Bradford opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1874-1881, 1876-07-29
the INDIAN QUESTION.


os ssV sesseess
Wendell Phillips writes 10 Gen. Hher
man ~ follows: SIR-An American
citizen, entitled aud bound to inquire
whether the officers OF tho republic are
men or something below humanity,
respectfully claim tho right 10 ask you,
are tho journals correct when they 70
present you an advising the extermina
ton OF tho Iudiansl This charge In,
been made several times during the last
three years. II II be false. ! beg you,
for tho honor of the nation and Of the
service, to deny it. While you neglect
to do 10 the press uses your supposed
example to commend that infamous
course and TO create . public opinion
which shall approve and demand u.
II the charge be true cannot but re-
member that you are better acquainted
than most Americans with the real rela-
tions Of our government to the Indians.
You were, in 1867, the head OF an Indian
commission, and its report. signed by
yourself and printed by the government,
Is one OF the most terrific pictures ever
drawn OF the wrongs the Indian has sui.
lered from this nation. This investiga-
ton and your general experience showed
you how cruel and unjust has been our
treatment OF tho Indian for the last
hundred years. You know that We have
surrounded him with every demoraliz-
ing influence, stepped him in intom.
perance, melted him to licentiousness
by tho example OF those set over him,
and tempted him to every vice. You
have yourself spread on the public re-
cords the evidence that the government
has robbed him OF his land, cheated
him OF his dues and uniformly broken
faith with him. II any OF the tribes are
to-day liars, thieves and butchers, they
may rightfully claim to have only
copied, at humble distance, the example
We have set them.
You are not ignorant that the Indian
has been outraged and plundered by tho
frontiersmen without stint or redress,
and butchered by our soldiers, under
the American flag, with brutal and de-
testable cruelty-the description OF
which in plain terms the press would
not admit to its columns. You know
no one better-that the worst brutality
which prurient malice ever falsely
charged the Indians with is but weak
imitation of what tho white man has
often inflicted on Indian men, women
and children. You know that on the
plains we have violated every rule of
civilized war, massacring women and
children with worse than savage b,u-
tality. Your career has not shown you
an instance where the Indian has lifted
his hand against us until provoked to it
by misconduct on our part, compared
with which any misconduct of his is but
dust in the balance.
Your experience will fully indorse
what President Harrison, when governor
of Indiana, said to his Legislature in
1907, "that the utmost efforts to induce
the Indians to take up arms would be
unavailing if one only of the many
persons who have committed murder
upon their people could be brought to
punishment"
You will not in the slightest degree
doubt or deny the grave charge which
Major General Harvey, after fifty years
service on the plains, made to q Con-
gressional committee, "that he had
never known an Indian tribe break its
word to our govei nment, and he had
never known the government to keep it's
faith with an Indian tribe" You are
too much of soldier not to confess
that had you been placed in the In
dams circumstances you would have
been ashamed not to have acted as he
has done.
You would accept, as every honest man
does, the statement of Major General
Pope, in 1876, that tho army officer
"cannot prevent wrongs which drive the
Indian to war. On the contrary, at the
demand of every agent whose unfair
dealing with the Indians has brought on
a difficulty, he is obliged to pursue and
force back to the same deplorable state
and place Indians whom he knows to
have been wronged, and who have only
done substantially what he would have
done him self under like provocation. "
You must be keenly sensible what a re-
proach it is to religion and culture that
our multiplying millions. with all the re-
sources of civilization and Christianity
in their hands. have lived for two hun
dred years close to this small and capa.
BILE race and been able to give it only
their vices-that all of good the Indian
has is his own; most OF his vices he can
rightfully charge to the white man.
Except the African no race will lift up
at the judgment seat such accusing
hands against this nation as the Indian
will. We have subjected him to agents
who have systematically cheated him.
We have made causeless war on him,
merely as q pretext to steal his lands.
TrampIng under foot the rules Of
modern warfare We have made war on
his women and children. We have
cheated him out Of one hunting ground
by compelling him to accept another,
and robbed him of this last by driving
him to frenzy, and then Furnishing re-
sistauce by confiscation. Meanwhile
neither pulpit nor press nor political
party would listen to his complaint
Neither in Congress nor in any city Of
the Union could his advocate obtain
hearing. Statesmanship, good sense
and justice, even from the Chief Magis
trate, We're unavailing when they plead
ed for such longtime victims of popular
hate and plllage as our Indian tribes.
Can it be possible, then, that with
such knowledge and such experience
you, SIR, the head Of the army, and
bound to show at least outward respect
to civilization, hive no counsel to give
except extermination-the determination
y, sn s'ared victims of greedy,
you advise professedly Christian P@ POI.
pie, stepped in gnilt, not to reform, but
to consummate its wickadness by such
hideous barbarism as only the most in
human tyrauts have ever attempted ?
The worst possible of infidels, do you
affirm that wise and powerful nation
is safe only when it sinks below the
level of savage life to clutch towards
peace by sweeping every man, woman
and child Of this insignificant race in
blood from our pathY Wise men laugh
at such timid folly; brave men despise
it. They know that fair play is the best
teacher and Justice always q sufficient
shield.
If, indeed, this is the counsel Won
give from your high place, then, for the
sake OF that Christianity which we pro-
fess and that civilization wo claim, I
wish it understood that one, at least, of