OCR Text |
Show to the right of the defendants to bring an action in any court of compe-tent jurisdiction to recover possession of the land. May 18,1895, all the facts in the case were laid before the Depart-ment and the law bearing thereon cited, with the recommendation that the matter be presented to the Department of Justice with request that the United States district attorney for the State of Washington be instrncted to institute in the proper court an action of ejectment against A. W. La Chappelle and any others in possessiou of the lands , allotted to the Chelan Indians, or such other action as he might deem proper to put the Indians in possession of the lands claimed by and allotted to them, and to q n~e tti t.le thereto. August 6 last I was advised by the Department of Justice that the United States attorney for the districtof Washington had been instructed to take such actloll as, upon careful consideration of the facts in the case, he should deem proper and likely to result successfully. It is trusted that successful proceedings will be had, so tliat justice may be done these Indians, long harassed and trespassed upon by Nr. La Chappelle and other whites. SALE OF CITIZEN POTTAWATOMIE AND ABSENTEE SHAWNEE LANDS IN OKLAHOMA. By theIndian appropriation act approved August 15,1894 (28 Stats., p. 295), Congress yrovidd that-- Any member of the Citizen Hand of Pottnw&tomie Indians and of the Abscntee Shavnee Indians of Oklahoma to whom a trust patent has been issned nnder the provisions of the act approved February eiglith, oighteen hnndred and eighty-seven (24 Stat?, 388), and being over twenty-one years of age, may sell and convey any portion of the land covered by snch patent in excess of eighty acres, the deed of oon-veyanoe to be subject to approval by the Secretary of the Interior under such rule8 and regulations as he may prescribe, and that any Citizen Pottawatomie not resid-ing upon his allotment, but being 8, legal resirlent of another State or Territory, may in like manner sell and convey all the land covered by said patent, and that npon the a,pprovsl of such deed by the Sooretary of the Interior the title to the land thereby conveyed shall vest in the grantee therein named. This legislation was not inaagurated by the Indians or by this office, or the Department in behalf of the Iudiaos, but was opposed and con-tested by all proper methods as not in the line of Indian progress and advancement, and as manifestly not in keeping with the spint of the act of 1887, which guaranteedto each Indian who took land u ~ ~ dsearid act a patent therefor in his name, '(which patent shaIl be of the legal effect, and declare that the United States does and will hold the land thus allotted for the period of twenty-five years, in trust for the soleuse and benefit of the Indian to whom such allotmeut shall have been made." These promised patents holding the land unalienable for twentyfive years were issued to these Indians in January and February, 1892, and before three of the twenty-five years had elapsed the restriction had |