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Show - -- ~~ -- r ' b REPORT or THE COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN ~BAIRS. 65 area of 40,152 acres, and also a schedule of 2,796 allotments made to the members of the several bands of Indians on the White Earth Reservation under the act of April 28, 1904 (33 Stat. L., 539), embracing an approximate area of 223,790 acres. With the excep-tion of 143 allotments which have been canceled or are still pending, . the schedules were approved on September 13 and have been entered on the tract books of the Office, and the Commissioner of the Gen-eral Land Office has been directed. to cause patents to issue accordingly. NONRESERVATION ALLOTMENTS. On April 22, 1907, the Department revoked its order of February 21, 1903, which suspended all allotments made to nonreservation Indians under the fourth section of the general allotment act of Feb-ruary 8, 1887 (24 Stat. L., 388), as amended by the act of February 28, 1891 (26 Stat. L., 794), and the Commissioner of the General Land Office was directed to issue trust patents on all approved allot-ments against which no specific charges had been filed. The order of suspension had directed that an investigation of all unapproved allotments bg made jointly by this Office and the General Land Office; but neither office has had a field force available to do the work Meanwhile, delay in the settlement of the question of allowing or canceling the suspended allotments was rendering the allottees inse-cure in their homes, as they were in doubt whether or not to continue to occupy and cultivate the land on which they had settled. The revocation of the order was therefore recommended, because it was ! believed that less harm would result from the patenting of the ap-proved allotments than from wntinuing their suspension. Since the date of my last report '925 fourth-section allotments have. been approved and 106 trnst patents issued. Allotments to m'zed bloods.-The decision laid down in the case of Ulin v. Colby (24 L. D., 311), which held, in effect, that Indians other than full bloods are not entitled to allotments under the fourth section of the general-allotment act, has worked a great injustice to many mixed-blood Indians. It tended to nullify the purpose of that act, which was to break up tribal relations and place the indi-vidial members of the tribe in a position of self-support and self-. dependence with the individual instead of the tribe as the unit. Many mixed-blood Indians are as truly Indian in character and habits as the full bloods themselves. Since, under the act of June 7, 1897 (30 Stat. L., 90),.they were entitled to the benefits of tribal relations by virtue of their mother's membership in the tribe, to hold that, because of their white ancestry, they should be denied the bene-fits of the fourth section of the general-allotment act was to punish them for seeking a living independently of their tribe. The Office 22848-08--5 |