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Show 14 EEPORT OF TEE COMMISSIONER OFINDIAN AFFAIRS. necessary to be done by the Government in itregulating th6 trade and managing all affairs with the Indians." The framers of the Federal Constitution, which in 1788 superseded the Articles of Confederation, deemed it of imp~rtanceth at the central gov-ernment shonld have exclusive power over intercourse with Indians. Therefore, section 8 of article 1 of the Constitution, provided that "the Congress shallhav6power * * + t~regulatecommerce * * * with the Indian tribes." The limitation on the power of Congress which the Articles of Confederation reserved to the "legislativeright* of the States was omitted, and the national Government,through Con-gress, was givm exclusive control of the matter. The Supreme Court of the United States, in Gibbons a. Ogden(6 Wheat., U8), decided that "wmmerce undoubtedly is traffic, but it is something more, it is inter-course;" and in United States a. Holiday (3 Wall., 407) it decided that commerce with the Indian tsibes means commerce between citizens of the United States and "the individuals composing those tribes. 1 Therefore, it follows that when Congress was given power by the Con-, stitution to regulate commerce with Indian tribes it was also given control of the intercourse between individual citizens of the United states' and individual Indians, and that there is nothing that conld asise out of our relations with the Indians which is not subject to regu. lation by Congress. The first step taken by Congress looking to the regulation of ow intercourse withthe Iudiau tribes was the passage of a law August 20, 1789 (1 Stats., 54), appropriating $20,000 to "defray the expenses of negotiating and treating with the Indian tribes," and authorizing the appointment of commissioners to manage such negotiations andtreaties. The commissioners thus authorized were sometimes referred to as ciagents for treating with the Indians ;I1 but their dutiea were merely to treat with Indian tribes with a view to securing the cession of same of the laud claimed ind occupied by them, and to est&blish peaceful and friendly intercourse between them and our own Government and citizens; their designation a8 Liagentsn seems to have been misap-plied. In a letter of instructions (dated August 29,1789, and signed by George Washington) to Messrs. Benjamin Lincoln, Cyrus Gri5ln, and David Humphrey, those gentlemen were addressed as ~'comrnis-sioners plenipotentiary for negotiating and concluding treaties of peace with the independent tribes or nations of Indians within the limits of the United Stabs south of the Ohio River?' This lettar begins with the statement that- The United States consider it as an object of high national importame not only to be at peaoe with the powerful tribes or nation8 of Indiana aouth of the Ohio, but,if possible, by a just and Liberal aystem of polioy to oonciliate and attaoh them to the intereats of the Union. The gentlemen named, under date of November 20,'1789,made a report to the Secretary of War upon their labors as commissioners plenipo- |