The Saint Paul globe., 1898-01-17
Docking Facilities Serious Question for the United
States in Case of Trouble With Spain
Any Other Nation.

the Crows; but, not daring to make
quite so bold a stroke at once, they
propose now simply to throw open to
white settlement the Tongue river tract
and leave the rest till more opportune
season.
To open this tract would dispossess
about 300 Indians, all told. 1t would
undoubtedly bring 1uin to them, for
within the narrower boundaries of the
reservation they would find it hard to
get the water necessary for the SUBJ
sistence of the whole tribe. The white
ranchmen who preceded the Indians
filed their water claims and ran their
water is left than is needed for the use
Of the Indians who are already settled
there.
The movement for opening the
Tongue river tract ought to be prompt
ly headed off. 1t is believed that Sec
retary Bliss and the commissioner Of
Indian affairs will stand firmly by the
rights of the Indians, legal and moral;
but over their heads congress may
choose to commit an outrage which, if
it dces not bring bloodshed at once,
will surely prepare the way for trouble
later. The Northern Cheyennes are a
very Warlike tribe. Death in battle
they have been trained to regard as the
highest honor that can come to an
serted, again and again, that, after the
assurances the Great Father has given
them, they will never leave their reser-
walton alive. The move of the cattle
men, after croWding the whole tribe
into the reservation proper, will be to
try to drive them away from there also.
Then, If not before, we shall have an
other Indian campaign on our hands.
The right course for the government
Is the very reverse of what Senator
Mantle will probably try to induce it
to take-namelv, to drive the white
squatters off the Tongue river tract,
and allot the land to the Indians giving
them eighty acres apiece under the
Dawes seVeralty act. They can still
choose, but they will at least own the
land. 1t would be a good thing then
to buy out the white ranchers on the
reservation proper, and thus obtain the
water rights they now possess. At the
figures at which good ranches, with
domestic improvements and irrigation
privileges. are held in various parts of
the arid West, this might cost $780,
600: but for the chance it would offer
for cutting off a prolific source of pos
sible future troubles, it would be money
well spent. These matters could be
considered later when congress shall
have procured all the necessary facts
and figures; but the allotment plan
could be, and should be, carried out
without delay.
In competition with the possibility Of
Spain's forcing hostilities upon us, the
question has been raised in Washing
ton, what would be done in case one
of our giant men-of-war were badly
damaged in action. Not long ago we
witnessed the spectacle of the Indiana
going to Halifax to be docked for re-
pairs because there was no dock in our
own country large enough to take her
in,,o in such condition as to be capa-
bic of use.
The first suggestion, naturally, would
be that this should be done again in
an emergency. But this leaves out of
account the obligation of Great Brit
ain to remain neutral. If it were a
mere question of humanity-it being
necessary through stress of weather,
failure of food, contagious or infectious
disease, or some like reason, for one of
our warships, even in the midst of
fight with Spain, to put into a British
dock, no question probably would be
raised of the propriety of her recep-
tion there. But the armor, engines,
ETC., of the modern warship are as
much a part of her offensive arma-
ment as Of her apparatus for getting
about, so that the usual rules Of hu-