THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 865 



owner had 4,000 acres, and that there were " many other very large and handsome 

 places" in the same valley, each owned by individual proprietors, but all being tribal 

 lands. A system of laws and customs, where tribal relations exist and lands are 

 owned in common, which permits one Indian to own so large a quaDtity of land, to 

 the exclusion of all other Indians, merely because he was first to occupy it or because 

 he inherited it from his father who occupied it originally, when all other Indians have 

 equal tribal rights with the happy and fortunate possessor, needs radical reformation. 

 Are these the sacred rights secured by treaty, which the United States are pledged to 

 respect and defend 1 If so, then the United States are pledged to uphold and main- 

 tain a stupendous land monopoly and aristocracy that finds no parallel in this country 

 except in two or three localities in the far West; and in these instances it may be 

 said that the titles are clear (having been obtained by purchase from the Govern- 

 ment), however questionable may be the policy which makes it possible for one man 

 to own unlimited quantities of land. 



How many Indians who have been less provident than these gentlemen who have 

 been shrewd enough to fence up thousands of acres in one farm, and whose claim ex- 

 tends a quarter of a mile in width around the already mammoth estate, are eking out 

 a miserable existence upon some barren homestead, or, worse still, are living by suf- 

 ference as day laborers on these large estates, although they own their tribal share of 

 these lands which they are too poor, weak, and powerless to secure or demand ! I 

 have no documentary statistics from which I can form an accurate idea of the pro- 

 portion of the population in the several nations who are hireling day laborers ; but 1 

 have been personally informed by very intelligent resident citizens that the ratio of 

 this class in the Cherokee Nation, including those who cultivate less than five acres, 

 is one-sixth of the whole ; among the Choctaws, Chickasaws, and Creeks, about one- 

 fourth ; and that among the Seminoles the ratio is even larger. So it is clear that a 

 large part of the population in each of these nations— held down below the common 

 level of their own race by stress of poverty and the weight of daily necessities, unable 

 by reason of present misfortunes to avail themselves of any opportunity or means to 

 possess themselves of their equal distributive shares of lands, and to so utilize them 

 as to place their families upon a higher social and financial plane — needs some potent 

 influence or power to dispel this system and establish a new order of things — in a 

 word, to raise up the down-trodden people to their proper level. 



It is undeniable that the five civilized tribes look to the Indian Office, under the 

 intercourse laws, only for protection from the aggression of white intrusion. In no 

 other particular do they respest or consult the authority of the Government. The 

 United States Army has stood guard over these Indians for fifty years, shielding and 

 protecting them from the grasp of the frontiersman and the settler. Yet they have 

 not seconded the endeavors of the Government to induce among the various tribes a 

 general spirit of taking allotments by setting the example themselves. This does not 

 seem a grateful remembrance of the sacrifices the American people have made for their 

 protection, in submitting to an annual tax of many millions of dollars to support and 

 maintain an army, without which the Indian Territory would have been reckoned 

 long ago among the things that were. 



Allotments.* — The following table shows the amount of land held by each of the 



* In 1886 Commissioner Atkins visited the Osage, amongst other Indians, and proposed to them the 

 allotment of their lands. Since the visit Chief Ne-ka-ke-pa-nak, the principal chief, has been investi- 

 gating the subject. His conclusions are given in the following to the council of the Creek Nation: 



Pawkusha, Ind. Tee., Jen. 3d, 1887. , 

 To the Council of the Creek Nation: 



Sirs: The Hon. Commrs Adinds visited our country, and on his way to the other uncivilized tribes 

 of indians I had a short talk with him and he wanted me to take out my lands by enlotments 160 achors 

 to the Head of famelys and 80 achors to every child to be garnted to the person for 20 years befour 

 they could do as they pleased with the above amount of lands and the Eemainder of land to be home 

 stead to white people and if I would do that I would have an everlasting home for My Self and Chil- 

 dren and My people and there childrin and that each of our people could controle at least 700 head of 



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