The Cheyenne daily leader. [volume] (Cheyenne, Wyo.) 1870-1884, 1876-08-07

The report that Crazy Horse has left
Sitting Bull and come in to suef for peace
may or may not be true, but the posi-
bility of such a thing reveals the full
absurdity Of our dealings with the In
dian, and the false position in which we
constantly place ourselves by u false
philanthropy. Crazy Horse is SO far
from being q ~potentate who has been
waging lawful and civilized war against
us, that he is merely a cruel and brutal
cut-throat, dependent on u bounty.
The guilt of his murders, robberies and
outrages is not at all obscured bv the
fact that there are several thousand
cut-throats like him; on the contrary,
this only intensifies the Nervousness of
his ~offense, and our first duty to Crazy
Horse and to society is to hang him as
soon as we get him in power.
1t would be just as well to place this
alternative before Crazy Horse, because
the impression in the aboriginal mind
seems to be that this little war is only a
hunting party of UNUSUAL interest and
rare excitement. The 700 C~heyennes
who started out the other day, and were
turned back by Colonel Merritt, are
doubtless pouting over the stern and
unnecessary cruelty which shuts them
out from a pleasure they would have
appreciated so highly; but otherwise the
agency beef and blankets suffice as well
in any ordinary times of peace. If we
allow Crazy Horse to return and tanta-
lie the baffied Cheyennes with stories
of the good time he had while out hunt
ing, it will be an intimation that when
ever agency beef and blankets fail to
satisfy the noble, ambitious red man,
he may take his rifle and pony and re-
new the experiences of the Rosebud
river and of the Little Horn. Whereas,
if we refuse Crazy Horses submission,
and leave him to be scalped by the Crows
or to be hung with becoming solemnity
if captured, and if we break up Sitting
Bulls whole force with a goOdly slaught-
en- of braves, hunt them through the
woods and over the mountains, kill their
ponies and capture their rifles, we will
have done as much as lies in our power
to secur a lasting peace. And if we
are to support the savages of this dan
gerOus and treacherous description, we
ought to lose no time in changing our
system SO as to protect ourselves against
q recurrence of this unpleasant ex-
perience. The agent is a civilian, con-
temptuously represented inthe pictorial
autobiography of our aboriginal wards
as a man with a high hat; he has the
pay Of a clerk, the responsibility of a
viceroy, and the authority Of an assis-
tant door-keeper; he is in a false posi-
tion, and can have no other object but
to get rich as soon as possible and get
away from his odious Punishment. But
the army officer is Secure of his position,
accustomed to command and able to
enforce respect and obedience. His re-
sponsibility is toward his own superior,
his duty is clearly defined, and above
all, his power and readiness to exercise
it are very well understood by the
treacherous paupers over whom it is
proposed to place him. He embodies
arms and organized and disciplined force
and while he would dole out beef and
blankets quite as honestly as the agents,
he would be much more efficient II he
were clothed at the start with the re-
sponsibility the want Of which he Is
called on to atone Tor when it ID too
late.
There can be no doubt Of what the
conclusion of3the military operations
will be; wars between barbarism and
civilization have never had any other
than one Termination, and It is merely q