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Show 14 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. been harmonious. and. it is believed, mutuallr beloful. There can be 110q ll~asrion~ I I tCh at, aa :I c:lea;~t,h e i,ersolls ~ I I I ~>Sr cnre~flo r tile dim. 1 c!lllt null reapo~~sibpleo sition of I~ldinr~agelnlrte cousciel~tiouua uld f i ~ i r l ~ . fill nlcll. Escel~tionnto t h i s slatelneut have bee11 lrss firullel~t he I I W ~ I xear than heretbfore, owing to the iucreased care of the riligious bddies iu their selectiorl of nominees, which has probably resulted from a quickened sense of the responsibilit,y assumed by tllem, and t.beir en-larged iufornmtion as to therequisite qualifications of an efficient a.gent. Other things being equal, the character of an accurate report of an ageuOy can be forecast by previous personal acquaintance wit.h the agent. If he is a man of nerve and hard sense, who has gone to his ageucg with the ruling purpose to do good, who believes tkilt an Indian is a fellow-man, susceptible to the same motives and influences as him-self, needing to be taught industry and individuality, the reports from that agency mill show a steadily improving condition from the time o? the arriral of t,he agent; and if the ordinary means are at hand with , which barbarism may reasol~ablyb e expected to be eured, the iudica-tions of sueb improvement shortly become marked, ,and the recovery of the tribe tkom barbarism is soon made to appear feaslble and well begun. class of me11 for agent@, and by no plan likely to be adopted is it prob- I Too ~uucb ernphasis cannot be laid on the necessity of securing this 1 able that better men can be secured for this service than the several I religious bodies offer on their nominatious to the Government. I Scarcely any service in the Government is more delicate and difficult thau that of an Indian agent. Ou no Coverun~ent nost of duty is an , officer more liable to be Gproached and manipnlatedby designing inen, and nowhere else are the apparent facilities for uu~letected fraud so great as in Inany of these distant and inaccessible fields. Surely the Goverumel~ct annot afford toappoint a mall to this duty who is not both able and upright, and who can be kept strong in his integrity. And yet the Government offers for such service, requiring such q~lalitfcations, the sum of $1,500 per aunuln a,s pay of anagent and the support of his family in a country unusually expensive. Uilu it be that the Gorern-merit illtends either deliberately to maim and cripple its service, or to wrong honest and efficient officers? I resnectfullv reDeat and nrge the ree~16melldatio1o1f lust gear, tlrat tho ~viarirso i' 11dia1>aE eutn-be in-crenscd to :lt least d2,O. UO .pe r annuln tbr the eastern agel~ciesa, ud $2,500 for the remote. LEGISLATION FOh: INDIANS ON A NEW BASIS. Frequent mention has been made in this report of the necessity for additional legislation ou behalf of the Indians. This necessity is appa-rent from the fact that the only statutes under which Indians are man-aged and controlled are ~nbstantiallyth ose enacted in 1834, known as the trade and intercourse laws, whose main purpose was to regulate traffic in furs, and prevent sale of ammunition and intoxicating drinks, aud intrusion upon an lndian reservation. This meager legislation was III accord with the theory then prevailing, that the Indian tribes were related to the American Government only as sovereiguties who natu-rallv would nroviae their own laws : and that the red men, being a weo-ks sent ia~wi~il d and outamable, heeded only to be kept as re1n;teiy as possible from all settlements, to be assisted as hunters, to be forcibly |
