The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1899-11-23
Commissioner Reviews Progress
of Affairs in All Branches
of the Service.
TIE STATUS OF THE INDIAN SCHOOLS
There Are Now 2O,522 Boys and Girls
in Attendance of an Enrolment
of Over 10000.
Over 5000 Persons Are Employed in the
Indian service-The Policy 10 to EN-
ploy Indians in Every Position to
which They Are Fitted

WASHINGTON, Nov. 19.-The annual
report of the commissioner of Indian
affairs, William A. Jones, besides re-
viewing the progress of affairs in all
branches of the service, urges more
systematic methods, study of individ-
ual traits and consideration of subse-
quent environment in outlying stud
les in the Indian schools. The entire
educational system of the Indian Of
fee, he says, is predicated upon the
final abolishment of the anamalous
Indian reservation system.
There are now 90 522 boys and girls
in attendance in the various Indian
schools o. an enrolment Of over 20, 600.
The Indian population from which
these are taken, being $1,000, while
the population has remained station
ary there has been sucn steady in
crease in the number of the Indians
being educated as 70 warrant the opin-
ion that the next quarter century will
witness, not q diminution OF the In
dian population, but an extinguish-
ment of Indian tribes.
One discouraging factor however, is
disclosed by the unsatisfactory results
of the past nine years. trial of co-edu-
cation of the Indians with the whites
in the public schools. The report says
the results of this co-education are not
commensurate with the expenditure;
that the idea theoretically is an ad-
mirable expedient for breaking down
prejudices and civilizing the Indian
but the figures show it is not an un-
qualified success.
The full blood, who needs such con.
tact most, is rarely secured, and the
groundwork, at least, of Indian educa-
tion, must be laid under the govern
ment's auspices and control. Stronger
measures for forcing the attend ance on
Indian schools are urged. There are
9, 562 employees in the Indian service
and the policy is to employ Indians in
every position to which they are adapt
ed by nature and education.
A thorough and exhaustive investi-
cation of the Seminoles in Florida has
resulted in the discontinuance of the
employees, and no school will be estab-
lished for them at present their real
and fancied wrongs having embittered
them against governmental assist
ance.
Concerning the Indian territory, the
report severely arraigns nepotism, lack
of management and demoralized con-
ditions and deplorable state of af-
fairs generally in administering the
schools and orphan asylums of the five
Indian nations.
Out of 81 boarding schools not more
than four of the superintendents are
competent to teach the ordinary En-
glish branches, and financial misman-
agement is especially complained of.
Reporting on the Chippewa outbreak
of last autumn, Commissioner Jones
says:
"For many years Chippewas have
been arrested and taken from their
homes to St. Paul and other points az
witnesses or as offenders, chiefly in
whisky cases. Often wholesale arrests
have been made solely for the feea
which would accrue to the officials.
Indians have been helped to obtain
whisky by the very ones who arrested
them for using it.
"In some cases Indians carried off to
court have been left to get back home
as best they could. The whole matter Of
arrests by the deputy marshals have
come to farce, fraud and hardship
to the Chippewas and disgrace to the
community"