Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1870-06-08
Debut of Red Cloud.


red man, getting from him the substance
the speech he will deliver before President
Grant N
GREAT FATHER Thousands of milest
away, where the suns last light falls on eeI
big hills, have left my people to come anY
look my father in the face. As the Light
makes us see all things around US clearly, d
may the Great Spirit make our talk plain
that we may understand each other, and tht
our councils shall be as brothers, who have
met to smoke the pipe of peace. Nj
Father, have heard that you are gres1@
and good. Listen to me, my ia ther, and 10
your ears hear one of your children, WI
comes from the wigwams of his people, wil
truth in his heart, and no lies upon his lit
have made many treaties with your con-
missioners, and they have promised many
times, but have never kept their promisesO
and l have now come to see my great father
myself, SO that we can understand each 9th.
er, and make no promises that we do not
mean to keep. They have told you that am
murderer, but do not understand 1t in
that way. You, great father, have driven
me away from my Countrywide only country
had to raise my children in.
80 Tell me, father, could any living man on
this earth stand such a thing as this? Sup
pose | should 60 to your CO untry, tear down
your fences, and steal your cattle, and your
hogs, would you stand by and have no word
to say? No, father, know you would not.
In ali the troubles of my people the white
man has been the first aggressor. Father,
we are not towards. We know that you are
fa apS aa! SSq S Sap osess kTe
and that you will protect your children when
they come to you for what they believe is
theirs. They ask you to listen to us to do
by us as a good father should do by his chill
dren, and to let us carry back to our brothers
and our people the assurance that the Great
Spirit has smiled upon us, and that the Great
Father is the Indian s Friend and the Indian g
Protector"
There is a hush in the noise of war from |
the west, and this visit of Red Cloud has
much to do with that desirable delay. He |
is not the only leader from among the red |
men now in Washington, or coming there to
attend TO important matters regarding their |
claims and grievances. These visits give US
hope that the war impending few weeks |
ago, and which seemed settled fact, will be |
averted. We can but hail such an event
with unmingled gladness, for we are verify |
guilty concerning our red neighbors. While |
we would not envelope the Indian in poetic |
haze, seeing him only as the al Noble Red
Man." and a. Lo the poor Indian, AS al |
ways sinned against and never SHINING |
while we must regard him as savage hea-
then, degraded, ignorant and crafty, we san
but rejoice at any course which gives him
Justice, and shows on our part at least honest |
dealing.
Yet our Indian relations present many |
vexed phases, and have almost instrumental |
BILE complications. The facts of the case,
and distance from seat of government, give |
opportunity for those complications, offering |
only limited chance to correct them. |; is |
well known how little order or law there is |
on our extreme limits of western settlement,
even among men going from our eastern |
states. And when we consider that the bust |
ness of our Indian affairs is carried on by |
men on the one side who find there is little |
law to restrain their brutality or eupidty |
and on the other side, by men who have none
of the guidance or restraints of civilization,
we can see how easily vexed and grave com
plications may arise. Supposed unfairuess
on one side leads to retaliation on the ottrr
the quarrel grows, the rifle is shouldred
and Ratchet dug up, the yell Of white men
and whoop of red, are defantly sent to and
fro then follow Minnesota massacres and
Piegan slaughters.
OF course we can crush the savages, and
Red Cloud is wise enough to see this. We
want our settlers and pioneers let alone,
when they do not intrench upon grounds
allotted to the Indians. We want thess to
have all reasonable claims, and our present
Administration seems determined this shall
be so. But we do not want our settlers
wives and children carried off to worse than
[ Algerine slavery. Nor should our soldiers
and adventurers steal away the wives Of the
Sioux warriors, nor Camanche braves. Let
there be right both ways. Ii is not ues-
tion of power, but of right; and we conf
IDENTIFY believe that when our officials act on
this plain principle, there will be much less
cause of complaint against the Indian than
now. While we must protect our citizens
in their rights, whether it be in the city of
/ Havana or among the Rocky Mountain fast
nesses, we should not be in hurry to es-
I
wrongfully. We need to treat the Indians
more as nations, having general claims on Us,
and in common with US, than as troubleso&e
wards, over whom we can lord it without
stint
There is growing belief that locating the
Indians on large reservations, and then bold
ing those reservations sacred from the en-
croachments of settlers, is the best and only
way of arranging these difficulties. The plan
works in Canada, among the Greeks, Cher
Okees, and others, with us. The few strag-
CLING tribes cannot be allowed the whole of
our western territory, to roam over at will,
keeping all improvement out and this plan
of reservation will give them all they need,
while it throws open to Yankee thrift and
enterprise the rich mines and valleys of our
Great West.
IT this end Is accomplished by Rcd Cqoud
and others, in their " talk - with the Great
Father at Washington, we can most gladly
welcome them among us seeing that such a
thing is better and cheaper than sending
twenty thousand soldiers out there to kill a
few scores of the savages, and make little
bill of six or ten millions month in addition
to what we now groan under in the shape OF
public debt. Better spend million or so in
locating, civilizing, and Outstanding the
wild fellows, than hundred times as much
in killing them. 1t would look better for ms
both now to the rest of the world, and IN
history. hereafter.
Pensions for Soldiers and Sailorsz51
the War of 1872.