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Show northern tribes to bring force against the federal government. The group began moving toward South Dakota. Legal considerations made it difficult to go after the Ute people with an armed force. However, the Governor of Wyoming was finally able to convince the federal government to send troops against them. When the forces of the U. S. Army converged upon the Ute group, they saw the hopelessness of their situation, and after a parley with the military, they agreed to be escorted to Fort Meade, South Dakota. There the Ute People were dismayed to find that the Sioux were not only unwilling to enter into an alliance, but they had no hunting lands to share. The Utes were settled on a portion of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation; they remained for two years. Some worked for the railroads, and others found jobs in Rapid City. In 1908 the Ute people were escorted back to Utah. The effect of the allotment policy on the Ute economic activities was disastrous. Being assigned to a piece of land meant fencing the land, keeping the cattle from roaming, daily tending of the fields- concepts alien to Ute tradition. The lack of understanding and the limited guidance and assistance by government officials produced resentment. The issue of water rights particularly caused much resentment. The first detailed examination of agricultural lands and water resources of the Uintah- Ouray Reservation had been conducted by Cyrus C. Babb in 1902 in anticipation of the opening of the reservation as a result of the government's legal obligation to protect the water rights of the Utes. 167 Babb's conclusions were that the area of the reservation was arid, and extensive irrigation systems needed to be developed before the land could be useful agriculturally. He also warned that protection and enforcement of Indian water rights was difficult, and evidence existed that the Indians were, and would in the future be, deprived of what rights justly belonged to them. Babb suggested that it was better to allot the Indians on adjoining sections on large tracts rather than on " detached areas- the whites being allowed to take up intermediate sections." 168 Under the provisions of the Presidential Proclamation of 1905, lands in the Strawberry Valley had been reserved to the Utes for irrigation purposes. The lands were soon lost. In 1903 authority had been granted the United States Reclamation Service to operate engineering parties in the Uintah Reservation to examine the hydrographic possibilities of the Strawberry Valley Reclamation Project, which was approved by the Secretary of the Interior late in 1905. This project needed a reservoir site in the Strawberry Valley. The Reclamation Service requested that the Ute people sell at $ 1.25 per acre the 56,000 acres which had been reserved to them. 169 The Ute people refused. The land was a grazing area, and fees paid by stockmen for the use of the land were still an important source of income for the Utes. A bill was introduced in the Senate which would have extinguished the rights of the Utes to lands upon payment of the $ 1.25 per acre. The bill was not enacted. The Reclamation Service invoked the right of " eminent domain." The land was taken, and $ 71,000 was paid for it into the tribal 33 |
