OCR Text |
Show The granting of permits or leases for grazing stock on Indian lands we regard as objectionable. These pastures were set aside to encourage the Indians In stock-raising. They were not set aside as a means to raise revenue to meet any part of the cost of administration, and the practice of raising revenue in this manner, on this and other reservations, has a pernicious effect on the Indians. Many of the Indians can be induced to put stock on the Indian range and care for it, If tho range is kept free of the stook of the white man, and this oan be done by charging a crossing fee and using the fees to pay Indian policemen to keep the range free of trespassing stock; but as long as cattlemen and sheepmen can cross the Indian range for the asking ( or without the asking ) there will be no proper supervision of the range, and without proper supervision, tho cattle and sheep of the white men will predominate, and the Indians' interest in stock-raising will wane as he witnesses the prolifioness of the herds of his white neighbor and the sterility of his own. We have endeavored in this and our former report to emphasize the fact that up to the present time the funds of these Indians have been erpeaded with no assurance that the Indians, idividually or as a tribe will profit therefrom. Every possible energy should be |