Bonners Ferry herald. [volume] (Bonners Ferry, Idaho) 1904-current, 1916-02-18
IS DEFENDER OF
THE INDIANS
Rev. Fr. Lambot Says Kootenai Indians
Best Band Morally of All the
u. S. Indians
MADE NATURAL ADVANCEMENT
Thinks Local Indians Should Not Be
Removed to Colville

sion, Feb. 8th, 1916.
To the Editor Bonners Ferry Herald.
Sir: There appeared in the last
issue of your esteemed paper two
letters dealing with the question of
moving the Indian camp from near
Boomers Ferry. There are some
statements in these letters about
which l beg to write a few words.
First of all there is the general
question: Is it good for these In
dams to be moved, and can the gov
eminent do it? Says Hon. A. T..
Smith: 81 do not understand why
these Indians should have been To-
Gated up in that section separate
and apart from the other members
of the tribe on the Colville reser-
vation." He could have easily found
out that "thc other members of the
tribe" are not on the Colville reser-
walton, the Co,ville Indians are an
other, and at time, an enemy tribe.
When the government made treat
les with the Indians and set apart
the reservations, these Indians also
were asked to go to the Flathead
reservation with the band that is
now there. But they answered that
this Kootenai valley was their faith
ers' home, where their fathers had
lived and died, and that they also
would die here and be buried with
their fathers and they refused to go.
Like all other human 0e'nSs they
have a natural right to thclc liberty.
They have natural right TO the
possession of their fathers land. and
they refused to be exiled to a strange
co lntry. Who can blame them?
But: "They are esse emit y
British Columbia Ind ans" and:
"Some years ago. when they en-
tered this country from Canada"
So writes Hon. B. Sinclair. Is it so ?
Do they come from Canada and do
they really belong to the British
government? True enough the
greater number of the tribe and its
headquarters are in British Column
bia, but the tribe claims as its
tribal grounds the whole of the Koot-
enai Valley, not excluding the parts
that are in Montana or Idaho. The
old traditions state that they have
come from the southwest; from time
immemorial they have been encampec
ouo,,~d +l,;e ,,1ooa xybara thau ORC To-
day; and rM. Sinclair himself gives
us the proof that as early as 1926
there were 400 of them occupying
this very place. How then can they
be called British. Columbia Indians
Truly and justly they call this val.
lev their Fatherland and their home
their own land which has not beer
bought but wrenched from them.
The government can ask them K
depart, and if they accept, good anc
well. If they refuse, the government
can of course use its power, not it,
right, and exile them to a far dis
tant country, even as the Englisl
sent the Arcadiahs to exile in thu
early days, or as the Turks do thes'
DAYS send the Armenians into thu
desert. And, if still using their right
they resist, the government is strong
enough to crush them. But these ar
not methods in use in our free coun
try.
Is it better for them to go? L
the picture which Mr.. Sinclair draw
of the camp at the Flathead is true
then the farther away from it the.
are the better for them. And that i
the only place where they would &c
In his letter Hon. B. Sinclair make
a sweeping condemnation of tn
Kootenai Indians, against which
must protest, as being unfair an
partly at least untrue. He relate
how they received generous dona
tons of land donations of their ow
land, and how generously, whic
they did not put under cultivation
but probably he does not know Q
those Indians who after living 1
and 20 years in a place, cultivatin
it and planting trees, have seen tn
white man come, root out their tree
and put them out of their place, be
cause he, the white man, had bougt
it from the government. He accuse
the Indians of "gross and retro
grading superstitions," of "makin
annual pilgrimages into Canada fc
the purpose of indulging this PR
pensity to gambling;" gratuitous a
firmations, unworthy of man WI
ais moved only by considerations (