OCR Text |
Show REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. 89 vided the same amount of money but without any restriction as to the locality in which it should be used. On account of the acute situation in the Indian Territory with the near appcoach of statehood, it was deemed best. to concentrate I attention there and on Oklahoma, and the period between July 1 l and November 16, 1907, was one of extraordinary activiQ. On the .part of the Government there was a determination to suppress this illegal traffic and turn the two Territories, as far at least as the In-dian parts were concerned, over to the new State in as clean a condi-tion as possible.. On the other hand the whisky peddlers, gamblers and outlaws generally were determined to take advantage of the con- 8 fusion attending the transition process to force forbidden 1iquors.int.o the Territories. In many ways circumstances favored the lawbreakers. Business in . the federal courts was in a hopelessly congested condition. Because of the inadequate proJision for the administration of justice, the dockets were clogged with nearly 8,000 criminal cases, all of them being cases which had arisen under the federal r6gime and been transferred to the stat,e courts by the enabling act. A network of railways which entered the Territory it many different points pro-vided avenues for introducing intoxicants; and the uncertainty as to what action would be taken by the state courts in regard to the trans-ferred cases, and the knowledge that the federal courts would be un-able. to cope with the situation, offered temptations to engage in the traffic which strongly appealed to the irresponsible and criminal element of the population. This was the situation with which Chief Special Officer William E. Johnson, who was in charge of the work in that locality, had ta cope. The energy and discretion with which he and his deputies met the various exigencies as they arose, and through which they triumphed in affairs requiring courage, skill and zeal, can not be too highly commended. Their operations consisted largely in sum-marily seizing and destroying, under authority of section 2140 of the Revised Statutes of the United States, ardent spirits and wine found in the Territory. This law was supplemented by later acts of Con- ' gress extending the inhibition so as to cover selling and introducing into the Indian country beer, wine, fermented or malt liquors and all forms of intoxicating drinks. These tater acts did not specifically authorize the summary destruction of fermented or malt liquors, but . the Indian Territory court of appeals, in a.decision rendered June 13, 1899, in the case bf the United States u. Cohn (52 S. W. Rep., 38), had held that the introduction or sale of any malt or fermented bever-age was prohibited by the statute, irrespective of its intoxicating qualities. This decision made clear that the several low-grade beers |