OCR Text |
Show 1 24. REPORT OF THE in more suitable localities. Should Congress authorize achange in the present system, and new reservations be established, great care should be taken so as to isolate the Indians from contact with the whites. Fertile lands should be selected which will repay the efforts to cultivate them; and, while upon this branch of the subject, I would respectfully call attention to a portion of the last annual report of my predecessor, which fully reflects my views. In speaking of the reservations in Cali-fornia, he says: "No white persons should be suffered to go upon the reservations; and, after the first year, the lands should be divided and assignedto the Indians in severalty, every one being required to remain on his own tract, and to cultivate it." In another portion of his report he says: "They should, also, have the advantage of well conducted manual labor schools, for the education of their youth in letters, habits: of industry, and a knou~ledgeo f agricnlture, and the simpler mechanic arts. By the adoption of this course, it is believed that the colonies can very soon be made to sustain themselves, or so nearly so that the government will be subjected to but a comparatively trifling annual expense on account of them. But it is essential to the success of the system that there should be a sufficient military force in the vicinity of the reservations to prevent the intrusion of improper persons upon them, to afford protection to the agents, and to aid in controlling i . the Indians and keeping them within the limits assigned to them." ~ If the State of California would so far relinquish to the general government her jurisdiction over the reservations that may be estah-. lished, as to admit of the trade and intercourse laws being put in forhe within her limits, so as to secure the Indians against improper interference, and to prevent the traffic with them in ardent spirits, it. would afford the department material aid in its effort to successfully carry out a proper system for the Indians in that State. This recom-mendation was made by my predecessor in his last annual report, and which I have thought proper to repeat here. If the legislation of Congress should be snch as to meet the views here expresscd, I feel confident that many of the abuses now complained of vould be cor-rected; and I would also respectfully sn gest that, to enable this office to fully carry out its policy, much shoul f be left to the sound discretion of the department, for it is not supposed that every difficulty can be anticipated, and if a reasonable discretion is left to it, many evils which would naturally arise in the development of a policy, in a measure new, could be corrected and steps taken to prevent their re-currence. In submitting theseviews in regard to the evils existing in our Indian policy for California, and suggesting such remedies as I believe to be proper, I have been actuated alone by a high regard for 1 the citizens of California, and their welfare, on the one hand, and stern official duty and humanity towards the Indians within her bor-ders, on the other; and it is to be hoped that the wisdom of Congress will devise some system, at least, that is less objectionable than the present, and that the Indians may yet he permitted to remain thete in quiet, and become cultivators of the soil. The superintendent for Oregon and Washington reports favorably in regard to the general condition of affairs in that.quarter, .except that the Shoshone or Snake Indians atill continue their hostillt~esa nd |