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Show REPORT OF"J!HE COMMISSIONEB OF INDIAN AFFAIXS. 25 well advanced in the general arts of civilization. They own farms and work them. They live in civilized fashion. Not a few of them . have received the benefits of higher education and are making their way in the world at large, and altogether they seem to be well on the road toward the severance of all extraordinary relations with the 'Government. But every year, as part of a lump appropriation made by Congress, $1,000 goes to these people as a per capita payment. There being more than 2,000 participants in the payment, the actual share of each man, woman, and child amounted a year ago to 47 cents and a fraction. To draw this pitiful stipend some of them traveled a good many mi1es;losing a day or more of time, to say nothing of the wear and tear on horseflesh and wagons or the railroad fare. This, of course, is an absnrdity on its face, and yet it is likely to go on, thanks to the conservatism which is so characteristic of the Indian . race, until some positive step is taken by the Government toward a new order of things. I tried last year to induce the Oneidas to make the first overtures for a commutation, suggesting to them that if they would ask Congress for some one good-sized expenditure for . . , their common benefitilike the building of a bridge or a town hall-and offer in return to absolve the Government from all obligations to them as a tribe or individually, I would do what I c o ~ ~tlod h sve the necessary legislation enacted. I had no doubt that our law-makers would appreciate the economic wisdom of making terms to , wipe that annual appropriation from the statute book. The Indians took the matter under consideration, but were loath to make the first advance themselves. I was not entirely surprized at their reluctance, as it is the common attitude of Indian tribes, even those who are pretty well advanced. They suspect. any project which has its origin with the Government, of being planned for the selfish interest of the whites rather than the exclusive interest of the Indians or the common interest of both Indians and Government; and their unwillingness to accept and act upon a suggestion of the kind I made, altho perfectly ready to admit its logical worth, was to have been ex-pected. I think, however, that if these Indiansand some others sim-ilarly situated-were approached by a properly accredited officer of the Government with an item of accomplished legislation already in hand RS a guaranty of his authority, they would not turn a wholly deaf ear to his arguments. ' And thus we might succeed not only in reducing the running obli~ationso f the Government considerably, but in bene-fiting the Indians concerned by giving them something of positive utility arid value to all, instead of doling out to them, year after year, a petty sum hardly large enough to pay for the children's Christmas candy. Not a few tribes have both real and personal property in such con- |