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Question. Do you suppose that the presence of the military is ne cessary, or even proper, among the Indians; and is not their presence a source of irritation to the Indians?

Answer. It is in many places a source of irritation. For instance, for a military detachment to go into the neighborhood of these Indians, upon their reservation, would be an irritation and annoyance to them. Question. Is the presence of the military in all this country, from the Colorado to the Pacific coast, necessary to protect the whites against the Indians?

Answer. I think, from the information we have had in regard to Arizona, that, to a certain extent, the military is necessary.

Question. In regard to the protection of the Indians against the whites, do you not suppose or believe that the marshals of the United States, with their civil processes and with the power to call in a posse comitatus, would be more efficient than a military to protect the Indians against the whites?

Answer. No, sir; not in that country.

Question. When you say "that country," you mean the country from the Colorado to the Pacific coast?

Answer. Yes, sir; so far as I know it.

Question. There is a portion of that country where the military would be necessary?

Answer. I think so.

By Mr. GUNCKEL:

Question. Give your opinion as to the proposed transfer of the Indian Bureau from the Interior Department to the War Department. Answer. I cannot conceive of any important benefit to be derived from such a transfer except possibly in the matter of transportation; but I can see a great many evils to result from it.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Question. How do your contracts for transportation compare with the prices paid by the War Department, so far as you can learn?

Auswer. The contracts that have been supervised by the board of commissioners have been very similar in their range of prices to those of the War Department. I speak only of the contracts of which we had the direct supervision.

Question. Is it or is it not possible for the agents of the Indian Bureau to make contracts just as closely, and guard them as carefully, as the War Department can do?

Answer. It is possible, but it has not been usually the case, I think. Question. Is there anything in the nature of things which prevents its being done?

Answer. There is not. Perhaps I should explain one of the reasons why the War Department can do it more cheaply than the Indian Bureau. The War Department has the means of transportation in itself. It has its own wagons and mules at military posts; it has the officers who are engaged in that particular branch of business, and who can give a closer supervision to it. The board of commissioners recommended in their first and in several successive reports, that the transportation of the Indian Bureau should be made under the War Department contracts. There is nothing to prevent its being done except the will.

Question. Now give your reasons against any consolidation of the Indian Bureau with the War Department.

see.

Auswer. The evils of contact between the soldiers and the Indians in times past have been so great that any movement toward bringing them about again should be avoided. The discipline of the military department is demoralizing either to white men or to Indians in its manner of controlling men. It is simply a control of force, exclusive of reason. The example of the officers of the Army and of their authority over the soldiers is bad for the Indians. It encourages the hereditary ideas of the chiefs, who do nothing except command. The improvement and advancement of the Indian is greatly dependent on the manner in whch instructions in agricultural and mechanical arts are given to them. These instructions cannot be given to them by persons who cannot instruct also by example, and whose duties do not show them that labor is honorable. Indians are very apt to imitate the white people they The chiefs imitate the officers, and it is the ambition of all to become like those who command. This tends to make labor seem dishonorable. The women among the wild tribes are required to do the heav iest part of the labor, and the Indians look upon the soldiers very much as bearing the same relations in this respect to their officers that these women bear to them. The tendency is to degrade labor. The moral effect on the Indians of the example of the people who surround them, and of the common soldiers, and the conduct of the latter toward the Indian women, is a very great cause of degradation. The conduct of the soldiers in regard to temperance is also another evil. The soldiers are severely punished for intemperance, and the Indians, who are very observant, often see that the vices for which the soldiers are punished do not always receive punishment when committed by their superiors. Then, in the matter of school instruction, there is nothing in the character or pursuit of the military to adapt them to it. In the matter of the instruction by Christian missions, while a great many of the officers of the Army, and especially the higher officers, are gentlemen who would not descend to any direct interference with missions, simply on account of difference of opinion, yet in times past it has been the case. Missions and schools have been broken up, and advancement already made by Indian tribes destroyed, by the misfortune of getting an officer or a few officers whose proclivities happened to be totally in the opposite direction. There would be constant liability to this. In the early part of General Grant's administration, when agents were appointed from the military, there occurred instances where a good deal of improvement made among Indian tribes was overcome by the misfortune of getting an intemperate officer, or an officer, as agent, not sympathizing with the idea of the advancement of the race.

The independence of the military in the management of strictly professional duties, and their jealousy of any complaint or interference of civilians, would probably extend itself to their administration of Indian affairs, and render the correction of abuses on complaints from other than military sources more difficult than now.

By Mr. HUNTON:

Question. Has your attention ever been called to the number of Indians borne on the rolls of the Indian Department, as to whether that number was the true number of Indians or not?

Answer. Yes; I sometimes find that the number has been very much exaggerated.

Question. Is the Indian Bureau taking means to prevent that overenumeration?

Answer. It has been constantly endeavoring to do so within the last

two years. So far as the body that I am connected with is concerned we have been striving very earnestly to accomplish that.

By Mr. McDougall:

Question. What is the moral tone and character of the officers of the Army in the Indian country?

Answer. I would like to say for the officers of the Army, that for those gentlemen with whom I have come in contact, I have the highest regard. I have generally found them to be men of whose conduct I could not complain. I have been treated with very great courtesy and kindness at the military posts, and have formed friendships with many of the officers of the Army. I have not been in a position that would enable me to see their defects.

By Mr. ALBRIGHT:

Question. So far as the military is necessary to control the Indian question you have now a duplication of officers-you have the Indian agents and the military posts?

Answer. That is exactly the case in every branch of the Government. The military is totally distinct from the other departments in its origin and purposes.

Question. The military must, in a sense, be subject to the Indian agents?

Answer. No, sir; I do not understand that it is necessary that they shall be subject to the Indian agents in any subordinate sense.

Question. If the Indian business is in the hands of the Interior Department the military have nothing to do with the Indian question, and can only act on the complaint of the agents ?

Answer. Yes; I think that is so as to the affairs of his agency. Question. The question is, then, whether, as the military is necessary, the expense of the civil officers could not be avoided?

Answer. A very large proportion of the Indian service is as far from having any necessary connection with military matters as is any other part of the civil service of the country. It is only at occasional places that there can seem to be the least occasion for connecting the two things together; that is in the neighborhood of these wild tribes.

By Mr. HAWLEY, of Illinois:

Question. You do not mean to say that the Army is never brought into requisition in regard to the Indians, except at the request of somebody connected with the Indian Department? Your answer would seem to imply that. Was it your intention to say that the Army is never brought into requisition as against the Indians, except at the request of an Indian agent or somebody connected with Indian affairs?

Answer. No, sir; I did not mean to say that. It is the duty, for instance, of the military to guard the Texas border. It is assumed that depredations are occasionally committed along the Texas border. There are forts there to guard the settlers. It is the duty of the military to do that. If the military find Indians or whites who have committed depredations or murders, it is their duty, without any requisition from the Indian agent, to attack them, pursue them, and punish them.

By Mr. ALBRIGHT:

Question. Take the localities where the military is posted for the express purpose of protecting Indians against the whites, aud the whites against the Indians; in what way then do the Indian agents use and employ the military?

Answer. Take a post like the post in the neighborhood of the Nez

Percés reservation, where the Indians are peaceable and quiet, trying to work, and are doing work. If some disturbance should occur among the Indians, or if whisky were sold or given to them, causing such disturbances, an agent may notify the military officer and request that aid may be given for the arrest of the white mischief-makers, or the Indians engaged in the disturbance.

Question. And is the military officer bound to afford assistance?

Answer. He is bound to do so. He has orders from the War Department to do so. It is a co-operation between the two departments, and is authorized by the laws.

Question. That must be a general order and arrangement between the two departments?

Answer. Yes; it is by an arrangement between the two departments. I suppose that some of the posts are for general military purposes, not for any special purpose, connected with the Indians.

Question. I understood you to say, in connection with Round Valley, that the whites had encroached upon the Indian reservation there, and that the military could not prevent it.

Answer. I did not mean to say so, in the light in which you seem to understand it. I say the military could not prevent it, because it has become a question for the courts. The whites have been there so long that the decision of the authorities is, that the matter has to be decided by the courts. If I were the authority I should put these whites off the reservation and let the courts decide the question afterward, knoTMing, as I do, that the whites are there by wrong. There are certain ques tions entering into the matter which have led to the decision that it must be done by the courts. Consequently, that military post there is not of any importance for the purpose of putting off these particular trespassers, is what I meant.

Question. Are you particularly acquainted with that section of country?

Answer. I said, in speaking of it, that I had my information from a member of our board who visited that country for the purpose of examining into the situation of Indian affairs there, and from other official sources. I have not been nearer than San Francisco, and am only acquainted with the facts from gathered information.

Question. You stated that you would locate military posts at not less than twelve miles from a reservation?

Answer. Yes, sir.

Question. What would be your suggestion as to the intermediate territory?

Answer. If I said twelve miles from a reservation, I meant from the agency. I think I said from the agency.

Question. The agencies are on the reservations?

Answer. The agencies are on the reservations. By placing a military post twelve miles from the agency it is not necessarily placed off the reservation. I do not mean that the post should be off the reservation, but away from the agency. There is a question of economy which properly comes into the consideration of a change of system. I do not be. lieve that it would be economy to place the Indian service in the hands of the military. I believe it would be more costly than even the present arrangement.

By Mr. HUNTON :

Question. Would the treatment of the Indians under the military department be as humane as it is under the Indian department?

Answer. I do not think it would; not, however, from any lack of kind and humane inclination on the part of the higher officers of the Army.

By Mr. HAWLEY, of Illinois :

Question. Have you stated any reason why it would be more economical to manage the Indians through the Interior Department than through the War Department?

Answer. I do not know that I have stated it.
Question. Be kind enough to state it.

Answer. I perhaps may do that by an illustration. During the last two or three years there has arisen a question in reference to the Sioux, Kiowas, and Comanches, and, later on, that question has become of some importance. There is a military post at what we call the Fort Sill reservation, where the Kiowas and Comanches are. The military idea of treatment there is that when there are raids committed by individual Indians on the borders of Texas the tribes shall be held responsible for the acts of the individuals. And the mode of settling the question is to demand the criminals from the tribe, and if they fail to give them up in a given time, punish them. Punishment means an attack upon the camp, which is war. The result would probably be the escape of the guilty, who usually keep out of the way; the killing of the many innocent, who are sure to be there, and the driving of the survivors to the war-path, burning under a sense of the wrong done to them; the cost of a war similarly inaugurated against a single tribe has often been greater than the entire cost of the Indian service for the last four years under the peace management. In such and other ways the military control would be vastly more expensive than the present system of controlling the Indians. The present system has been a success, as any one may see in looking over the last three or four years.

Question. You mean to say that it has been more economical, for the reason that war has been, to a great extent, obviated?

Answer. Yes.

Question. In answer to my former question, as to whether it is more economical to continue the management of the Indians in the present form, you mention the practice of the military of demanding from Indian tribes the surrender of the particular persons who have violated the law. What is the system under your management?

Answer. I did not state that as the system. I suppose that if I knew positively by my examination of the temper of the Indians, and my personal intercourse with them, that by making such a demand it would be complied with, I would make it myself, under the right circumstances, in order to get the criminal.

Question. That is, you would demand of the tribe the actual offenders? Answer. I would get the offenders, if I could do it without involving great expense and the great wrong of punishing the innocent. I I only spoke of that incidental case as illustrating my meaning. Question. I did not understand you now to state how it is done differently under the present system.

Answer. Under the present system the effort is made in every way in accordance with the treaties, and with reference to each individual case as it arises, to get possession of the criminals and to bring them to punishment, precisely in the way it is being done, or rather that it should be done, in regard to white criminals.

By Mr. ALBRIGHT.

Question. In your estimates of the relative cost of managing the

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