Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-05-13
SENATOR MORRILL, AND THE
Usage LANDS.

bill providing for the sale of the Usage
lands in Kansas, and the settlement of the
Indians in the Indian Territory, will be
read with satisfaction by every friend OF
humanity. He places the responsibility
for our difficulties with the Indians where
they properly belong, and speaks for JUS
tee to a weak, decaying and much abused
race. We copy the following from the
report in the Globe, of the 9th:
Mr. PRESIDENT if | could hope to arrest
the attention of the Senate on this bill
should be very glad to state some of its char
acteristGs which in my judgment deserve
the most serious consideration. | think |
can show to the Senate that this bill is OF the
most questionable character, the passage of
which would be little less than legislative
scandal, to be pointed TO in the history OF the
country as so extraordinary as to be wholly
unjustifable upon grounds either OF legisla-
tive expediency or legislative wisdom.
The whole difficulty comes from the fact
that lawess men, men who were DESTROYS OF
obtaining these lands, inscriptions men, men
disregardtul of the rights of the Indians. have
gone on there in great numbers, hocked in,
perhaps, from other States, as the Senator
says. | have no disposition TO single out the
people of Kansas for offensive criticism; but
there is the tact-if there is trouble on that
reservation it comes from lawless aggression
of whites on the rights of the Indians
Why, sir, the Secretary of the Interior asks
an appropriation of $4,000 to feed these
Usage Indians. Why? He says while these
Indians were off on their hunt, rs they had
right to be, in the latter part of the fall and
early part of the winter, people rushed into
that reservation, occupied their possessions,
and when the Indians returned they found
them in full possession Of their cultivated
lands. their corn-fields, their corn, their
houses, their buildings; and they hold them
to-day; and the Government of the United
States has never lifted its hands to protect
these Indians although there stands the treaty
obligations. Although there stands the faith
of the nation pledged in solemn treaty to
protect these Indians, twenty thousand squat
tiers are there, and this nation is to send
regiment of men, at an expense, the honora-
bic Senator says, greater than the whole value
of this land, to protect what? TO protect, as
my honorable friend from Iowa said yester-
day, the white women and the children from
the tomahawk and the scalping- knife of the
savage. That is his representation.
Sir, if the United States have duty to
perform therc-and they have as high and
as holy as nation can have-it is to protect
the Indians against lawlcss and reckless dep
relations of these twenty thousand squatters.
They are in state of starvation. They are
wandering over that territory, and have been
violently assaulted, their stock taken, provi-
sion taken, and everything upon which they
subsst, and the Army called in to protect the
white population, it is said, against the In
dians and then the Senate of the United
States is invoked to complete the wrong thus
begun by expelling the Indians, turning them
off to wander and to perish. These are the
Osages, who have inhabited that region of
country known as the Usage country for
period beyond the memory of the white race.
We have been treating with these Indians
now for sixty years and more. We have
taken them under our protection. They
have been our allies, as you will see If
you look into the treaty stpulations.
We have cultivated terms of friendship
with them. They have observed their
treaties; that the history shows. And now,
forsooth, when having by these treaty stipu-
latons reduced their entire dominions, which
once covered the entire State of Kansas and
more, down to five million acres, we propose
to call in the military and eject them by force.
Was that ever done before in the legisla-
ton of this country? Was it ever done any
where before? will anybody say that VIC
ought to do thing of that sort to a feeble and
impotent people who are in your power with
no power to resist and no voice to be heard?
VIII anybody say that any such act as that
ever was known in any civilized country and
in any deliberative body? But that is this
proposition. You propose by this act of leg
slaton to override n solemn treaty made
with these Indians and in which your faith is
pledged by an act done in their absence, Civ
ing them no voice ana no day in court: and
all this is to be done by the Representative
of a Christian people.
That some arrangement ought to he made
to relieve the state of affairs existing in Kan
sas | am fully persuaded. l think it not I'M
likely that the Indians oasi:. to &c removed.
have no doubt in the condition of affairs
which exists in Kansas that one of two things
must happen ; either the white trespassers
and squatters who are there without any au-
thority of law and against the treaty obliga-
tions of the United States must be dealt with
as they richly deserve, and removed from
that res ervation, and they are twenty thousand
strong it is said, or the Indians must be re-
moved; and as the Indians in the latter his
tory of our country have always gone TO the
wall in these conflicts, and will now, have
no doubt, l am only solicitous, recognizing
that fact, that provision shall be made for
these Indians out of this reservation; that
they shall notAe stripped of it; that 1t Shall
De sold honestly ana laiTly as "a.eei "a
trust for the benefit of the Indians, and be-
come trust fund for them that wheresoever
they go, whether they shall find home in the
Indian country or whether they shall roam
still further, the Government of the United
States shall hold the full benefit of this reser-
walton. pitiful remnant of an empire, for the
protection and support of these Indians.
With that view think this bill ought to be
recommitted to the committee with instruc-
tons, and those instructions are to provide,
with the consent of the Indians, for their re-
moval to some suitable place. l am opposed
to an arbitrary assumption of ownership over
land that we do not own. l am opposed to
putting upon the records that we arrogantly
assume 10 deal with these people according
TO our arbitrary will. / would humanely and
! compassionately provide for them somewhere
where they can have security, and then pro-
vide that these lands shall be sold under the
direction ofthe Secretary Of the Interior, the
proceeds Of the sale to be carefully preserved,
and the interest of it TO be applied to the sup
port and protection of these people 80