The Daily Alaska empire., 1951-11-01


 launched by James E. Curry during the Washington hearing on the bill in August of this year.
 Curry is the attorney for a num- Der of Indian communities and or ganizations in Alaska. He will no doubt come to Alaska to attend the convention of the Alaska Ma tive Brotherhood at Ketchikan in mid- November, and it is not im- probable that he will also take in some of the Alaska hearings on the Bartlett bill and that he will shoot off a few more fireworks.
 Curry and the Bureau of Indian Affairs have been at war for some time over Curry's contracts with the Indian groups he represents, both in Alaska and in the states.
 The regulations require that the contracts of such attorneys be ap- proved by the Indian Bureau, which is the guardian of the Indians. In this way the Bureau can guard the Indians against interruptions law yers, or against lawyers the Bureau might choose to consider unserupu- lous.
 There does not appear to be any regulation that would guard the Indians against interruptions bu- reaucrats.
 Jamel E. Curry went to Loyola University in Chicago" to use his own words. He did not say whether he graduated from Loyola or that he graduated from any university. Af- ter he attended Loyola, he worked for the United States Fidelity and Guaranty Go, for several years, af- ter which he engaged in private law practice for several more years.
 About 1884 Curry went into gov- ernment service in the Interior De- partment He was first lawyer in the Office of Indian Affairs, now known as the Bureau of Indian Af- fairs, for about three years and q half
 From the Indian Office, Curry moved into the Puerto Rico Reeon- struction Administration, which is also under the Interior Depart ment. From there he went to an- other branch of the Interior De- partment, the Bituminous Coal Di- vision. and was attorney for the Consumers Council of that bureau
 The Bituminous Coal Division, which established minimum prices for bituminous coal and otherwise stabilized" that industry, went out of business on August 24, l943, which was about the time the fix ing of maximum, rather than mlnl- mum, prices became fashionable. Curry left the government servlce at about the same time.
 Puerto Rico became the scene of Curry's main activities for some time thereafter. He established ms residence in Puerto Rico and re- presented the Puerto Rico Aque- duct Service, which operates all water works in that territory; the University of Puerto Rico and, at times. the Puerto Rico Communlca- tions Authority. In 1948 Curry testi- fled that he spent about half his time in Puerto Rico and half in Washington, D. c.
 It was around 1945 when Curry opened an office in Washington and to handle the legal work of various Indian groups. At about the same time he became attorney for the National Congress of American h. dians.
 In the NCAI he is associated with Mrs. Ruth Muskrat Bronson, who previously worked for the Indian Bureau for 19 years. Some years ago Mrs. Bronson made couple of brief trips to Alaska, thereby qualifying as an authority on h. dian affairs in the Territory. :
 Her Alaska trips were Financed hy grant from the Robert Mar shall Civil Liberties Trust, which is also known as the Robert Marshall Foundation.
 A report of the Special Commit tee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, on March 29, 1944, said of the Robert Mar shall Foundation: This fund Of more than a million dollars, which originated with the rich mans son whose name it bears, has been one of the principal sources for the money with which to finance the Communist Party's fronts generally in recent years"
 Another Associate of Curry in some of his legal work for Indian groups has been Felix Cohen who from 1883 until early in 1948 was a lawyer in the Interior Depart ment and who did a good deal of the stirring in the Alaska Indian claims furore under Secretary Ickes.