186 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 197 



migration patterns for these areas at different seasons of the year at 

 quinquennial intervals, together with two observations at the same 

 season at 5 -year intervals, thus affording a measure of population 

 trends in the interim.^ ^ 



It must be stressed that the general problem of developing and main- 

 taining an improved system for the collection of demographic data 

 among the Navaho is increasingly related to the corresponding prob- 

 lem in regard to American Indians as a whole. In view of the grow- 

 ing dispersion of the Indian population among that of the general 

 society, it can be argued that the efforts of a single Indian agency or 

 administration, however well conceived and directed, can no longer be 

 expected to produce adequate demographic statistics relating to the 

 population under its jurisdiction, without extending its research activ- 

 ities far beyond the confbies of its local area. It appears, therefore, 

 that the collection of improved demographic statistics on the Indian 

 population of this country would require a coordinated effort, nation- 

 wide in scope. 



A summary of the several major interests which would be served by 

 the collection of improved demographic statistics on this population 

 points clearly to the need for an integrated approach in obtaining and 

 processing the basic data. 



In the first place, the greater dispersion of the Indian population 

 in off-reservation areas makes it increasingly difficult for local Indian 

 agency officials to maintain accurate rolls of the Indians under their 

 respective jurisdictions.^^ 



Secondly, the registration of vital events occurring among Indians 

 requires some coordination and regulation of the activities of the offi- 

 cials who carry out this registration at the State and county levels. 

 Here, also, the growing dispersion of the Indian population makes it 

 imperative that these officials, especially in the "non-Indian'' States, 

 be informed of the need to properly identify Indians as such, and to 

 record their tribal affiliation on the appropriate certificates. It need 

 hardly be added that the processing of these vital statistics, aimed at 

 determining vital rates and trends among the several Indian tribes, 

 could be carried out most effectively at a central office, linked ad- 

 ministratively to the National Vital Statistics Division of the U.S. 

 Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In this connection, 



31 The question of costs cannot be dealt with in this brief outline, except to remark that 

 such a program as is envisaged here would require heavy initial expenditures together with 

 continuing financial support thereafter. It might be added, of course, that the "cost" of 

 continued uncertainty with regard to the size of the Navaho and other Indian tribes is 

 itself considerable. 



^ Results of the 1960 census indicate that the intercensal increase in the Indian popula- 

 tion of "non-Indian" States is two to three times as great, on the average, as the corre- 

 sponding increase in the "Indian" States. A substantial part of this difference can probably 

 be attributed to the growing dispersion of the Indian population, although the improved 

 recognition of Indians in "non-Indian" States through self-enumeration may also have 

 played an important part in this growing disparity. 



