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Show reservations. 143 Sutherland's objections were rejected; the survey was made of the Uintah Reservation ( the Brown and Brown survey). In the spring of 1903, Indian Inspector James McLaughlin held a council with the White Rivers and Uintahs to explain the plans to open their lands to white settlers and to secure their consent. McLaughlin informed the men gathered for the council that: ... until quite recently, the policy of our Government has been that Indians had unquestioned right to all lands of their respective reservations; but a recent decision of the Supreme Court of the United States is that Indians have no right to any part of their reservations except what they may require for allotments in severalty or can make proper use of., 44 However, McLaughlin also threatened them that the Indian Office was " very anxious that you consent to the provisions of this Act so that you may get the best of your reservation lands for yourself." I45 The Utes were not to be intimidated. Chief Happy Jack, a White River leader, explained: After the white people come in here they will say, ' We took your land, now we will take your water and your house. So you get off this land; go to some other country and find some other place!' This is the reason we feel bad over this business. The land where the white man's towns are belonged to us at one time. These Indians do not understand what they mean. You are just like a storm from the mountains when the flood is coming down the stream, and we can't get help or stop it. 146 A total of 280 male adults belonged to the White River and Uintah bands. McLaughlin was able to get only 82 signatures of Utes giving their consent to the opening of their reservation. Several of these may have been bribed or were school- aged children! 47 Officials moved forward to allot lands to the Utes without their consent. By an Act of April 21, 1904, Congress extended the time for the opening of unallotted lands to public entry on the Uintah Reservation to March 10, 1905.148 During the Congressional debate on the provisions of the April 21, 1904 Act, the Lone Wolf vs. Hitchcock decision was discussed. Also discussed was the theory that possession did not convey title to land. The ages- old debate had been articulated on the one side in the 16th century by the Spanish priest, Francisco de Vitoria, that the Indians were the true owners of their lands. On the other side, the Swiss jurist, Emmerich de Vattel, had articulated the theory in the 17th century that man had an obligation to cultivate the earth, and the man who did not do so, had no right to the land. Vattel's theory seems to have been favored by the 1904 United States congressmen who intended that: ... hereafter no Indian reservations could be opened to settlement 30 |