The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-08-13
The Indian Peace Commissioners.

The Indian Peace Commissioner.
FTOn, The World.
The Commissioners appointed by the Gov
ernment to treat with the Indians, who met in
st. Louis last week, reassemble at Omaha to
proceed thence into the Indian country.
They are to meet the Northern Indians at Fort
Laramie at the time of the September full
moon, and the Southern Indians at Fort
Larned at the time of the October full moon;
this fixing the dates by moons being easily in
telligible to unlettered tribes who have no
other almanac. General Sherman, early last
week, sent forward orders to the commanders
of posts to provide necessary subsistence in
both places for the assembled chiefs; to send
runners inviting them to the conferences; and
to refrain meanwhile from all hostilities which
are not defensive. If the Indians can be in
duced to treat with the Commissioners, we
trust that the result may be not only peace
with the tribes and the removal of terror from
the frontiers, but permanent settlement of
all Indian difficulties.
The hour has evidently struck for the final
dissolution of the old method, inherited from
our colonial infancy, and so incongruous to
our political system, of dealing with the In
dians by treaties as we do with independent
foreign nations. 1t was wise method in its
day. Its former necessity is fully vindicated
by the difficulties that attend its termination;
for if the Indians are unmanagable as citizens
subject to our laws when their numbers and
area are so much reduced and their accessi-
bility so much increased, what could have
been done with them when they occupied the
greater part of the continent, and were pro-
tected by interminable forests The early set
tiers of the country were compelled to treat
them as independent nations, because no other
method was possible. If an Indian committed
a murder or a trespass, a colonial government
could not have sent a constable to arrest him
and bring him to justice, for in trying to find
the culprit the constable would have exposed
himself, at every step, to a hundred flying
tomahawks and arrows. Wrongs committed
by Indians could be avenged only by war, the
wrong -doer being punishable only by punish
ing his tribe, who protected and defended him.
Where war is the only means of redress a
treaty is necessarily the only foundation of
tranquility. 1t has accordingly been found
cheaper to purchase the lands of this con-
tnent from the Indians, than it would have
been to take them by force and defend the
settlers.
But the great progress of our settlements
has made the independent nation theory obso-
lete, except so far as it can be made the instru-
ment of it's own explosion. The carrying of a
railroad through the heart of the continent
and the impetus thus given to the inpOurng
of our people, make it certain that unless the
Indians viii consent to change their location
and mode of life nothing remains for them but
bloody determination. 1t is fortunate that
the recent troubles have occurred, if they lead
to the collection and voluntary settlement of
all Indians within a moderate space. We hope
the liberality of the inducements offered by
the Government will be sufficient to accomplish
this object. The time has come for asserting
our authority over them and claiming their
allegiance. The idea that they have any origi-
nal rights on this continent superior to ours
is fanciful and sentimental. People sometimes
talk about the Indians as if all who had ever
lived were yet alive. But the truth is that the
grandfathers of the Indians are as dead as our
own, and the earth belongs not to the dead
but TO the living. We have been as long on
this continent as the Indians. If birth here is
foundation for any claims, our claims on that
ground are precisely as good as theirs. It is
no greater a hardship for an Indian to be born
subject to the authority of the Federal Gov
ernment than it is for pale face. We have
no sympathy with unreflecting sentimentalism
founded on dead antiquity. The time has
come when we must govern the Indians gov
ern them generously and paternally, we hope;
but it is recorded in the book of destiny that
we must either govern them or exterminate
them. We are not hereafter to make treaties
with them but laws for them; or if treaties,
only as the easiest method of bringing them
undar the dominion Of laws