OCR Text |
Show REPORT OF THE CONJIIPSIONER OF INDIAB AFFAIRS. .LXXXI So far as the'work of this office is concerned, I see little if any neces-sity why the Ir~dianss bonld be at large expense for employing attor-neys to prosecute their &aims. Whatever legislation is required to secure the payment to the Indians of moneys due bhem most rest, necessarily, upon the facts presented by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, and largely upon his opinion touching the merits of the case. It hardly seems necessary that a large percentage of moneys clearly and justly due to Indians should be gaid to some attorue)- for his serv-ices iu inducing Congress to pay the nation's just debts. The Indians should not be forced to eluplay attorueys for the t.ransaotion of any business that they can transact themselvee or which should be trans-acted for them by their or by the Indian OEce. There may he, doiibtless are, and will continue to be cases where it is perfectly proper for au attorney to be employed in the preparation and prosecution of Indian claims. I must confess, however, that I am greatly embarrassed, as the Commissioner charged wit.h the administra-tion of the affairs of the Indians, and standing in an important fieuse for the time being as their legal guardian and as the representative of a wise and just Government, when I am appealed to to sanction a eon-tract authorizing an attorney to receire fro~ut he Indians 25 per centum or more of moness claimetl to be due to them as payment for serrices rendered ill persoadiug the Government, through Congressional legis-lation, Executive action, or judicial decision, to perform iis clearly recognized duty. I shall continue to vithhold my approval from all contracts that are not clearly inthe interest of the Indians, and unless a failure to ap-prove woold be a disadvantage to them. Since ~ r i t i n gth e preceding, I find n passsge in the report of Hon. Hiram Price; for 1883, page 10, which I will quote: The practice of approving contracts to collect from the Government money dne the Indiana is one that, in my judgment, ought not to exist. The Govsrnmont claims to be the gnardian of thn Indians, and as aooh is clearly under obligation to guard their interests and protect them in their ri~hta;b ut nuder section 2103 of the Revised Statutes it has for yearn been the practice to approve of contracts by which ontside parties have tskenfromtl~uIodiaoshundredos f thousandsof dollarsfor servios which ought not to have cost the Indians one cent. If the Government, acting se guardian, oweq or holds in trnst for the Indians, money or property belonging to them, the clearest and plainest dictates of oommon sense and common honesty re-quire that the wardshould not be compelled to suffer loss to obtain what is justly due him. UNITED STATES COURTS IN THE INDIAN TERRITORY. Since my last annual report, by an act approved May 2,1890 (26 Stat, 81, and page 371 of this report), Congress has created the Territory of Oklahoma out of-a part of what mas the Indian Territory, establishing therein a Territorial government. By the same act the Indian Terri-tory is defined to comprise IL all that part of the United States which is 9975-6** |