JOURNAL OF THE SECOND ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE BOARD OF INDIAN COMMISSIONERS

WASHINGTON, January 15, 1873.

A meeting of conference was held by the Board of Indian Commissioners with the representation of the missionary boards, engaged in Indian missionary work, at the "Arlington," Washington, D. C., at 10 a. m., Wednesday, January 15, 1873.

There were in attendance Commissioners Felix R. Brunot, (chairman,) Dodge, Bishop, Campbell, Lang, Tobey, and Farwell, and T. K. Cree, secretary of the Board of Indian Commissioners, and the following representatives of the mission boards of the churches engaged in Indian work:

Rev. S. B. Treat, D. D., secretary American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions; Rev. Jay L. Backus, D. D., secretary American Baptist Home Missionary Association; Rev. George Whipple, D. D., secretary American Missionary Association; Rev. George Deshon, Roman Catholic Missions; Rev. John C. Lowrie, D. D., secretary Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions; Rev. R. L. Dashiell, corresponding secretary Methodist Episcopal Missionary Society; Colonel E. C. Kemble, secretary Protestant Episcopal Indian Commission; Rev. John G. Brown, D. D., secretary Board Home Missions United Presbyterian Church; Rev. J. M. Ferris, D. D., Reformed Dutch Church Mission Society; Rev. W. L. Hayden, Christian Missionary Convention; Dr. William Nicholson, Cyrus Beede, Benjamin Tatham, Thomas Wistar, F. T. King, Society of Friends, (Orthodox ;) Samuel M. Janney, Daniel Foulke, Dillwyn Parrish, B. Rush Roberts, Richard T. Bentley, (Hicksite;) Rev. John T. Sargent, secretary Massachusetts Indian Commission; Aaron M. Powell, New York Indian Aid Society; R't Rev. William Hobart Hare, missionary bishop of Niobrara; Bishop Harris, Methodist Epis. copal Church; Edward P. Smith, American Missionary Association; Hon. William Welch and Mr. King, Protestant Episcopal Indian Commission; Hon. C. Cole, United States Senate; Hon. John W. Stevenson, United States Senate; Hon. C. B. Farwell, House of Representatives; Colonel Phillips, member-elect to House of Representatives; and William P. Ross and other representatives of the civilized tribes in the Indian Territory; General O. O. Howard, United States Army, and many other - friends of the Indians.

The chairman called upon Right Rev. Bishop Whipple to open the meeting with prayer, after which he said:

In behalf of the Board of Indian Commissioners it gives me pleasure to welcome you most cordially, and to say that we appreciate the effort made by the missionary boards of all the churches in co-operating with our endeavor to civilize and christianize the Indian wards of the nation. Much has already been accomplished toward civilizing the Indian race; their condition has been much improved, and a more just administration of the laws and designs of the Government pertaining to them has been secured by the co-operation of the missionary boards that you represent. We invited you to meet with us as the representa

tives of these boards that we may hear such statements as you may have to make in regard to the progress of the work, and suggestions as to the needs of it, to the end that we may secure greater efficiency and insure continued progress. It is believed in thus meeting together much good may be accomplished for the future. So much has already been accomplished as to make it almost certain that if four years more of the present Indian policy is pursued, there will be no question of the same humane and just policy being adhered to so long as an Indian policy by our Government is necessary. There has been much pressure brought to bear upon the administration to induce a change in the Indian policy, but public opinion has sustained it in its high aims. But as difficulties are met with not only by the administration and the friends of the Indians, but by the agents in the field, it is necessary that public opinion should support them, also, in carrying out the designs of the system. The board will not attempt to instruct the missionary societies in their duties, but will ask such recommendations from them as their experience in the work may suggest as necessary in successfully carrying it on. There are, however, some points which we think essential to success.

First in importance is the selecting of agents who represent you in the field. The very best attainable men should be secured to fill these important positions.

Second. The employés should all be married men of Christian, or, at least, good moral character; and the agent should be held responsible for their right doing. In some cases in which the agents you have nominated have been Christian men, disposed to do right and to endeavor to civilize and christianize the Indian, those about them as subordinate officials have not been men of the same character, and the efforts of the agents have been thwarted. The missionary societies ought to know not only that the agent is a proper man for his position, but that all his employés are men of good character, and they should exercise a careful supervision of the agencies committed to them, and see that they are perfectly conducted. I might cite many other needs of the service, but they have, doubtless, all suggested themselves to you, and will be brought out more fully in the reports of your own experience in the work.

I will call upon the representatives in alphabetical order and will ask them to give the result of their experience in the operations of the past year.

Mr. WELCH. The gentlemen that have been invited to meet with the Board, and who have listened to your statement in regard to the kind of agents that are necessary, would like to confer with you in regard to the difficulties they meet with in the field. We secure an agent of the right kind-one desirous of doing his duty-and the communities living about him, interested in defrauding the people committed to his care, in every way endeavor to thwart him, and even here such agents are threatened with removal by men of influence if they continue to stand between them and their illicit gains. An agent beset by these difficulties is present to-day. If you need strength and public opinion, will you tell us in what direction it is needed? Some men say and think that the Indians have no rights that a white man must respect, any more than the wild beasts that roam the forest. There are rings that are trying to secure the lands that belong to the Indians. On these and any other points we would be glad to hear from you, and in this way we would know what points it is best for the representatives and agents to touch upon in their reports.

Mr. BRUNOT. The points to which you refer will, I presume, come up in the reports of the representatives of the missionary societies, and will thus come before the meeting for consideration, and I think it is better to have them presented in that way.

Mr. WELCH. Some who are now present cannot remain until the close of the meeting, and points might be brought out thus early in the meeting that would be of value to them. Your secretary, Mr. Cree, is here and he is conversant with all the difficulties which agents and others meet with, and he might sum up the most important for consideration by the meeting.

Mr. BRUNOT. We have all noticed the pressure to attack Indians, coming from all quarters, and any one who has watched the proposed legislation of the present session of Congress, could not but observe how many propositions there are looking to the despoiling of Indians and asking legislation unfavorable to them. Many border people seem to think that the Government has placed Indians upon these reservations as a medium through which the whites may be furnished with money, and in order that a better opportunity may be afforded to oppress them and despoil them of the Government bounty. We desire that oppression of Indians may be prevented and that wrong against them may be punished, and we desire the assistance of the missionary boards in carrying out these designs. The subject is one beset with many difficulties in its details, and it is difficult to select any definite points and say that such deserve your special effort at this moment. We need the continued co-operation of the missionary societies and friends of the Indians in getting a correct public opinion and preventing the commission of these wrongs. I think that the better mode for the conduct of our meeting will be to have these reports, and as the meeting progresses, the matters which you have suggested, with the modes by which we can best co-operate with each other in preventing these things which should be prevented, will develop themselves. I therefore propose to ask, in their order, all the representatives of the societies that they will make such reports as I have spoken of. I call on the Rev. George Whipple.

Mr. WHIPPLE. If the chairman of the board pleases, I will ask the Rev. Mr. Smith, who is the secretary of the American Missionary Association, to make a few remarks in relation to the agencies under the charge of the Americam Missionary Association.

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Chairman, I am not aware to what extent the board desires a report, but I will state that the association has had under its charge during the year four agencies, one in Washington Territory, one in Minnesota, and two in Wisconsin. There are in all about sixteen or seventeen thousand Indians under their care.

The agency at Green Bay, under Mr. Richardson, has had a year of prosperity, to which the personal efforts of the agent, aided by friends of the Indians, have contributed very much. The consent of the Department having been obtained by the agent, the Menomonee Indians did their own lumbering last winter, and the lumber which they took into market realized $20,000, which left to the Indians about $12,000 net after all expenses were paid. A double benefit thus accrued to the Indians, the benefit arising from being the recipients of the proceeds of the outlay for subsistence and the encouragement to labor. A great outcry was raised by the lumbermen of Wisconsin against this transaction, which was officially represented through a Wisconsin Representative in the House, and a commission, of which Mr. Turney, of the Board of Indian Commissioners, was a member, was appointed by the Secretary

of the Interior to inquire into the matter. The report which represented the transaction as being in every way a beneficial one, and entirely upright, was entirely satisfactory to the Department.

Permission for the Indians to lumber was asked for again this year by Mr. Richardson, but owing to the interference of parties in Wisconsin, it was not granted. Subsequently, through the misrepresentations of interested parties, the Department asked the association to discharge Mr. Richardson and nominate another man in his place.

The agencies at Superior and Chippewa have had a prosperous year in many respects, and their schools have gone forward with considerable success.

The agency in Minnesota is much more difficult, as it is a larger field, the reservations connected with it being scattered all over the State. There have been built at the reservations this year, one hundred and nine comfortable log-houses, 18 by 22 feet, with five rooms in each house. The work was all done by the Indians, with the exception of some portions which actually needed the services of skilled carpenters. The lumber has been all sawed by the Indians, and the engineer is a full-blood Indian.

Their crops in the spring were very fine indeed, but they have since been all destroyed by the grasshoppers, and there is likely to be suffering among them this winter. They have supported themselves by labor during the past summer. I think there is no doubt in the minds of the association as to the practicability of christianizing these Chippewas, or any other Indians under their charge. It is only a question of time and patience, of kind and fair dealing, and they think the Government ought to make considerable appropriations to forward the work.

It is a constant complaint that the new plan is costing more than the old one. So it does for the present. I can go into Minnesota and distribute their blankets to them or give them their ten dollars per year each, and then leave them, and the cost will be much less than staying with them and opening schools and farms. But, in the former case, the distribution of blankets and their support would have to be continued while they exist, while in the latter they will soon become selfsupporting, valuable citizens, and eventually millions of dollars will be saved. The old plan would require a persistent and continued expenditure, while the new plan will soon obviate the necessity for any outlay. I have no question but that a single generation, with the children kept in school, will crush the barbarism in Minnesota.

The CHAIRMAN. We would now be pleased to hear from Bishop Whipple.

Bishop WHIPPLE. Mr. Chairman, as the agency in Minnesota is more directly under the eye of Mr. Smith, I will not do more than make a few remarks upon these agencies. I have been at the White Earth agency, and with all the Indians in the northern part of Minnesota, and for the first time in my connection with Indian affairs have I found an agent and his employés wholly occupied with their labor for the Indians. It is not simply that the agent has been faithful. He has had to grapple with the most terrible resistance. These things should be considered. It is a matter of law. There is no law in the Indian country. The Christian Indian is taught by his teacher that he is not to pursne the old plan of acting under the law of instinct. crops may be injured and destroyed, and he is perfectly helpless, as the Government has never provided any judicial officer to protect his rights. One Indian may kill another in the most populous town, and no questions are asked. An Indian has killed another in the streets since I

His

have resided there, and it was considered a matter of no consequence. The Government leaves these Indians utterly unprotected. Cases of murder are occurring constantly, and an effort to protect these Indians brings down great opposition. I think a great deal of credit is due to the wife of the agent. She has taken a great interest in all, endeavoring to civilize and elevate the Indian women. Mrs. Smith has been teaching these women to make soap, and their households have been entirely renovated; and, so far as I know, every effort which honest, faithful Christian people could make for the safety of these poor people has been made.

The difficulties in Minnesota grew merely out of the lack of any law whatever. The Leech Lake Indians are perhaps one of the worst bodies of Indians, in this respect, to be found in the country. They have again and again committed murder among their own people. For instance, Hole-in-the-Day was killed; he was chief of the tribe. We have had

at least twenty such murders committed in open daylight. Mr. WHIPPLE. Mr. Chairman, permit me to ask Mr. Welch to make a few remarks relative to the Indians of whom we have been speaking. Mr. WELCH. Mr. Chairman, I had an official interview with General Sheridan in regard to the character of these Indians. He stated that although considerable trouble was occasioned at times by the Chippewas, and he was compelled to punish them, he did not blame them so much, because in nearly every case, they were aggravated by wrongs. He felt assured that if the Government would pursue a right and just course toward these Indians, a large proportion of the crimes could be remedied. I think the Chippewa Indians are the worst band I have known in Minnesota. I want to say a word, Mr. Chairman, about these Leech Lakes. They are ordered by the government of Minnesota to remain on the reservation. They have $4,000 a year for agricultural purposes and purposes of tillage, and there are about two thousand of them. They could not remain on their reservation and make a living. • It would be a question of starvation or of disobeying the Government authorities. They roam all over Minnesota and are liable to come in contact with the whites, who are ordered to drive them back, and if necessary raise the militia and force them back. The agent says they come up to the reservation and ask me to give them work. I have not a dollar of money and cannot get it, yet there are these Indians among us, and we are directed by the Department to keep them on the reservation. They cannot live on the reservation. They came to me last summer-more than a hundred of them-and asked me to give them work. If I had an appropriation I might give them work.

Mr. BRUNOT. There appear to be two very important facts developed by this statement. One of these facts is that it is not admitted that the Indians have any right to make a living on the reservation by selling the lumber which belongs to them, for thus they may conflict with the whites in the neighborhood; and the other one is this: it has just been represented that they are not to have leave to go off the reservation, for the purpose of earning a living by labor.

Mr. TATHAM. I propose that these two facts and all other points which are, or may be, deemed of interest in the course of the council, be especially noted, in order that the condition of these Indians may be brought to view at a future time. It is proper that we should hear the truth, and I am in hopes that nothing here developed will be lost, and that the secretary will make notes of the points as we go on.

Dr. NICHOLSON. Our body has charge of the Indians in the Central superintendency, which embraces all in the Indian Territory, and a few