Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1918-07-31

farmer, stockman, and country bank
err in the world. He also teaches six
ty thousand children what he thinks
they ought to which includes
how to earn living. He runs high
schools and colleges, but he takes
particular pleasure in a multitude Of
little primary schools, each presided
over by dominic and his wife, who
mothers the children and cooks their
midday meal.
Besides all this Judge Sells is at
torney at law for more than three
hundred thousand people in their dis
putes with the outer world. When
they quarrel with one another, he
is usually Judge and jury too. There
are many other things that this mod
ern Noah, Abraham. Joseph, and
Moses does for his chosen people. 1t
would take a column merely to cata-
logue them all.
The fact is, Mr.. Sells is Indian
Commissioner in the Department Of
the Interior at Washington. The In
dams are wards Of the nation" and
the Commissioner stands for the ma
ton. The nation is supposed to be
civilized and the Indians uncivilized.
And the Commissioner is expected to
show the Indians how we do the
|thing-the thing that is called being
civilized
We, also, should learn. Here is the
interesting point: In trying to show
the Indians how to do it we can learn
to do it a great deal better ourselves.
A study of the operations of the In
dian Bureau yields great many sug-
gestions as to the fine things we
could do for ourselves, if we could
only find a way to set up in New York
City, Oskaloosa, and Cripple Creek,
"a government as intelligent and as
enthusiastic for progress as the In
dian Bureau is.
Or course, we in New York, or in
any other American town, would not
care to have Judge Sells and his dep
uties boss us around. Still we are
bound in honesty to face the follow
ing proposition: If we are dealing
squarely in selecting men out of our
own number to impose the natural
laws of industry, commerce, communi-
cation, transportation, and so on, up
on the Indians, why don't we do the
same for ourselves?
An Indian child is taught how to
raise corn and cotton, how to ride
and swim and build a shack. Why
should not white children be taught
these things?
An honest and Industrious Indian
can borrow six hundred dollars from
the Great White Chief to stock his
farm and set himself up at house,
keeping. Why is the White Chief less
considerate of his own sons?
Are We Really Civilized?
The Indian is protected from land
sharks and STOCKHOLDERS. Why should
not the rest of us be protected?
The Indian understands that in the
nature of things highway or
watercourse is a public affair. Why
can't everybody in the United States
be made to understand that?
What is civilization, anyhow? We
are trying to give it to the Indians,
but have we got it ourselves? Ger
tainly we can have no very strong
hold on it until we have grasped the
idea that there are natural laws of
social wellbeing, laws that we neither
made nor can unmake, and that liberty
and democracy consist in obeying
these laws, even in being compelled
to obey them.
We do no violence to our democrat
ic faith in imposing these laws upon
the Indians, anybody that is able to
do it has right to impose them up
on anybody else. The trouble with
us is that we do not sufficiently I'M
derstand them or respect them.
That is the reason our railroads
run to receiyerships, our mines and
forests are raped by private greed
and our common stock of steam pow
err and water power is mostly turned
to other than public ends.
The white man should do for him
self what Cato Sells is doing for the
Red Man.