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Show REPORT OB THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. 23 I tion for its disregard of the rights of the Indian, seeking their illustrations in the unjustifiable wars opened upon him; in the frauds practiced upon him by unscrupulous traders, contractors, and Gov-ernment functionaries; in the absorption of his lands, a few thousand acres at a time, at prices which look small indeed beside the valuations at which the same lands have been held since white enterprise has developed them; and yet the authors of these works have been so hypnotized by their abhorrence of such merely physical iniquities that they have overlooked entirely the vastly greater moral damage wrought upon the same victim under the guise of a benevolent desire to civilize him-at long range. As if self-reliance were not at the very foundation of our own civilization ! The evils of war, of graft, big and little, of business frauds and all other foms of bad faith are capable of remedy in the same monetary terms in which we meas-ure and remedy evils among our own race; but what compensation can we offer him for undermining his character, and doing it by a method so insidious and unfair? Unhappily our generation can not go back and make over from the start the conditions which have come down to us by inheritance. We can, however, do the next best thing, and avoid extending or per-petuating the errors for which we are not responsible, and we can improve every available opportunity for reducing their burden. Just as we have undertaken to free the Indian from the shackles which the reservation system has imposed upon his manhood, so we should recognize it as a dnty to free him from the un-American and pauperizing influences which still invest his path to civilization through the schools. The rudiments of an education, such as can be given his children in the little day school, should remain within their reach, just as they are within the reach of the white children who must be neighbors and competitors of the Indian children in their joint struggle for a livelihood. Indeed, this being a reciprocal obli-gation- the right of the child, red or white, to enough instruction to enable hi to hold his own as a citizen, and theright of the Govern-ment to demand that every person who handles a ballot shall have his intelligence trained to the point that reading, writing, and simple ciphering will train it-I believe in compelling the Indian parent, whether he wishes to or not,to give his qffspring this advantage. My interpretation ofthe dnty laid upon me by the statute in this regard has carried me even to the use of physical force and arms in the few instances where reasoning and persuasion failed and the Indians. have defied the Government. For a little while still, as I have said, the reservation boarding schools must stay for lack of something adequate to take their places; but as fast as one of these can be replaced with ,day schools the |
