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Show REPORT OF TEE COXMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. 149 80 as to permit of the sale of timber in the Indian Territory for "props and caps for mines and ties and pilings for railroadsdao"n ly. COiVNI881ON TO TEE FlVE CIVnIZED TKIBES. No change was made in the personnel of the commission during the year. It consists at this time of Hon. Henry L. Dawes, of Massachu-setts; Tams Bixby, esq., of Minnesota; Thomas B. Needles, esq., of Illinois, and Hon. Clifton R. Breckenridge, of Arkansas. The commission was originally organized under the authority con-tained in section 16 of the act of March 3,1893 (27 Stats., 612-645), which authorized the appointment of commissioners to enter into negotiations with the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickassw, Creek, and Seminole nations-for the purpose of the extinguishment of the national or trihl title to lands within the temtory now held by any or all of aid nations or tribee, either by eemion of the same or some part thereof to the United Sbtes or by the allotment and divi-sion of the eame in severalty among the Indians of such nations or tribes, respec-tively, etc. A clause in the Indian approp&tion act approved June 10, 1896 (29 Stats., 221-339), directed the commission to hear and determine the application8 of all persons who might apply to it for citizenship in any of the Five Civilized Tribes, and provided that such applica-tions should be made to the commission within three months from the date of the passage of the act, and further- That the rolls of citizenship of the several tribes as now-existing are hereby con-firmed, and any peraon who shall daim to be entitled to be added to said rolls ris a citizen of either of wid tribes and whoee right thereto has either been denied or not acted upon, or any citizen who may within three months from and after the passage of this act deaire aueh citizenship, may apply to the legally conntituted court or committee designated by the several tribes for such citizenship, and such court or committee shall determine auch application within thirty days from the date thereof. A clause contained in the act of June 7, 1897 (30 Stab., 62-84), required the couimission to investigateand report whether " Mississippi Choctaws under their treaties are not entitled to all rights of Choctaw citizens except an interest in the annuities." The act of June 28, 1898 (30 Stats., 495), generally known as the Curtis Act, required the commission to identify the Mississippi Choc-taws, and also to make a roll of all the citizens of each nation, and to distribute the property belonging to the various tribes, per capita, according to value. A clausr, in the Indian appropriation act approved May 31, 1900 (31 Slats., 221), declared that the commission should continue to exer-cise all authority theretofore conferred upon it by law, and provided that it should n o t receive, consider, or make any record of any application of any person for enroll-ment as a member of any tribe in the Indian Territory who has not been a recognized |