OCR Text |
Show GXXVI REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIES A measure having theabove ends in view will be matured and pre-sented for your consideration at an early day. THE EASTERN QHEROKEES.. The twelfth article of the Cherokee treaty of 18% provided that those Oherokees'who were averse to removal, and were desirous to become citizens of the States where they resided, were entitled to remain, etc. (7 Stab., p. 483.) Some eleven to twelve hundred availed themselves of the privilege. These Indians in tima became possessed of certain land in North Carolina, the title to which was so insecure and unsatis-factory that Congress, by act approved Jnly 15, 1870,(eloventh sec-tion; 16 Stats., p. 362), authorized and-empowered the Eastern band of ' OherokeeIndims, by that name and style, to institute and carry on a suit or snits in law or equity,in the distrid or circuit courts of the United States, against certain agents, for all claims, causes of suit, or rights in law or'equity (including said land) that said band might have against them, and made i t the duty of the district attorneys and the Attorney- General of the.United States toinstitute and prosecute the same. Suits were accordingly brought in the United States court for the western district of North Carolina, at Asheville, May term, 1873, ,against William H. Thomas et al., aadupou agreement by aU the parties in intersst, at the May term, 1874, Messra ltufus Barringer, John H. Dillard, and Thomm Rnffin were appointed arbitrators to make a report of all facts and all rights and dues to the Indians, touching all the ques-tions involved in said act, whose award wm to be, and did become; find and a rule of t6e court. This agreement was approved by the Hon. R. P. Dick, judge of said court, the Secretary of the Interior, the Oom-. missioner of Indian Affairs, and the Department of Justice on or before the 17th of June, 1874. On the 24th day of October, 1574, the arbitra-tors made and filed their award, affirming the Indian title to the land known as Qualla bonndary-aome 50,000 acres, etc.-which was con- 5rmed at th4 followinq November term of the said United States circuit court, held at Asheville. . . The terms of that award, as well & tho history of their claim, are fully set forth in House Excntive Document No. 169, Forty-seventh Congreus, timt session, bnt the award has never been fully executed, and the lo: dians have. unceasingly complained of the intrusions of the whitesnpon said lauds, and of the non-enforcement of that award and decree of the conrt.. Their unsettled condition has been the subject of seveFiLI inves-tigations by this office, and the fact fully brought out that, in a great measure, it grew out of the failure to carry said award into execution. 4 This office has felt for some time that it was pawerless to relieve the Indians of the dificulticu surrounding them, but has by its reports of April 24, 1885, and August 30,1886, reoommended that the Attorney- |