A High-Handed Measure

The incidents of the war had produced causes of irritation between the governments of the United States and Great Britain, and most delicate questions of national responsibility had been raised. At home, that chronic evil, war with the Indians, was then raging on the great Western Plains; and there was a wide difference of opinion in the public mind as to the best methods of putting an end to the strife. There was great exasperation on both sides, along the frontiers. There was an abiding sense of mutual injury; while all well-informed persons had a clear conviction that the deeprooted animosity of the Indians toward the white people was occasioned by the rank injustice which the former had suffered at the hands of the latter. With this conviction there was a widespreading desire that a policy toward the barbarians, founded on justice and kindness, should be pursued. But military leaders in the war, contemplating the barbarians from a point of view opposite to that occupied by the Christian philanthropist, recommended the most vigorous and unrelenting measures toward them, and for that purpose it was proposed to vest the entire control of the Indians in the War Department. "Indian tribes," said a distinguished general, "should not be dealt with as independent nations; they are wards of the Government, and should be made to respect the lives and property of citizens. The Indian history of this country for the last three hundred years, shows that of all the great nations of Indians, only remnants have been saved. The same fate awaits those now hostile; and the best way for the Government is to make them poor by the destruction of their stock, and then settle them on the lands allotted them." Another general, equally distinguished, formulated the estimate of the Indian character by the average frontiersmen, by saying, "The only good Indian is a dead Indian."

These indefensible propositions and this unjust judgement have been too long the inspiration of our methods of treating the Indians. Fortunately the ethics of the mailed hand--Might makes Right--does not wholly prevail, and a more humane policy has been adopted. President Grant, soon after his inauguration in the spring of 1869, recommended the appointment, as Indian agents, of several members of the Society of Friends, or Quakers, who are noted for their uprightness and peaceful principles and conduct. Congress approved the recommendation of the President, and early in April (1869) sixteen Friends were chosen to carry out the policy of justice.

The radical defect in the general policy of the Government is in its treatment of the barbarians, namely, holding them as foreigners instead of as citizens, and making formal treaties with them; or as children having no legal rights. The peace-policy has not yet had a fair trial. Its excellent fruits are seen in many places, and give abundant evidence that if it could be faithfully carried out, under a wiser political plan, it would solve the great problem by pacifying the Indians, and tend to their rapid advancement in civilization. Evidences abound in the later reports of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, of a rapid advancement of the arts of peace, especially of agriculture, among the Indian tribes. Commissioner E. P. Smith, in his report for 1875, says: "The civilization of the Indians is not only entirely possible, but is fairly under way." He reported that out of the entire Indian population within the domain of the United States (278,963 souls), 40,638 men and boys supported themselves by the labor of their own hands. About one-sixth of the barbarian population in our Republic had become producers! "Five years ago," said the Commissioner, "10,329 Indian families were living in houses. This year shows 19,902; a gain of 92 per cent." He also reported that the number of children attending school was 10,600.

These facts show that our barbarian brethren are capable, not only of civilization, but of becoming orderly and valuable citizens. As a savage hunter, the Indian is expensive. During only six years--1870 to 1876--our Government made appropriations for the support of the Indians on their reservations (exclusive of the cost of military movements to keep them from "picking and stealing") of the large sum of nearly $44,000,000. Treat the Indian as a man and a citizen, and wars and unprofitable expenditures on his account would cease.

Immediately after the assembling of Congress in December, 1868, Mr. Cragin of New Hampshire offered an amendment of the National Constitution, for securing the elective franchise to the freedmen. The proposition was debated for several weeks, and on the 26th of February, 1869, Congress adopted a joint resolution recommending the following, as a Fifteenth Amendment of the Constitution:

"SECTION 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

"SECTION 2. The Congress, by appropriate legislation, may enforce the provisions of this article."