| OCR Text |
Show This leads me to consider the general policy of allotment as con-trolled by lam. The general allotment act, as amended and now in force, prescribes that the area for each allotment shall be 80 acres of agricultural or 160 acres of grazing land. For allottees in Kansas, Xebraska, or park of Oklahoma such a provision might be considered fair; but it was made at a time when local-conditions in the wide West were only vaguely understood, and for a sweeping rule it fails thrn giving an Indian either. more land than it is wise to burden hi with or less than he can possibly make a living on. Nearly all the reservations yet to be allotted contain little or no agricultural land that can be cultivated without irrigation. Eighty acres of irrigable land to each Indian is far more than he can utilize, especially as, owing to lack of funds, the cost of irrigation is almost prohibitive. The enterprising white farmer suppork a whole family perhaps on 20 acres, and has all he can do to look out for that mucli; but when it is proposed to give each member of an Indian family 5 or 10 acresmaking, say, 50 or 60 acres in all for the head of the family to cultivate-a cry of protest goes up from quarters where kindness of purpose is abundant but information deficient. All who have had to deal with Indians at first hand, and know well their characteristics, will agree that no other people are so easily discouraged by being given a task which seems to them beyond their powers. Hence, in allotting to an Indian a tract of land larger than . . he can hope to till--especially when his tenure of the water necessary to make it productive depends upon his beneficial and continued use thereof-we place upon him not only a physical but a moral handi-cap. I would far rather, in distributing among Indians an area of land capable of high tillage, give each a little less than be could take care of at a pinch than spoil all by making the portions too large. ' We haveto look at this question in a broad way, considering ultimate consequences for good or ill rather than immediate aspects of gen-erosity. On the other hand, the limit of 160 acres of grazing land is equally without the mark. On such a reservation as the Jicarilla, for in-stance, no white man, much less an Indian, could support himself on only 160 acres. The reservation is on the great Continental Divide, rocky, mountainous, and ,partly timbered. At best it is only a tolerable sheep range. True, there are small patches that can be cultivated, but these will not in the aggregate exceed 10,000 or 12,000 acres. To allot their lands to the Jicarilla Indians in 80 or 160 acre tracts would be of little benefit to the majority of the tribe. The small area susceptible of cultivation makes it impossible to as-sign to each Indian sufficient agricult~~rlaaln d for his needs, but the rigorous winters make it necessary that each have some farming |
