Kim Collins, Cherokee Nation ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** File contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Kim Collins ****************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, material may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material, AND permission is obtained from the contributor of the file. Unauthorized use for commercial ventures expressly prohibited. All information submitted to this project remains - to the extent the law allows - the property of the submitter who, by submitting it, agrees that it may be freely copied but NEVER sold or used in a commercial venture without the knowledge & permission of its rightful owner. 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Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain the written consent of the contributor, OR the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. ****************************************************************** ****************************************************************** HOW INDIANS ARE ROBBED The “Boomers” The Tools of Thieves and Speculators March 27, 1885-The Cherokee Advocate-To The Editor Of The Herald--We have observed that you printed various articles about Oklahoma, the Cherokee lands and the would-be squatters, or “boomers,” who have been attempting lawlessly to settle thereon. Representing as we do the Cherokee Nation, the owners of one of the tracts threatened, we desire to present to the public what we consider to be the true statement of a much-misrepresented question. The term “Oklahoma” has no legal significance. It was originally used in a bill to form the Indian Territory into a United States Territory, which like thousands of other bills by nameless schemers, was introduced into Congress the better to fill the political waste paper basket. It has been applied indiscriminately to portions of and so far as it has been used to mislead the public into the idea that there are public lands in the Indian Territory open to settlement, it has not only been an error, but the cover for a deception. There are no lands in the Indian Territory that are or that have been in any sense public lands for upward of forty years. There are no lands in the Indian Territory, which are more Indian reserves for the time being segregated from the public domain. Nearly every foot of land in that Territory was conveyed by the United States, by patent in fee simple, to certain partially civilized Indian nations-the Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks, Seminoles, and Cherokees. A small portion of the northeast corner was disposed of to the remnants of a few small tribes. How Indian Territory Was Created On the 28th day of May, 1830, Congress passed an act setting apart the Indian Territory, not as a location for Indians living thereon, but the purpose is set forth in the first section of the act as follows: Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States Congress assembled, that it shall and may be lawful for the President of the United States to cause so much of any territory belonging to the United States west of the Mississippi, not included in any State or organized Territory, and to which the Indian title has been extinguished, as he may judge necessary to be divided into a suitable number of districts for the reception of such tribes or nations of Indians as may choose to exchange the lands where they now reside and remove there. Section 2-authorizes such lands to be sold or exchanged to such tribes as were located in States or Territories where the United States had obliged themselves to extinguish the Indian title Section 3 -makes it lawful for the President “solemnly to assure the tribe or nation with which the exchange is made that the United States will forever secure and guarantee to them and their heirs or successors the country so exchanged with them.” It also authorizes patents to be issued. Section 6-makes it lawful for the President to protect such tribe or nation “against all interruption or disturbance from any other tribe or nation of Indian, or from any other person or persons whatever.” Under this act and many treaties made in pursuance of it the Indian Territory, so styled, was created. It was not a Territory of the United States, but a Territory where Indians could obtain a title to their lands, and where governments of the Indian people not inconsistent with the constitution of the United States could be framed. The founders originated with some of the American Republic and much effort, law and treaty were directed during the first half of the present century. The chief object was to secure the removal of the powerful of the Five Civilized Tribes or nations living in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, and North Carolina, and to get possession of the lands occupied there. The chief argument used was that the Indians would thus by exchange and purchase, get a fee simple title from the United States which could not be disputed and would be able to build up governments of their own. This act the government shamelessly violated? Can the United States give any title to any one else until they buy back the property? On what pretext are we to be forced to sell it for less than it is worth in a fair market? What right have these squatters, who set law and the President’s proclamation at defiance to profit by the enhanced value of our property. These are the questions we ask of the honest, fair minded honorable people of these United States. No Lands Ceded But it may be said a portion of them have been ceded. The Cherokees ceded and sold, chiefly under appraisement, the neutral lands and narrow strip in Kansas. These were sold and conveyed under the terms of treaty agreement and are owned by whites who bought them. No portion of Cherokee lands in the I. T. was ever ceded. An examination of the treaty of 1866 plainly shows that. In the 16th article of the treaty of 1866 the Cherokee Nation consented that certain friendly Indians might be located on a portion of their lands west of 96 degrees, to be taken in compact form, the price to be agreed on between the contracting parties. The only way to get a clear title to any portion of the land they must obtain a patent from the owner, the Cherokee Nation. An equitable title might have been claimed by closely following the express language of the treaty, but a title obtained in that way would have been involved in legal obscurities. The government placed several Indian Tribes on our lands, but in no case followed the treaty. They endeavored to appraise the whole arbitrarily, but that act had no legal binding force on the Cherokees and the United States did not even then pay for the land thus appraised. By acts of Congress certain sums were arbitrarily paid and an additional amount was finally offered for these occupied tracts, the only tracts the government had any right to purchase of the Cherokee, which would give title. To bring to a close these matters with an unreasonable purchaser, the Cherokee Legislature passed a law authorizing the new compact proposed by Congress for the five small tracts, and the Cherokee authorities issued and the government accepted the patents as the law directed and the money was paid for them. These tracts occupied and thus sold to the Osage, Pawnee, Nes Perces, Ponca, Otoe and Missouri are the only portions sold or occupied and there is no other way under an authority of any law or treaty to get another acre but by offering the Cherokee Nation an amount sufficient to induce it to grant a patent. Congress can do a good many things, but it cannot pass a law to confiscate property. The Creek and Seminole lands were held by patent like the others. In 1866, in the treaties they then made with the United States, they ceded the western portion of their lands for a special purpose-“settlement of friendly Indians and freedmen” that had been by birth or location before the war residents or slaves in that Territory. A small price was paid for this conditioned cession, less that one-third of what the lands were then worth. A portion of the lands thus ceded was and are occupied by friendly Indians. A small portion has not been allotted. It is still by law and fact reserved for Indian purposes. The Creeks purchased it with that understanding. The government does not own it for general purposes and cannot so convey the lands. White Men Intruders Besides, this small, unoccupied portion is near the center of the Indian Territory. It is subject to the Indian intercourse law, which requires the expulsion and punishment of white intruders. There is no government there under which white men could live. It has not been lawfully opened, nor can it be lawfully opened without great change and purchase. Above all, Congress has just passed a law to open negotiations with the owners, the Creeks and Seminoles, for a total relinquishment of the tracts conditionally ceded, and with the Cherokees for the purpose of inducing them to sell their unoccupied lands west of the Arkansas River that have never been ceded. It will observed that so far as the Cherokees, at least, are concerned they are under no obligation to sell them, and certainly not for less than their value. The Cherokee Nation has been offered for grazing purposes an amount very considerable above $1.25 per acre. They offer grants in that country to the extent of ten, to twenty millions of acres. For years these corporations, through their agents at Washington, worked for a territorial form of government in order to destroy the Indian governments, thinking that if this was done they could secure their grants. Several railroad companies had bills passed during the war giving them enormous grants across the continent, fifty miles wide. They got the public domain where the road was constructed and they hand a clause slipped in the bills to give them alternate sections to any reserve when “the Indian title was extinguished.” As will be observed, these lands are not held by Indian title, a term known to the law. They are held by United States title, but the corporations seem to hope to be in possession of them nevertheless. They, through their agents, are carrying their “boomers” for cheap rates and for nothing, and even “grub staking” them. These corporations are thus conniving at gross violations of the law. They are trying to humbug, drive and coax poor settlers into these lands to force a title, and thus secure the half of the country for themselves Plenty Of Land Elsewhere Any honest settler can find plenty of public lands belonging to the United States to settle on without trying to steal lands the government has already sold. If such lawless raids are to be encouraged they will bring on a condition of things where no man or interest will be secure in his property. There is not a government military reservation or park that could not thus be squatted on by a far better place, for they are public property. AN APPEAL FOR FAIR PLAY To these facts we wish to call the attention of the people of the United States. A great many well meaning people have doubtless been deceived into thinking this is a case of hardship for poor settlers. The leaders and most of the “boomers” are old squatters, by trade, dealers in inchoate titles, and speculators as well as lawbreakers. We will not believe that the masses of the people of these United States are dishonest, unfair, and insensible to what is due the honor of their own country or the rights of a people who have never wronged them. We appeal to the American sense of fair play.