868 THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 



they would no longer be subjected to the jealousy, contention, and selfish greed of ad- 

 venturous land-grabbers who now seem to regard the Indian a legitimate object of 

 prey and plunder. These adventurers do not attempt to dislodge and drive from 

 their domiciles the peaceful white settlers in their distant homes. Let these Indians 

 once assume all the responsibilities of citizens of the United States, with its laws ex- 

 tended as a protecting aegis over them, and the day of their fear and apprehension of 

 marauding whites will be forever ended. When this is done then will the five civil- 

 ized tribes, and perhaps other tribes of the Indian Territory, be ready to form a terri- 

 torial government and pass, as other Territories, under the protection of our Consti- 

 tution and laws, and be represented in Congress by their own delegate. 



The great objection that is urged by the Indians to dissolving their tribal relations, 

 allotting their lands,* and merging their political form of government into an organized 

 Territory of the United States arises out of their excessive attachment to Indian 

 tradition and nationality. I have great respect for those sentiments. They are pa- 

 triotic and noble impulses and principles. But is it not asking too much of the Amer- 

 ican people to permit a political paradox to exist within their midst — nay, more, to 

 aftek and demand that the people of this country shall forever burden themselves with 

 the responsibility and expense of maintaining and extending over these Indians its 

 military arm, simply to gratify this sentimentality about a separate nationality ? No 

 such exclusive privilege was granted the Pueblos of New Mexico, nor the inhabitants 

 of California, Utah, and Arizona, or any of the more northern Territories, including 

 Alaska. 



It is alleged that Congress has no power, in view of the treaties with those Indians, 

 to do away with their present form of government and institute in its stead a terri- 

 torial government similar to those now existing in the eight organized Territories. 

 While I greatly prefer that these people should voluntarily change their form of gov- 

 ernment, yet it is perfectly plain to my mind that the treaties never contemplated the 

 un-American and absurd idea of a separate nationality in our midst, with power as 

 they may choose to organize a government of their own, or not to organize any gov- 

 ernment nor allow one to be organized, for the one proposition contains the other. 

 These Indians have no right to obstruct civilization and commerce and set up an ex- 

 clusive claim to self-government, establishing a government within a, government, 

 and then expect and claim that the United States shall protect them from all harm, 

 while insisting that it shall not be the ultimate judge as to what is best to be done 

 for them in a political point of view. I repeat, to maintain any such view is to ac- 

 knowledge a foreign sovereignty, with the right of eminent domain, upon American 

 soil — a theory utterly repugnant to the spirit and genius of our laws, and wholly un- 

 warranted by the Constitution of the United States. 



Congress and the Executive of the United States are the supreme guardians of these 

 mere wards, and can administer their affairs as any other guardian can. Of course 

 it must be done in a just and enlightened way. It must be done in a spirit of pro- 

 tection and not of oppression and robbery. Congress can sell their surplus lands and 

 distribute the proceeds equally among the owners for the purposes of civilization and 

 the education of their children, and the protection of the infirm, and the establish- 

 ment of the poor upon homesteads with stock and implements of husbandry. Con- 

 gress cannot consistently or justly or honestly take their lands from them and give 

 or sell them to others except as above referred to, and for those objects alone. The 

 sentiment is rapidly growing among these five nations that all existing forms of In. 

 dian government which have produced an unsatisfactory and dangerous condition of 

 things, menacing the peace of the Indians and irritating their white neighbors, should 

 be replaced by a regularly organized territorial form of government, the Territory 

 thus constituted to be admitted at some future time as a State into the Union on an 

 equal footing with other States, thereby securing all the protection, sympathy, and 



* The Indian allotment act of February 8, 1887, noted on a previous page, specially exempts the lands 

 of the five civilized tribes. 



