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Show 82 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. Subsequently other funds in various amounts were received by the Cherokees, none of which were distributed pro rata to the Freedmen, Delawares, and Shawnees. Among them was particularly the amount received for the sale of the Cherokee Outlet, $8,595,736. A portion of this, $1,660,000, was retained in the United States Treasury until the status of the Shawnees, Delawares, and Freedmen should be determined by the courts. Most of the remainder, $6,640,000, was distributed to Cherokee citizens by blood to the exclusion of the adopted citizens and Freedmen. Consequently a suit was instituted by ewh of the aforesaid parties against the Cherokee Nation, in the Court of Claims,' under the author-ity of act of Congress approved October 1,1890 (26 Stats., p. 636), hz: No. 16837.-Charles Jonrneyeake, Principal Chief of the Delaware Indians u. The Cherokee Nation and the United States. No. 1683.-Johnson Blsckfeath,er, the Priucipal ,Chief of tho Shamee Tribe of Indians u. The United State8 end the Cherokee Nation. No. 17209.-Moses Whitmire, Trustee for the Freedmen of the Cherokee Nation, v. The Cherokee Nation and the United States. Delawares.-The suit by the Delawares haviug been heard, the Court of Claims filed its first decree thereon April 24,1893. Its general pur-port was to determine and declare the rights of the Delawares in the common property of the Cherokee Nation, which decree declared that they were citizens of the Cherokee Nation e.qually with those who were Cherokees by blood, and equally entitled to participate in a fund derived from the common l~roperty. This decree was carried to the Supreme Court by appeal of the defendants and affirmed. On petition of complainants for further decree the Court of Claims on the 18th of March, 1895, decreed that the decree in this suit entered May 22,1893, he extended and applied to the fund arising from the sale of the Cherokee Outlet viz, $8,595,736; that 759 be taken as the number of Delawares entitled to participate in that fund, and that the sum of $188,254 be paid by the treasury of the Cherokee Nation or by the Sec-retary of the Interior "to the individual Delawares, per capita, who would have been entitled to the same if the unconstitutional restric-tions above referred to had not existed in the distribution of the fund of $6,640,000 to the exclusion of the complainants therein?' Freedmen.-The suit for the Freedmen having been heard, the Court of Claims filed its first decree March 4, 1895, suspending its judgment until tbe ]lumber of persons who were entitled to participate or the number of persons who constituted the body of the present claimants could be ascertained. In its second decree of March 18,1895, the court took the Wallace roll as furnishing the true number of the Freedmen, 3,524, and stated that it would enter a decree, following the form of that which was last entered in the case of the Delawares, to the effect that the Secretary -. .~. LFor the decrees of the Court in these suits seep. 416. |