FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 383 



This company has not, nor has any of its agents, violated the law or any of the 

 executive orders, in relation to the importation or sale of breech-loading fire-arms, or 

 any other fire-arms. 



Under the Revised Statutes of the United States, section 1955, this matter is en- 

 tirely within the control of the President. President Grant, on the 4th February, 

 1870, prohibited the importation and use of fire-arms and ammunition into the 

 islands of St. Paul and St. George, aud his order was promulgated by the then Sec- 

 retary of the Treasury on the 8tli February, 1870. But on the 9th September, 1670, 

 the President modified that order " so as to permit the Alaska Commercial Company 

 to take a limited quantity of fire-arms and ammunition to said islands, subject to 

 the directions of the revenue officers there aud such regulations as the Secretaiy may 

 prescribe." On the 10th September, 1870, the Acting Secretary of the Treasury an- 

 nounced the President's order and prescribed the regulations. These pertained to 

 the islands of St. Paul and St. George alone. 



On the '3d day of July, 1875, the Acting Secretary of the Treasury, with the ap- 

 proval of the President, issued a circular to the collectors of customs, prohibiting the 

 importation of breech-loading rifles and fixed ammunition suitable therefor, into the 

 Territory of Alaska. 



On the 21st of April, 1879, Mr. Sherman, then Secretary of the Treasury, issued a 

 notice announcing the etfect of section 1956 of the Revised Statutes, relating to the 

 killing of otter, lur seal, etc., and prohibiting the killiug of fur-bearing animals by 

 persons other than natives in Alaska, except those taken by the Alaska Commercial 

 Company under its lease, and i)rohibiting the use of fire-arms by the natives in kill- 

 ing otter in the months of May, June, July, August, and September. Ho expressly 

 announced that " white men, lawfully married to natives and residing in the Terri- 

 tory, are considered natives within the meaning of this order." 



On the 30th March, 1882, the Treasury Department, with the approval of the Pres- 

 ident, issued a further circular to the collectors of customs, amendiag and modifying 

 so much of the instructions of July 3, 1875, as prohibited the importation of breech- 

 loading rifles, aud suitable ammunition therefor, so as to permit "each adult emi- 

 grant " who intends to become an actual bona-nde settler on the main-laud, to ship 

 to the care of the collector of customs at Sitka, for his own persoual protection and 

 for hunting game, a rifle aud .suitable ammunition ; also to each actual boua-fide resi- 

 dent of the main-laud of Alaska (not including Indians and traders), upon applica- 

 tion to the collector and with his approval, to order and ship for personal use such 

 arms aud ammunition to his care, not exceeding one rifle for each such person to- 

 gether with proper ammunition. 



Ou the 21st of March, 1885, tbo collector of customs at Sitka addressed the honora- 

 ble Secretary of the Treasury a letter upon the subject, requesting an extension of 

 the provisions of the circular of the 30th of March, 1882, aud recommending, in view 

 of the increasiug population and needs of the Territory, that such authority be ex- 

 tended so as to permit actual settlers aud residents, not traders or Indians, to import 

 for their own use breech-loading arms and suitable ammunition into all parts of Alaska, 

 including its islands, except the leased Pribylov islands, and that the collectors of 

 customs at San Francisco, Port Townsend, and Sitka, respectively, be empowered to 

 grant the requisite permits. The Hon. Daniel Manning, then Secretary, granted the 

 reque'st, and made the order accordingly in his official letter to the collector at Sitka, 

 dated May 8, 1885, sending and directing circulars to that effect to the respective 

 collectors named. These letters bear date the 12th May, 1885. 



On the 4th May, 1887, further regulations were issued by the present honorable 

 Secretary of the Treasury, prohibiting ' ' the importation into said Territory of breech- 

 loading rifles and suitable ammunition therefor, except for the personal use of white 

 settlors or temporary visitors, not traders." 



All these orders were approved by the President. 



This company has never in the slightest degree violated these several regulations, 

 a fact that we stand ready to verify and sustain, whenever required by the Depart- 

 ment, by Congress, or by any judicial tribunal. 



IX.— As TO THE Rescission of the Lease ; the Abandonment op the Leasing 

 System, and Substitution of a New Plan for the Management of the 

 Islands of St. Paul and St. George, Proposed by Governor Swineford. 



This recommendation of Governor Swineford is not new, but was before Congress in 

 187(5, and we beg leave to refer to the report of the Committee of Ways and Means of 

 the House of Representatives, before referred to (Forty-fourth Congress, first session. 

 Report No. 623), and to the action of Congress thereon. This company has in every 

 respect fulfilled its agecementi, as wo have fully shown, and there was no ground for 

 rescission of the lease in 1876, and there is none now. At the time the lease was about 

 1o bo authorized by Congress there was a great deal of discussion of this policy. Mr. 

 Boutwell, then Secretary of the Treasury, was quite adverse to it, and favored a 



