Arizona weekly citizen., 1882-07-09
THE INDIAN QUESTION

The New York Herald endorses the
 proposition for disarmiug the Indians
 and the plan of the new Secretary is as
 likely to be popular in the east as ID the
 west. We should like to see it put into
 effect. The Herald says:
 The Indians are officially known as
 wards of the nation" The Govern
 ment Is their guardian, and in that l capacity treats them as children or paupers. It does not require that they
 shall support themselves, and so far they are paupers; 1t provides men and means
 to instruct them, and so far they are ! children. But neither children nor 1 paupers should be allowed to own or use | firearms. The Government, as guardian l of these wards, has right to take their | arms from them and tO prohibit thelT l possession of weapons, and as 1t ought | also to preserve the peace and protect ! white people from attack, its duty Is to | disarm the Indians.
 An Indian outbreak" such as has | happened twice in eight months in Ari- | zOna, takes place only when the Indians 1 On a reservation have been allowed to | accumulate a sufficient stock of arms, ammunition and ponies to tempt them | to what they regard as a spree
 In Arizona last fall. as in other parts before, the Indians proved to have, when they "broke out" better arms than the troops opposed to them. They accumu- late their store of rifles and ammunition
 under the noses of the Government
 agents. They buy them with what they can save out of their abundant rations and with the money they get from the
 sale of blankets and petty manufactures
 of their own When they "break out"
 they leave their old men, women and
 children ID the care of the agent. and
 when they have killed, burned and rob
 bed to their hearts content, they sneak
 back to the reservation, once more pro
 claim themselves good Indians and de-
 mand the protection of the government against the just resentment of the peO-
 pie whose farms they have pillaged and whose brothers, fathers, wives and little children they have slaughtered. That Is IS the story of an Indian outbreak, and II would be an incredible story if it had not been repeated over and over again for many years.
 We trust Secretary Teller is in earn est and that he will cause total and ab- sOlute disarming of the Indians He would do well if he would also take away their ponies, which are m many tribes an important part of their outfit of war. Indians living On q reservation have no need for either ponies or arms. They plead, and those who profit by them plead for them, that they should have guns and ponies to hunt. But they do not need to hunt. Reservation h. 1 dlans are fed by the Government. | lodged by the Government, clothed by | the Government. All their proper | wants are suppliedat the public expense. l They are not compelled to labor, and II | IS a mistake in their management which | We hope Secretary Teller will pres ently take in hand. But If anywhere aL | Indian wants to cultivate the ground, | he requires for that, not ponies, but | work horses, animals unfit for war | purposes.
 When NIT. Teller has disarmed the | Indians he will have taken the first and | most important step toward cIvilIZlng | them. While they have guns and ponies | the schoolmaster labors in vain. ln | stead of hunting or loafing about the | reservation, gambling for tobacco. he | should order the agents to employ them | in making roads through the reserva- tion grounds, in making their OWL houses and places tidy and keeping them so: in short, he would accustom the h. dians to daily and systematic labor. Most of the Indian reservations are kept like pigpens-no roads, or bridges are repaired, no order, no neatness about the village grounds; no inspection of the houses to see that they are clean within; no caae against waste; no daIly roll call ed no attempt in fact, on impress upon these paupers and wards of the nation those habits of orderly | and civilized life which are far more than reading and writing.