No.™7r" ^^^' "^^^ WAHNENAUHI MANUSCRIPT — KILPATRICK 203 



Some years before all this, the Chiefs, Headmen and Warriors, 

 had met together in Council and agreed, for the general good of the 

 Nation, to make a more united Form of Government; instead of each 

 Clan working for its own, they chose one Principal Chief, an Assistant 

 and a Council, consisting, at first of thirteen members, upon whom 

 devolved all the business of the Nation, as making laws, appointing 

 oflBcers, &c. They immediately organized Companies, called Regu- 

 lators, or, Lighthorse whose duty it was to suppress theft and robbery, 

 and to protect the peace. This Legislative Body made laws, as they 

 saw needful, for the protection and improvement of the Nation. As 

 early as 1808, prohibitory laws were made to prevent the introduction 

 of intoxicants into the Nation, for, when the Annuities were to be 

 paid, vicious whites were ready with Whiskey to give, or, sell to the 

 Indians that they might obtain possession of their money; this nui- 

 sance became so prevalent as to make it an absolute necessity to the 

 Nation to act in its own defence. Although the law could not wholly 

 eradicate the evil, it proved a wholesome check to the flood of intem- 

 perance and, with amendments, has continued in force in the Cherokee 

 Nation to this time. Black Fox was Principal Chief at that time. 



About the same date, laws against poligamy were enacted. 



The first Public use made of Sequoyah's Alphabet was to print the 

 Gospel of Mathew, and a Collection of Hymns in the Cherokee Lan- 

 guage. ["] — In 1828 Public Schools were established by the Council, 

 to be supported by the National Government. 



Educational exercises conducted in both Cherokee and English 

 Languages. 



Two years previously measures were taken by the National Council 

 to have published at the National expense, a News Paper, devoted to 

 the Interest of the Indian People. 



This paper, called "The Cherokee Phenix," printed in both lan- 

 guages, continued to be published until the removal of the Tribe, West 

 of the Mississippi. [^^] In History, little is said of this event, so laden 

 with loss and suffering to the Cherokee Indians. 



It is only what has been repeated many times since, in the case of 

 other Indian Tribes. 



If the Cherokees could have been united and acted under one 

 Leader, they might have escaped much of the trouble and loss by 

 which they were overtaken. The dissatisfaction, already mentioned 

 as existing in the Nation, on account of selling land to the aggressive 



" The Cherokee hymnal, first Issued at New Echota in 1829, is still in use after having gone through many 

 editions. It is lai^ely the work of the brilliant fullblood Cherokee scholar, Ellas Boudinot (1802-39), and 

 Rev. Samuel Worcester. 



'« The Cherokee Phoenix was founded in 1828; it was suppressed by Georgia militia in 1834. Elias Boudi- 

 not was its first editor. Although bilingual, it was In one sense the first newspaper in an American Indian 

 language. 



