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Show Appendix B Land Claim From the time whites first began to take Nuwuvi land, they were ill-at-ease about how to deal with the native inhabitants. They established towns, farms, forts and missions. They professed peaceful coexistence while driving the Nuwuvi into the desert. Yet, the whites sometimes openly admitted the Nuwuvi's right to the land. They recognized the morality of legally extinguishing the Nuwuvi title to the land and making some form of compensation. They often considered making a treaty of cession with the Nuwuvi. A treaty was drawn up in 1865 and signed by a handful of Nuwuvi who were not representatives of the whole tribe. The provisions of the treaty were incredibly unfair. They asked the Nuwuvi to go to the Uintah Reserve and compensated them with a mere pittance, most of which was to go to the signers of the treaty. Fortunately, the treaty was never ratified. However, it stands as an admission of the Nuwuvi's right to the land. The whites were unable to satisfactorily justify their presence on Nuwuvi and Ute land. That fact is expressed with confusion in the following statement: Whereas, by reason of the acquisition of Upper California and New Mexico, and the subsequent organization of the Territorial Governments of New Mexico and Utah by the acts of the Congress of the United States, these Territories have organized Governments within and upon what would otherwise be considered Indian Territory, and which really is Indian Territory so far as the right of soil is involved, thereby presenting the novel feature of a white legalized government on Indian lands. . . } This statement does not succeed in making it clear how whites could have a legalized government over land which is not theirs. The Nuwuvi also were well-aware of their rights to their native land. William R. Palmer, sympathetic to the Nuwuvi point of view, observed that: 147 |