THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 867 



By the fifteenth article of the Cherokee treaty of 1866 (14 Stat., page 803) it is pro- 

 vided that— 



"The United States may settle any civilized Indians, friendly with the Gherokees 

 and adjacent tribes, within the Cherokee country, on unoccupied lands east of 96°, on 

 such terms as may be agreed upon by any such tribe and the Cherokees subject to the 

 approval of the President of the United States." 



This treaty further provides that the Indians who may thus be settled among the 

 Cherokees are to have a district of country, set off for their use by metes and bounds, 

 equal to 160 acres for each member of said tribes, at a price to be agreed upon, pro- 

 vided the consent of the Cherokee Nation is first obtained prior to such settlement. 

 Here 160 acres is made the basis of the homestead. I believe that, except in a few 

 cases covered by specific treaty stipulations, such as the Omahas, Sioux, and Yaka- 

 mas, allotments made to Indians by the Government have not exceeded 160 acres to 

 an Indian. The quarter-section is universally recognized by the Government as the 

 limit of the homestead; 160 acres is the recognized standard number. But I would 

 not confine the members of the five civilized tribes to 160 acres. I only think that^ll 

 lands in those nations should be divided in severalty equally among the population, 

 so that those members of the tribes who now stand mutely by and see members of 

 their own race occupy and cultivate their lands and pocket the proceeds may be put 

 in actual possession of that which belongs to them. 



I shall refer hereafter to the untold ills among the five civilized tribes, caused by 

 the want of courts having jurisdiction over all crimes committed by all persons. But 

 before taking up that subject I desire to reiterate that the full and complete remedy 

 for the numerous evils that afflict those people lies deeper than the incomplete system 

 of judicature which prevails within the limits. These people have, in a great meas- 

 ure, passed from a state of barbarism and savagery. Many of them are educated 

 people. They have fine schools and churches. They are engaged in lucrative busi- 

 ness of various kinds. In fact, so far as outward appearances go, there would seem 

 to be very little difference between their civilization and that of the States. And yet 

 when we come closely to investigate the laws and customs of their system of govern- 

 ment, it is radically different from that of any of our States. Nowhere.in the United 

 States, except in polygamous Utah and a few inconsiderable and widely scattered 

 villages, is there a white community that pretends to hold property, and especially 

 lands, in common. This is the fundamental error from which proceed the troubles 

 which afflict the five nations. The practical operation of'this system of holding 

 creates an aristocracy out of a few wealthy and powerful leaders, while the poor, al- 

 though equal owners, are so impoverished as not to be able to assert their equal 

 rights of property and manhood. 



I am not recommending that Congress shall undertake to do anything with refer- 

 ence to these five civilized tribes which is inhibited by the treaties. But I do advise 

 the nations themselves to awake to a true appreciation of their own situation, and to 

 have the respect for that public opinion in this country which makes laws and forms 

 States and which has thus far protected them in their treaty rights. I do advise our 

 red brothers, whose interests I desire to see promoted, to advise with each other and 

 to act wisely by passing just and equal laws for the division of lands in severalty, 

 allotting to each member of the tribe his own birthright. The treaties I hope to see 

 observed. But where the continued observance of those treaty obligations works an 

 injury to the Indians by alienating from them the mass of the people of the United 

 States, who are by instinct opposed to all monopoly, or where it does great injury to the 

 Indians themselves, it seems to me it is the duty of the Indians to agree among them- 

 selves to a modification of those treaties — to remodel all such laws and customs as 

 give a monopoly to a few (or even to many), and to place themselves abreast the 

 times and in accord with the ideas of free and equal citizenship which prevail in this 

 great country. 



Territorial government. — If the Indians of the five civilized tribes would then put 

 away tribal relations, and adopt the institutions common to our Territories or States, 



