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Show Shivwits 115 In 1916 President Woodrow Wilson issued an Executive Order expanding the reservation. In that same year, supervision of Shivwits was placed under the Superintendent at Goshute Indian School, located at Deep Creek Reservation. The reservation began to stabilize at this point under the control of the Superintendent of the Shivwits Indian School. The Nuwuvi living at Shivwits still had a multitude of problems. Their major problem was health and its effect on Nuwuvi population. In 1917 the Superintendent reported that "the general health condition at the school as well as the whole reservation has been poor this year, a great many Indians have complained of rheumatism, colds, lagrippe and especially eye trouble. ... we have 85% trachoma and we need a special physician." 10 In 1919 he reported that Spanish influenza had claimed the lives of several, and many more were ill from it. There also was still a high percentage of eye disease, leaving many Nuwuvi helpless.11 Two other problems were the constant presence on the reservation of cattle owned by local whites and the conflicts over water. The lack of irrigated land, added to other problems, forced many Nuwuvi to seek jobs off the reservation. In 1937 Congress enlarged the reservation and provided for a stock driveway across it in a partial attempt to solve some of these problems. The conflicts over water worsened over the years, especially after termination of their special relationship with the government completely removed any Nuwuvi input into determining water rights. In 1940, the Shivwits band organized under the Indian Reorganization Act, establishing a constitution and by-laws. However, this action did little to improve the Indians' situation. There was little or no shift in responsibility since the Bureau of Indian Affairs had provided them with very few services and even less direction. This fact was part of the strange reverse logic used in the termination proceedings during the early 1950's. Because the Nuwuvi already were receiving a minimal amount of aid from the United States, why not completely end all federal aid ? Few stopped to consider that the reason the Nuwuvi were not receiving services was not because they did not need them, but rather because the government had failed to exercise the responsibility owed to them after placing them on reservations. |