burden on the United States Government. All they ask is a secure tenure of their island home, and citizenship. Every sentiment of justice and humanity demands that their reasonable and modest request should be granted. But, alas! traces of gold, it is rumored, have been discovered in the cliffs along the eastern side of the island, and what can withstand the "auri sacra fames?"

Instigated by greedy gold seekers, a bill was introduced in both Houses of Congress last winter, and is still pending, to take away from the Metlakahtlans and restore to the public domain about five-sixths of Annette Island, leaving to them a small peninsula on the west side, containing about 21 square miles. So much alarm was excited by this proposed legislation that Mr. Duncan was sent to Washington to protest against it. He remained here several weeks. He fully explained the condition of his people, their substantial gains and rapid progress in the arts of civilization, and the good influence they are exerting upon the surrounding native tribes. He earnestly pleaded for "protection and isolation from vicious whites." The moral and material injury which would result from the passage of the bill now before Congress can not well be overstated. The Commissioner of Public Lands disapproves it. In a letter to the Secretary of the Interior, dated January 6, 1898, he says:

In my judgment the rights and interests of the Metlakahtla Indians are worthy of respect and should be carefully guarded. It is my opinion that their interests can not be successfully maintained or their welfare secured if, as contemplated by this bill, they should be limited to so small an area as the western peninsula portion of said island, and furthermore subjected to temptations which, it is to be feared, they have not as yet attained sufficient strength of character to successfully resist.

The Secretary of the Interior also says:

I am convinced that these Indians should be permitted to remain in undisputed possession of their reservation, and that no part thereof should be opened to settlement. The bill has, therefore, my unqualified disapproval, and I trust it will not become a law.

We heartily indorse these emphatic words, and recommend a substitute for the pending bill granting a full title in fee of Annette Island to the Metlakahtlans, with provision for the allotment of the lands in severalty to the Indians and their recognition as American citizens.

THE INDIAN TERRITORY.

The most important measure of legislation relating to Indian affairs during the year was the passage of the Curtis bill, entitled "An act for the protection of the people of the Indian Territory." The provisions of the act are fully explained by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs in his late report. We need name only its most important features. It provides for the allotment of lands to individual Indians in equal portions, or rather in portions of equal value, and thus makes all the people of the Five Tribes citizens of the United States. The mineral lands are reserved from allotment, and are to be leased by the

Secretary of the Interior and operated for the benefit of the tribes. The town sites are also reserved, and the lots are to be appraised, the occupants who have improved them having the prior right of purchase. This is the first attempt to secure for white residents a title to the lands upon which they have built costly buildings and flourishing towns. The act makes the exclusive use of large tracts of land by single individuals, which has been practiced to a large extent, a misdemeanor punishable by the courts. In short this act, together with that which took effect January 1, 1898, must work a complete revolution in the affairs of the Territory and place it practically under the Government of the United States. For its execution a vast amount of work remains to be done by the Dawes commission, and the education of the 64,000 Indian citizens to make a right use of their new privileges throws a new responsibility upon the churches that are doing missionary work in the Indian Territority.

EDUCATION.

All who are concerned for the civilization and welfare of the Indians watch with special interest their progress in education. From a small beginning, twenty-one years ago, when the sum of $20,000 was appropriated for the support of Indian schools, the work has steadily grown into such dimensions that its management requires a large part of the time and thought of those who have control of Indian affairs. The Commissioner devotes twenty-four pages of his annual report to this subject, and whoever reads those pages can not doubt that we have now a system of education well organized and under intelligent supervision. The attendance has steadily increased from year to year. The following table shows the enrollment and average attendance for the fiscal years 1897-98, exclusive of the schools among the Five Civilized Tribes and the Indians of New York.

Enrollment and average attendance at Indian schools, 1897 and 1898, showing increase in 1898; also number of schools in 1898.

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b Three schools transferred to the Government and contracts made for two schools which were paid by vouchers in previous years.

e Thirty-one public schools in which pupils are taught not enumerated here.

d These schools are conducted by religious societies, some of which receive from the Government for the Indian children therein such rations and clothing as the children are entitled to as reservation Indians.

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