New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1886-06-24
suppose tnat any harm will follow the decree OF
INDIANS As FOREJG NERS.

INDIANA rs TOhEJbNhH'.
Tho prepostefous position occupied by the
Indians in this country has Just been illustrated
clearly by decision Of the Supreme Court OF
the District of Columbia to the effect that The
red man is foreigner. There is, OF course,
nothing new in the principle. 1t Is an newt
able inference from the practice OF making
treaties with the Indian tribes. But the United
States Government has employed so many and
such radically different policies toward i's
wards" that the incongruitles ana anomalies
of the situation have become amazing. mus IL
is to be observed that Congress, while cnnced-
ing in one way the position OF foreign nation
to the Indians, undertakes in another way the
care and subsistence of these foreigners and
vet further proceeds to dispose OF thci terri
tory as if they possessed no rights whatever.
Even the present decision that the Indian is
foreigner operates only to prevent the
Cherukees from obtaining justice upon certain
men accused of swlndling them. Congress
could pass the law which resulted in robbing
them of a large amount, but when they seek
restitution they are coolly informed that they
are foreigners, and that the court has no
jurisdiction in the matter.
The middle in short, seems all but hopeless,
and the disgrace arising from it becomes
deeper every year. To the world it must
appear that whenever we have to do with the
Indians we throw off every pretence of honor
and equity, and cheat and rob them with
shameless greed and persistency. Notwith-
standing the incompatibility of the attitudes
we have assumed toward them, our homogeneous
and contradictory policies all operate alike in
one way: they all work together for the
plundering of the Indian. Happily in the
present instance the interests OF American
citizens are likely to be so seriously affected
that Congress will probably be driven to adopt
the only measure which can clear up the
ENHANCEMENT. Right Of way has been granted
several railway corporations through the
Indian reservations. Now if the Indians are
foreigners, it is clear that Congress had no
authority to grant right of way through their
lands, and so the corporations will find them
selves threatened with costly and tedious
litigation and they will bring pressure upon
the National Legislature to take action in the
premises
There is ore plain and obvious remedy for
the trouble and that is to cut the Gordian knot
by making the Indian citizen of the United
States. The situation swarms with blunders
and absurdtics. We have foreign nation OF
rather a series of foreign nations planted here
and there among us. We are called on to
maintain them, and TO make laws for them, but
we must rot enter upon their territory. We
declare them foreigners, though in truth they
are the original owners of the soil and we are
the foreigners. The United States pretends to
own the entire country, yet does mt control
Except lllegitmately) the Indian Territory.
BY sweeping away all the rubbish of treaty
making with tribes of ages ard all the
jargon aboat foreigners, and dealing with the
Indians as we deal with the immigrants, we
can get back to common sense and the prin-
ciplcs of equity, but IN no other way. Now,
too, that powerful corporate interests are in
vOlved, there il some hope that the matter will
be brought within the sphere of "practicalh
politics, and that the justice which Congress
would not do the Indian SIMPLY because it was
justice, may be done because by refusing
longer to do it American citizens may be in
iured. Let the good work be accomplished,
however and the friends of the Indian will not
attempt to look the gift-h in the mouth.