The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-04-15
FIGHTS OLD CLAIM
Jackson Opposes Paying Old
Texas Indian Claims.
More Damage Done in Kansas
in Same War.
NO PAY FOR SUFFERERS
Because Indians Were on War
path at That Time.
Treasury Should Not Be
Opened to Claim Agents.

Washington, April 15.--@The govern
ment never intended that it would pay
people who happened to suffer by
larceny 90 otherwise on the part of
the Indians, and therefore I say the
only true policy is that if the govern
ment now proposes to pay Indian claims
it should begin at the bottom and opel.
up the courts and the treasury of the
United States and let US have an ad-
justment all along the line"
This argued Congressman Fred Jack
son of Kansas in opposing bill before
the house to provide for the adjudica-
ton and payment of claims arising
from Indian depredations in early
days. Continuing, he said:
why talk about the depredations OF
Indians in Texas from 1860 to 1870? L
apprehend that no state in the Union
has suffered so many Indian depreda-
lions as has my own native state OIL
Kansas. In these very wars that are
talked of here the fighting on Kansas
soil was ten times as severe as it was
on Texas soil Not in the entire his
tory of Indian warfare in this coun
try have such examples of cruelty ano
savagery on the part of the Indians
been afforded as those which occurred
in western Kansas from the year 1860
up to the year 1870. And the depreda-
lions committed by those Indians can
not be recompensed in money. You
can not benefit the men who were set
tiers there by now opening the treas
ury of the UL-ited States to the attor-
neys and claim agents.
Upon the little island of Arickaree,
in the Republican river, a band of Kan
saS men held at bay AOr days and days
all of the combined tribes of the IN
dams who inhabited those western
plains. They lived upon mule meat ant
upon horse meat until two of their
number escaped and walked over the
plains to a post of the United States
army and brought relief from those
savages who had attacked them, and
after that these Indians were followed
back into the Indian Territory and into
Texas and were destroyed or captured
But by the terms of this bill the
depredations committed by those In
dams could not be paid for, because
they were on the warpath.
Now, then, the Indians who went
into the settlements and took the schooi
teachers from their desks and carried
them away as captives, the Indians
who went in and carried off
the children of the early set
tiers of Kansas were upon the war
path, and under this bill it is not pre-
tended that any money shall be paid
for the damages that these Indians
committed.
Under what kind of equities eau
you expect that these men who have
built I'D their country under such cir
cumstances as that shall now be taxed
to pay few foreigners down in Texas,
or out upon the western plains, or in
some other part of the country, for
some property that was stolen by In
dams who were not at war?
There is one other fact here that l
want to mention concerning this law,
and then I am done; and that refers
TO this provision OF the bill which pro-
vides practically that the claims as
adjudicated by the secretary of the in
terror shall fix the amounts to be paid.