The Tucson citizen., 1902-04-12
ABOUT INDIAN EDUCATION.


on the Indian question that has ap-
peared in an American magazine in
many a long day is one by Hamlin
Garland, in the april North American
Review. entitled THE Red Mans
Present Needs" Mr.. Garland has come
in contact with the Indian incidental
1y in his 'wanderings over the Rocky
Mountain States" and therefore has
the advantageous position of an OBJ
server without any purpose beyond
the acquisition of information. People
ordinarily who go among Indians go
WIN some special purpose and with
preconceived theories, and this fact is
the chief cause of the follies in our
Indian system which Mr. Garland
would correct
None of the American Indians now
support themselves by hunting. There
is not game enough anywhere for that.
They must. perforce, adopt civilized
modes of support. But in bringing them
to a self-supporting condition it must
be remembered that they are in the
primal stage of civilization from watch
it has taken the white races many CEN
turies to develop. There is no such
thing as an instantaneous change
from barbarism to civilization
outside of the comic opera stage. 1t
takes generations of growth. But the
Indian is human, ana human nature
is the same everywhere as to customs,
prejudices, religion and superstitious
ideas, and other mental. attitudes.
When an effort is made to trample
these under foot, to tear them out
by the roots, the results are invari-
ably bad.
Mr. Garlands suggestions are based
largely on these facts. He has noted
that Indians are naturally sociable
and dislike isolation; therefore he
would group them in little settlements
along the streams in their reservations
instead of scattering them on farms"
on the uplands.
He has noted that their alleged agri-
cultural and Industrial instruction on
reservations is humbug and farce,
because the people who are appointed
to the work are selected for political
reasons and not for fitness. He would
give them farmers who can and will
farm, and would have these farmers
the husbands of wives who can and
will teach Indian women "how to cook
and sew, how to keep house, how to
bridge the chasm between the tepee
fire and the cook stove"
When a tribe has a natural aptitude
for an art and has developed it--such
as weaving. basket-making or pottery
making-he would give them instruc-
tors who could encourage and further
develop it. This would not only stim-
ulate sc!f-respect and preserve arts
that should not be lost, but would
give the Indians congenial and profit
able employment which would not in
terfere with the general labor market
Mr.. Garland would have schools on
the reservations and not seperate chill
dren from parents. This is in line
strictly with the proposal of Delegate
Smith, of Arizona. in Congress- Dur
ing the present Congress. Mr.. Smith
denounced in an eloquent speech that
attracted much attention, the custom of
taking children away from their par
ents or friends to be educated in the
East, as not only absurd and useless,
but outrageous Mr. Garland argument
in a nutshell is Education should arm
the child for his battle for life and
should not ALLEVIATE him from his peo-
pie. Honor thy father and thy
mother is a command which the red
children implicitly obey, until they are
taught that everything their poor old
parents do is vile" This is good com
ZION sense. 1t is more important that
a child should honor his parents than
that he should wear his hair short
He wonld not allow missionaries to
excerise arbitrary power over the
habits of their charges. The evident
truth is that a person who has enough |
religious fervor to undertake mis-
sionary work is very apt to have such !
strict ideas of life that he would be |
intolerable to ordinary white people if
allowed to dictate their course of life.
It is not that missionaries do not
mean we'll, but no man is either good
enough or wise enough to govern an
other man absolutely without that
mans consent.
And finally, when an Indian takes