Major Clark says, in summing up, that several years of study have convinced him that the usual theory that the Indian population is destined to decline and finally disappear, as a result of contact with white civilization, must be greatly modified—probably abandoned altogether.
—Missionaries Riggs and Williamson substantially agree that (1) the Indians, in their wild state, increase quite rapidly, unless disturbed by some violent agent, as war, famine, or pestilence; (2) the first effect of a change to civilized life is to diminish their numbers; (3) the final effect, however, is to a recovery and more rapid growth, even, than in their former state.
—From the best official estimates, there are in the country about 275,000 Indians. Of this number, 56,630, or only about one-fifth, receive subsistence from the government. Perhaps a majority of the whole number are self-sustaining. The tribes in the Indian Territory are said to compare favorably in moral, social and material condition with many of the white communities in the neighboring States. Schools, courts, church organizations and local legislatures are among their cherished institutions.
—The only Congregational Church in Indian Territory was dedicated Sunday, December 2d. Its site is in the town of Caddo, on the line of the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad. Having been begun in the year 1876, it is known as the “Centennial Church.”
—Official statistics lately published show that, for the past forty years, the military operations against the Indians by the United States have cost $12,000,000, on an average, each year. The wild Apaches, 10,000 in number, cost the government nearly $2,000,000 annually for the pay of the army that takes care of them; while the 60,000 Cherokees, who are civilized and quiet, cost us almost nothing.
—The governor and delegates of the Chickasaw nation, and the delegates of the Choctaw nation, have united in a memorial to the Senate, remonstrating against the passage of the bill to enable Indians to become citizens. They say:
We have no objection to the measure in so far as it permits citizens of our nations to become citizens of the United States, if upon such change of citizenship they leave our jurisdiction, and surrender all rights growing out of and depending upon the tribal relation, retaining, however, all their separate property. But this bill expressly provides that, after one of our citizens becomes a citizen of the United States, he shall retain all his rights and interests in the lands, claims, annuities, funds, and other property of our nations or tribes. The result of these provisions is that after he ceases to be a citizen of the Choctaw or Chickasaw nation, he retains every right which he had while a citizen. The proposed statute will violate the treaty, and confer on citizens of the United States, who are not citizens of the Chickasaw nation, a part of a large fund which the United States have covenanted shall be the property of the Chickasaw nation. Certainly we could not be expected to consent that a treaty stipulation of such great importance to us should be annulled by an act of Congress.
—A bill to allow the civilized tribes of the Indian Territory to elect a delegate to Congress has been introduced in the House, and referred to the Committee on Indian Affairs. A sub-committee has been appointed to consider and report upon the bill. Their report is favorable, and will be made to the committee on the re-assembling of Congress. It will no doubt be adopted. It provides that a delegate, who shall be a member of some one of the Cherokee, Creek, Seminole, Choctaw, or Chickasaw tribes, shall be chosen at a general election, to be held under the supervision and direction of the Secretary of the Interior, and shall have all the rights, privileges and emoluments of a delegate from any of the regularly organized Territories. The report shows that it costs the natives upward of $60,000 yearly to send delegates here. Under the present system each tribe now sends from two to five or six delegates, at an expense of about six dollars a day each. One delegate for all, who shall have the privilege of the floor of Congress, would give the tribes much more influence with the government.
—The new Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Mr. Hayt, took the oath of office Dec. 18th, and received his commission.