The Minneapolis journal., 1901-11-02

maintained and the agents court deals
out justice without charge to those who
are benefited.
AS for the backward Indians, mostly
fullbloods, about q thousand in ALT Is
the reservation system and government
help that keep many OF them from i'm
proving their condition. The Indian, like
some other people, is content with the
minimum effort that will support life. If
government rations are forthcoming In the
hour OF need, If he can get most Of the
tools and utensils he needs from the ware
house, the average Indian is not going to
hurt himself working. He will fish a
little, hunt little, work little on the
farms and in the lumber camps, let his
wife and children gather wild rice. and
loaf a lot.
A RatfOn-Getting Device.
OF late, to be sure, it has been made a
strict rule to issue no provisions except
to the sick and aged, but this has not
accomplished its purpose, for the Indian
is a natural communist, and the moment
the old father or mother gets some flour
it Is divided up among the family, no
matter how able bodied the children may
be. Indeed, they often use the old peo-
pie as a regular means of breaking into
the warehouse. Thrown absolutely upon
their own resources, large numbers Of
Indians Of this kind would give a good
account of themselves. They can work
when they have to and are amply able
to take care Of themselves. Some Of them,
OF course, can never be weaned from
their present ways. They are too old to
change. To the end they will be wig
wan Indians, living as nearly as possible
as their fathers lived before them. But
with their hunting and fishing, their wild
hni fnor o1A
and, having land Of their own, they will
not be without place to pitch their tents.
But what will become of the chronical-
ly sick, the feeble, aged and the help
less young II the Indians are placed on
the same basis as white people? The
Indian schools will take care of the young
and some sort of hospital should be
provided for the old. Then the problem is
solved. If the 5000 White Earthers were
full-bloods, every one, it would be hard
er problem. But here intermarriage is
solving the Indian question by absorbing
the red man into the white race and lay
Ing the foundations of thousands of fam
lilies whose 'posterity will proudly boast of
their Indian blood.
AS the Outsider Sees 1t.
From the standpoint of the outsider
who wants to get in, there is no reason
why the reservation should not be opened
up. Conceding that the Indians have
taken the cream of the land in their reser-
vations and making allowance for large
part which, as pine lands, will not be
open to the homesteader. there remain
thousands and thousands of acres of for
est and prairie land of great fertility and
we'll worth taking for nothing. The total
Of unallotted and unreserved land, good
and bad, is S42,O2S acres. Then, too,
eventually the owners of the allotted lands
will be able to sell them. The law pro-
vides that they cannot sell for twenty
five years from the time of allotment
for most, perhaps all of them, this period
began with 1889-but half that time is
already past, and it may be possible to
change this provision 1t is claimed that
majority of the Indians will oppose the
opening of the reservation If they are not
given title simultaneously with the OPEN
ing, so that they may sell their lands il
they choose. Many of the allotment own
ers doubtless are possessed of sufficient
worldly wisdom to be allowed to do as
they please with their lands, but 1t would
be most unfortunate, for many of them If
they were allowed to sell their birthrights
until they had learned by hard experience
that land is easier to get rid of than to
get, and that in the hurly burly of life
in common with the white man it is a
good thing to have a piece of land that
is your own.
After the Opening.
But in any event the opening of the
reservation would bring in new popula-
tion, numbered in the thousands, towns
and villages would spring up 80, 900 OOC
feet of pine would be cut, and the indiana
being everywhere in contact with prosper.
GUS white farmers. could not fail to learr
from them Then. too, the Indian boys
and girls coming back from the schools
would not be compelled to sink again tt
the wigWam'S level, as so many of then
do now, but would find among the new
population, and yet at home, opportuni-
| ties to apply their training and utilize
their learning. Within a few years from
the opening the 80 townships of the reser.
vation-four of the original towns have
already been ceded-would support busy
population of $4,000 or 10000 in place O
the stationary 5000 who now make bu
partial use of their opportunities.
The influx of such a population would
mean much to the towns around the res
ervation and would create a market fol
large amount of manufactured goods
so that distributing and manufacturing
centers, such as St. Paul Minneapolis anC
Duluth, though remote from the. reserva
ton, would be greatly benefited by it.
! opening.
! Thus it will be seen that all consider
ations favor the early opening of thi!
| reservation
Theodore M. Knappen.