The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-08-04
CATHOLIC SOCIETIES
FEDERATION IN SESSION IN
 ATLANTIC CITY.
President Roosevelt Sends Telegram Expressing Regret Over His In- ability to Be Present-Sioux
 Indian Speaks.

| Atlantic City, Aug. 3.-The three days | convention of the Catholic Federation oi Societies was opened with a solemn requiem mass in St. Nicholas Catholic Church in memory of Leo XIII. Right Rev. Bishop Messmer of Green Bay, Wis consin, was the celebrate, and Vicar Gen eral Fox of the Trenton diocese delivered the sermon, the subject being The Late Pontiff.
 President Roosevelt sent the following message to President Minahan; Oyster Bay, N. Y, July 2,
 My Dear Slr-I have received your let ter and also have spoken personally about the matter with Bishop McFall. l regret greatly that it is out of my power to ac- cept your very kind invitation. l believe most heartily in the work you are doing in your Catholic societies and it would have been a particular pleasure to have accepted your invitation. l am well aware of what your society has accom- plished, social betterment, not only on Catholics. but of all our people, in pro noting the unification and naturalization of our countrymen, and in working for morality and decency, especially in the intimate home relations upon which rests the ultimate well being of the entire State. Wishing you all success and con- graduating you on what you have don in the past,
 II am with great regard,
 Sincerely yours,
 "Theo. Roosevelt"
 Delegate Joaquin Ferran of Porto Rico addressed the convention. He said in his country there were but ninety-five priests for nearly a million Catholics He asked the convention to ask the Ameri- can Government for an order directing that the title to the lands of the church
 fr ktn fNf the church, as. although the church was in possession of the property, the title had never placed on record in it's favor.
 The representative of the Sioux Con- gress Mintani Hanska. addressed the con- vention in his native language. His re- marks were interpreted to the convention by Father P. F. Dillman,.S. J., the pastor of the Rosebud Agency. South Dakota,
 The chief said in part:
 "I am glad to look. on your faces for I know you are my friends. I know that you will protect the rights of the Indian If you will help the poor old Sioux people I know you will help their children. and will help the schools of their children and the black robed missionary priests, who are trying to make all the Sioux good.
 My people love their children very wei, and they want them to have good strong bodies. but they also want them to have good souls. They want to have good lives here and also hereafter. and we do want more schools We want more black robes to teach them we'll And when I left my people far, far away, they said: You go to the Great Big Federa- lation and the Federation will give us more schools and more black robes.'"
 The chief added that he was a Catechist and that the nearest church to his home was forty miles away, there being two priests in six thousand square miles and that on Sundays he collected the people and led them in prayers and singing.
 Closing he said:
 "All I have heard, and all have seen will tell my people when go back to them and it will then gladden. their hearts. May you all prosper and may the Great Spirit bless you"